About Me

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This blog is about coping with the strains of chronic illness whilst bringing up two beautiful children; it's also about the stresses of bringing up two children on your own while suffering with a chronic ongoing health problem which is at times very severe.... you can look at it either way. It's about being a single mum; it's about raising awareness of Interstitial Cystitis; it's about helping me cope. Writing this blog is beginning to bring me back to who I really am, who I really always was, before the single motherhood took over full time, before the illness set in.... a writer. I've always written, from essays to stories to journalism. This is the first thing I've written in years. It's helping me regain my confidence. PLEASE DO LEAVE ME COMMENTS AFTER MY POSTS! I'd genuinely love to hear your views on my (sometimes controversial) opinions. Thank you for taking the time to read. It would be great if you could comment so I know that you've been here and what you think.

Friday 31 January 2014

england is sinking

... so I woke up this morning to hear Michael Eavis talking on the radio about how perhaps the west country farmland should just be abandoned to become swampland and left to the birds and the clouds and the crocodiles.. or maybe not crocodiles... though they have been around since dinosaurs, haven't they? I'm sure they'll outlive us this time, too...

At first I thought it was some kind of joke. And then I heard the weather forecast. There are areas of the s/w of England that have been underwater for over a month. Several villages which have become islands. One village which is totally cut off, accessible only by a makeshift boat crewed by some very hardy but increasingly pissed-off residents.

The government were going to declare it a state of emergency, then decided they wouldn't, because it's only Somerset... then decided something had better be done, so are sending some army troops down there. What precisely the army is going to do remains to be seen. More heavy rain forecast for the weekend... I'm glad I live on a (very steep and rather high) hill.

Wednesday 29 January 2014

on a slightly brighter note...

My darling Pre-Pubescent beauty of a daughter, who continues to amaze and confuse me in equal measure, who lights up my life every time the darkness really descends, has got into her first choice school for next year. I am so happy about this; we all are.

Whatever happens to me, I know now that she will be ok. Or at least, that it is much less likely that she will join a gang and be pregnant at 15. No, she is going to have a brilliant start in life; an environment that is stimulating and safe at the same time; so many advantages. She will not be like me aged 13. She will not fuck up the way I did. And even if she does, there will be an army of people to pick her up. I'm not on my own anymore, even though her father is off on a beach in Thailand with his latest 'broody' girlfriend, even if something happened to my parents. PPB now has a huge, soft trampoline on which to bounce off from; not only bounce ... she can fly.

Our option two and three for schools were frankly not wonderful, so this result is just such a relief.

It is the first good thing that has happened to us since my little nephew was born.

It is a wonderful school - the right balance of academic and pastoral - they want you to do well, but also, more importantly, they want you to be happy and fulfilled - and I am so proud of her for all the hard work she put in to get there. She's even been awarded a scholarship for particular talent in an artistic subject area; that part doesn't surprise me one bit considering how talented she is and how hard she works. I'm glad she doesn't know I'm writing all this, or she'd be blushing; but she is, she's amazing.

And my Blue Eyed Boy, who holds my hand through these winter days, is loving piano and cricket in equal measure, and has just been moved into the top groups for Maths and Literacy at school, which is fab too. He has also just learnt to play monopoly, which he is delighted with and wants to do all the time. He reminds me so much of both my little brothers; particularly the one who has ended up really rich, which bodes well for my latter years (bladder bag or no bladder bag, BEB will look after me I'm sure).

I am constantly flabbergasted, proud and consoled by the pure survival instinct of my children. They are both little toughies; hardcore survivors. I suppose they have had to be. And that thought makes me a bit sad. But it shouldn't. Illness doesn't equate with blame. And considering all that is going on, they are doing just fine.

Some people say it's not healthy to live for your children; I would dispute that. Without them it is quite evident to me that I would not be here by now; they are my reason for carrying on. I think living through your children, expecting them to make up for your inadequacies, do the things you didn't do, travel down the paths you didn't take, or perhaps exactly the paths you did take and are prescriptive about... all of that is deeply unhealthy.

But for my children ? Right now, that's all it's for.

fair weather friends are no friends at all

oh and to those of you who have abandoned me, either suddenly or gradually, and decided I am 'too much hassle' because I am too depressing/melodramatic/boring/pathetic... but still sneakily read my blog... the ones who were there when I smiled, and partied, and went over the top, and made life exciting... the ones I needed when my health vanished but somehow you vanished too... you know who you are and how sad you are.

