Patching up

Pads has been getting neck pain over other few days and asks for 'breakthrough' pain relief, which amounts to two paracetamol and that generally works. Although this is making us all slightly jittery, we were operating with less fentanyl since half term. I say 'were' because we discussed the situation with our nurse last week and it was agreed to go back up to the 36 micrograms/hour (from 25). Yesterday he slept out the morning but then was pretty lively for the rest of the day. I made the mistake of tickling his knee while we were on the sofa in the afternoon - he always insists on 'having the last laugh', jab, or poke in these situations, in spite of spending several minutes in an arm lock. In the end I usually give up and let him win.
There are 'early bird' tickets available for RIAT next summer and this allowed me to ask Pads if he wanted to go again. 'So long as it doesnt rain!', he replied, recalling this year's downpours... He has happy memories of using the scooter, even though initially he was pretty upset at the prospect of riding a 'granny-mobile'.
In other news, Bo's been finding it really tough since attending the orthoptic clinic last week. Something had 'happened' to the referral from the optician and the hospital, but Ally chased it up and we got a cancellation. He now has to spend ideally four hours or more a day wearing a patch on his good eye, which renders his vision severely impaired. We can break this up into two 2 hour sessions but finding those slots in a day can be difficult. The idea is to tell his brain and the related nerves that he still needs his 'lazy' eye. There is a small chance that this will work and they're giving it until the end of January to find out for sure. If things improve by then they may suggest extending the period of patching. If not then he'll have to cope, as he has done thus far, with one good eye. To give you an idea of how limited his vision in that eye is, the orthoptist was walking towards him with a four inch high letter 'O', asking him to say when he could tell what letter it was. Bo stopped her at about 2 yards distant. So, although his other eye is perfect, the idea is to get the lazy eye working as well as possible in case something happens and he needs a 'good spare'. He was really quite low about this on Friday, given that he cant see to even eat or walk around when patched.
On Saturday I was trying to convey how important these next weeks and months are by using a chat session between two computers in the house. I was being 'Boaz at 12 years old':

BOAZ! It's yourself talking to you from the future! I've just opened a wormhole in the space-time continuum to bring you a really important message.
You see, something bad happened the other day I need to tell you about.
I was playing with Jack and he shook the stick in his mouth and it hit my eye full on.
Now I have to wear a plaster on my good eye until it heals up.
I know I/you really did not like wearing the patch for those few days you tried it and gave up.
But I really wish I'd tried harder to make my 'bad' eye get better.
If only I could have stuck at it...
The doctor says there's nothing they can do now to make my sight better in my bad eye.
I am worried I'm going to be almost blind now for the rest of my days...

I do not think this helped as much as the prayer of his 3yo cousin, which went something like this: 'Lord God, thank you for Jesus, thank you for Boaz, thank you for Boaz's eyes, thank you for Boaz's plaster for his eyes, please make Boaz's eye better. Amen'

60 years of devastating firepower

Here's a picture of the badges and commemorative coin that Pads was given at the Royal International Air Tatoo eight days ago. The Air Force Reserve one is apparently quite rare, Keith, the crew chief, didn't think he'd be able to get another one for a few months.

RIAT 2012

We had a tiring but excellent trip to the Royal International Air Tatoo.
What made it was the TSGT Keith Bishop who'd flown his B-52 all the way from Louisiana and kindly invited Pads in for a private minitour and gave him a commemorative coin and two patches, one ripped from his shoulder!

RIAT 2009

We're back from RIAT 2009. We had a great day although it was tiring. We'd had the plan to do this last year for Asher's birthday 'party' with his school chums but the event was rained off. Quite what a major 'todo' that was became apparent today - what a massive event it is: spread over at least a mile of runway!
Pads was up for it, at 7:40 - which was really impressive, although he did wane towards the end of our time there and we responded accordingly. Just in case, we'd bought him entry to one of the enclosures and he was there the whole time with Rhys with an excellent view of the runway. Meanwhile, I and the boys toured the show. Top tips learned include getting there earlier (but that was out of the question today), taking a lot of cash, and using the free bus service more to get around. Oh yes, and, be prepared for 8-9 year olds to find each other more fun than the show :-) unless they spot some storm-troopers, that is! Even the Red Arrows were no match for these guys...!
After that, we visited a Farm near Wotton-under-edge. The boys wanted to play cricket and we had to 'do' the cake. Pads revived and enjoyed the animals too.

Finally, I must add that Pads was brilliant for his needle yesterday and we are very grateful to God for what we have seen and done over the last 7 days.