I would just like to say thank you, sincerely, because I do not want shits like you in my life now or ever, and neither do my children.

I wouldn't speak to you again if hell froze over.

So if /when I ever recover, don't ever bother darkening my door. I won't be opening it. I have learnt to survive without hypocrites in my life.

It is the middle of the night.

I cannot sleep.

In six hours I get up with the children.

This is becoming a pattern.

I sit, watch TV, try to eat; come to bed; wash; try to read; end up on computer reading about more and more theories surrounding IC.

Lately I think there must, must, must be some occult/lurking/hiding bacteria in my bladder causing these terrible symptoms, particularly due to the way the whole thing started, with cryptosporidium and with ecoli found initially.

I talk to people on forums; I research doctors and ways of culturing bacteria; I know far more than my own GP now, and perhaps more than my own consultant urologist.

This probably is dangerous.

It seems to me tonight that I shall need to travel to Staffordshire, to visit a Dr there who does something called 'Broth culture', searching for fastidious organisms. It is quite possible that the good old NHS have simply failed to culture what is there; that the bugs have hidden themselves in the lining and muscle of my bladder; and it will take a fine tooth comb to find them , metaphorically speaking that is...

Meanwhile I continue the Elmiron poison. Day whatever. Week 3. I feel like a ghost of myself. But I make myself get through the days, go through the motions, eat, be with the children, give out what I can to my few friends who do seem to be needing me still.... I miss those people whom this illness has removed from my life by whatever means. I miss them so much. But most of all, I miss my health. I am too young for this. I am not ready to be told that my bladder may eventually have to be removed as it will shrink and be covered with scar tissue. I am not ready to consider a 'bladder pacemaker'. These things were raised last week at the hospital. I have to believe there is an answer; we just haven't found it yet.

However much I might wish that I didn't have to fight this fight anymore, I'm not ready to give in.

Wednesday 22 January 2014

elmiron nightmare

so I'm trying emptying the capsule into water and it is making me feel less sick, even though I feel like I am taking a kind of poison. but when you are in such constant pain as I am in my bladder/urethral system, you will try anything, and I fought so hard to get the medicine I am hesitant to give it up after not even two weeks. but it seems to be poisoning me from the inside.

mission for tomorrow is to get to the hospital to see the consultant - my father is coming with me - which is good, as he can speak for me when I cry, but bad, if he makes out that all this is somehow in my head (it isn't, it's in my bladder).

am only just hanging in there, for the sake of my children, who are being beautiful, brave and amazing. am doing my very best, but my best doesn't feel very good right now.

more later

Monday 20 January 2014

poison me, cure me, elmiron day ten

The past three days have been total hell

I have found it hard to drag myself around the house, to do basic things for myself and for the children, to dress or leave the house impossible. just so exhausted. and of course depressed as well, but this is not depression doing this. this is the medication; though which medication I'm not not sure.

I have had to turn to one of my best mates who is totally wonderful and has been a huge help and also to my long-suffering (and don't they let me know it) parents.... in the end the GP came out to me this afternoon.... and her answer? side effects from 'one or other' medication - either the pain medication or the Elmiron - and 'worry and tears'. She was totally unhelpful and I felt worse after seeing her.

Family support good practically, Mum's been helping with school runs thank god, but emotionally they make me feel weak, useless and guilty.

I feel scared.

I don't know where this illness is going to lead me. I don't know if I am poisoning my body or starting to cure it. I don't know what the hell to do and there seems nowhere to turn. Am in the eighth circle of  hell, with my poor sweet beautiful children standing on the outside, watching.

Tuesday 14 January 2014

Elmiron: day four. Panic. Don't Panic. Panic.

On Sunday we had one of those days today where we didn't leave the house. And actually we got a lot done: thank you cards; party invitations for PPB who is turning 11 (how did that happen?) on Wednesday and is happy with going to the little local theatre with a few friends on Friday night and then her best friend sleeping over; music practice; a lovely film that we'd been saving to watch all together. The kids even played playmobil together for more than an hour letting me lie down and read the paper.

A couple of years back, it would have been a happy day.

Well, actually, it wouldn't, because my head would no doubt have been in a mess over some stupid man or other whom I was desperately in love with but who didn't love me enough/the right way/ was using me/planning to leave me/fuck me over/delete as appropriate... at the time, two years ago, it would have been Mr Sleezeball, the ageing writer who thought he was God's gift to womankind but was in fact just a superficial, self-important, arrogant loser, not worth my time and attention, not even that good in bed... who started me off on this rollercoaster of illness in the first place, and I would not have appreciated what I had.

If I ever, EVER, get better, I will remember these thoughts... Because now, if I didn't have IC, a day like Sunday would be lovely. Had I not been feeling so ill, just hanging out with the kids at home sounds great. Instead it was bearable; with toilet trips twice an hour, and taking it really easy lying down as often as possible with a hot water bottle whilst trying to disguise it as part of a 'game' or having a rest watching the movie.

Being the only adult might seem a bit strange anyway, if you are used to being part of a couple; but I am SO used to it that actually it sometimes seems strange at the moment hanging out with other adults. Often it is just me and the children; or me, my children and my parents. The rats have left the sinking ship and only a few loyal supporters locally remain. My old, dear friends and relatives are of course still 'there', but 'there' is, increasingly, across the Atlantic Ocean, or in Australia, or some other faraway country, or city (even London feels like the Moon in my mind when I consider the journey there and back).

All in all Sunday was more bearable than Saturday, when PPB flew into a rage after a school entrance exam and swore at me and threw a glass (she later claimed to think it was plastic) down the stairs, then locking herself in the bathroom until I was in tears in pain outside ('wee in the garden if you have to; why not?'). Why am I giving this child any birthday presents? Why am I not sending her off to Boot Camp in the USA - or is that forbidden until they actually reach 13?! Joking aside, I love her dearly and would lay down my life for her, but my god she pushes my buttons. It turned out she was really upset because the Maths paper was hard, and this is the school she really wants to go to, assuming we get the necessary funding / scholarships as well. I can relate to that, but the behaviour was just so out there, like she used to act. Just like I used to act, come to think of it, though not til I was a teenager. They grow up faster these days.

So I started the Elmiron Saturday first thing. And now it is Tuesday evening. As yet, nothing much has happened. Slightly more pain yesterday; slightly less today. Very late period, perhaps connected to the illness in some way although we explored the hormonal angle and the doctors decided I was 'fine' on that level; perhaps it is all the stress. Watch this space. My body will just be processing this new toxin and starting to ask: 'what is this??' and deciding how to react. I am going to keep doing the acupuncture weekly, and keep on with the vitamins and supplements I've been taking, plus some extra iron as the doctor discovered in the pre-treatment blood tests that I'm anaemic.

I'm just going to try to keep calm and not panic ( or should that be 'keep calm and keep taking the tablets'). As Tracey Emin says: Panic. Don't Panic. Panic. Don't Panic. Panic .......

Adopting this stoic attitude might be difficult if the hair loss comes, or I start bleeding rectally, or my liver enzymes shoot up, but I will cross that bridge if and when it decides to appear. In the meantime, one foot in front of the next. Dealing with intense pain, intense tiredness and increasing depression from the chronic-ness of the chronic nature of this illness, one hour at a time. A dear old friend the other day reminded me of her close friend who died of cancer; she was our contemporary at university and such a cool person, and so inspiring quite apart from her illness; but her bravery towards the end was quite remarkable. She took every new blow as it came and meanwhile she continued to enjoy the sparkles in the rain. I hope I learn now to do this. And after all - I feel with guilt - why guilt? - this is not cancer; not now; probably not ever connected. It is the slow plodding onwards of life at a different, reduced, afflicted pace.

For today, it's time to do my children's homework with them and make their dinner and give them some Mummy time. For tonight, ice my daughter's birthday cake and finish wrapping her presents (the last year, I suspect, she will ever ask for Sylvanian families...still haven't given way on the mobile phone or I-things... proud of myself, but we can't hold out much longer can we Jamie Oliver??) and perhaps blow up some balloons and lay out a special birthday breakfast...

The only way to find the energy for this is not to think further than the next hour, or half hour ahead.

This is a trick I learnt at school, when hating it so much that my friend Em and I used to 'count the 5 minuteses' until the end of the lesson/ day.

Thank God I couldn't see forwards twenty years; that I couldn't see how all of that energy and work and enthusiasm and life in my teens and twenties would have simply been for this: mid-thirties, single mother, chronic pain. Never where I expected to be.

And yet I have two beautiful children out of this hell. I have two beautiful children to protect from my own personal hell, and I do it quite well, most of the time.

Who knows how the Elmiron will work? But this is not the end. It is somewhere in the middle. NOT the end, however dark my days become. If it is not over, it is not the end.

When you are going through hell, as some smug bastard or other once said, you just have to keep going.



Tuesday 7 January 2014

midnight terrors

I have got to start taking the Elmiron. Full name Pentosan Polysulphate.

Success rate: one in three. Risk of side effects: high. Risk of serious side effects, including liver damage, rectal bleeding and alopecia: considerable.

But did I mention that out of every ten women who have been brave enough to take this for their IC for six months, three or four have really improved and gone into remission. These are odds that I now have to take.

It's sitting there in my cupboard; eyeing me from its little white box, which cost BANES around £300 for a month's supply; looking so innocuous; daring me not to care that it could poison me rather than help me.

I fought so hard to get it, to get a chance at taking it; I made my doctor fight so hard... and now I have it, I am scared. No - not just scared. Absolutely terrified.

I am scared it will make me sick, nauseous, unable to eat, thus further reducing my immune system and causing rows with my family over my not eating and making me feel worse and worse... I am scared it will give me migraines, upset stomach, rash, insomnia (hey, that one I have now...) but these are not the main things.

I am scared it will slowly damage my liver, perhaps irreversibly; or cause rectal bleeding, how ironic that would be as it was rectal bleeding which started this whole cycle of illness 15 months ago.

But the terror, the real midnight terror, is I will lose my hair.

I've seen the pictures, photos of women whom Elmiron has helped and their IC is in remission or greatly improved, but they have ugly patches of alopecia around the hairline, or mixed in with normal hair, or their hair goes so thin it just all comes out one day. And I love my hair - I've always been terrified of losing either my hair or my breasts as they are so much my identity as a woman, but even knowing this I said fuck it, I don't mind, I would shave my head now if it would get rid of this thing which dominates and permeates every area of my life; the IC is so bad that I do not care. And now my aunt says fuck it, maybe it won't be so bad and you can get hair extensions or weaves; and the doctors say fuck it (well, they don't talk like that, but you know what I mean), deal with the hair loss when it happens, if it does... we have to try it, we've nothing much else left to try.

And yet I am paralysed with terror.

I put it off over the New Year because I had to take some antibiotics for a throat infection and I've been telling myself to wait til they are out of my system. But it has been a week now.

Tomorrow, I start the treatment.

Tonight, I can't sleep, I can't breathe properly, I can't stop crying. I am properly frightened. I have no hand to hold. I want the man I love; I want my brother; I want my cousin; I want my Granny; I want my real best friends.... none of these people are here. It's surprising how many people I long for are either abroad, or dead. Only my parents and my children are really with me through this (aside from a few loyal local friends) and I cannot let them see how terrified I am.

I can't let this beat me. So much in my life I thought was so much worse than this and yet when I look back it was nothing at all. It was always a man. A man not loving me. I thought that was the worst thing in the world. God how wrong I was! How stupid! Unrequited love/longing is a walk in the park compared with a chronic painful illness.

Realise this: you take your health for granted but it is the best thing you have. Better than your lovers or your children or your careers or your passions because without health, you cannot enjoy or live any of those things. They become burdens which root you to the world; albatrosses around your neck, because you no longer like your life. You can no longer run in the long grass (if you ever did run in the long grass, but you know what you mean; I think I used to, with my long hair blowing in the breeze... or perhaps I just wish that I did); you can no longer kick a football around with your little boy - that's the one I miss the most. The most pleasant thing you can do is lie on the sofa with a hot water bottle and try to give your children your attention, have a bath, or sleep. But sleep evades me, so scared am I.

So fuck it. Tomorrow I start the treatment. It's a giant canon; it's a nuclear bomb; it's my own personal Russian Roulette game, with a gun half empty, or half full, of bullets.

Cure me; destroy me. You decide, Pentosan Polysulphate. Because right now you're all I have left. And it's not just my life here; it's my children's lives too.

Saturday 4 January 2014

'the trouble is, your son thinks you're about to die'

... was pretty much the first thing that my son's paternal grandmother said to me at the handover today.

Wow. Wow. Did she just say that? Bitch. BITCH

And then, as the day went on, this led me to think of my 3 worst handovers (let me explain, for non separated or divorced or single parents, these are not some kind of dodgy drug runs but where you actually do hand the child over from one reality/home to another and expect them to adapt immediately, without tears or tantrums, and take it all as it comes. It pretty much never goes to plan, and there is always some problem, but some are definitely worse than others). These are, I think, my three worst EVER in ten years, though I could easily compile a top ten if anyone was interested:

At number 3 we have the one where I drove little Blue Eyed Boy to his Daddy's as a toddler, the first time I ever relented to let him stay with the total loser after our break up (second break up; first one happened when I was 9 weeks pregnant and he 'had' to leave 'for the sake of his mental health', then professed to be 'off travelling in Asia' when in fact was hiding in a dirty flat in a dirty town in the south of England for 7 months...). The overnight visit - 2 nights, as I recall - was to be at BEB's Nanny's house, which is, to be fair, very cosy; and I do (no, after today I don't; I did then) trust his Nanny to care for his every want, need and desire, being nearly as devoted to the little man as I am. His father is another story - he loves him, but he hasn't much of a clue about anything if his mother isn't around. She still does his laundry, cooks him dinner, makes excuses for him, wipes his arse for all I know, and he's 40 pretty soon. If I ever get like that with my son, please shoot me.

Anyway I think BEB was around 2. We got there ok; I took a friend, and we had tea, and it was all very 'nice', until it came time to leave. I just couldn't do it. I decided to turn around and take Blue Eyed Boy straight home on the 3 hour drive with me. My friend tried unsuccessfully to talk some sense into me: 'but we've just arrived!' 'but how will it look!'... None of this went down very well. I sat on the sofa, for hours, with my son on my lap, until it was very very dark outside, picking holes in how they were planning to spend the next few days and inventing problems once I could find none. Everyone tried to persuade me to leave. Eventually, the choice was a travellodge and return the next day to face their wrath, or just let them get on with it, as was the original plan. I did leave. But I hated every second of it and sobbed on the motorway. Perhaps because I know, underneath, that love doesn't always equal top class care.

Number 2 is the time when I drove a much younger Pre Pubescent Beauty to Reading Car Park (if you've never been there , just don't do it. I mean the big one under the Railway Station, with no discernible exits or entrances, no sign of light or life but plenty of two and four legged rats lurking about the dingy corners) and waited to meet her Daddy who was also coming by car (why, why, why did we meet there?) ..history does not relate... We were going through a particularly bad patch about money. I demanded petrol money for the trip; he threw it at me, saying 'okay then, I'll have to take the child out food hunting'. PPB, who was only about six or seven at the time, truly thought she was going hunting through the dangerous streets of south Essex, armed with spears and knives and no doubt her gung-ho father wearing his camping gear full head-torch, and got frightened, and ran off, into the car park. With cars driving around. Fast.

Suddenly, we stopped shouting at each other; we were briefly united in our terror for our girl; furious; trying to calm down so that she would have enough sense to come to one of us rather than get run over by an impatient housewife with Waitrose shopping to get on with. Eventually she emerged from her hiding place and ran up to me, jumping in my arms and saying she wasn't going to Daddy's if she had to stab living things.

I tore the £30 up. In his face. remember doing it. God, it was satisfying. 'Don't worry, darling' I said. 'He doesn't mean real hunting, he doesn't know how to do it. You'll be eating crisps and pizza and all those things you like but I don't let you have very much and I'll see you after the weekend'.

Don't think I sobbed my way home that time; it was more like screaming and punching the steering wheel repeatedly. We all laugh about it now, if the mood is right, but at the time we were pretty upset.

Number 1 was today. And it was the worst because my Blue Eyed Boy was so, so upset, and I couldn't protect him from it, and I didn't cause it.

Only by getting IC , and do you know what - I am sure fellow sufferers can relate - I am so so sick of feeling guilty about an illness which I didn't want, didn't deliberately catch, can't get rid of, suffer in daily pain, urgency and pressure with, and which I wish to God didn't affect other people otherwise OF COURSE I WOULD TAKE THAT PAIN AWAY, from them and from myself too funnily enough.

My son was due home today, and couldn't sleep last night, and this morning his Dad (who has now gone bankrupt and permanently moved in with his mother, Blue Eyed Boy's beloved Nanny, whom heretofore I've had a fair amount of respect for) asked him what was wrong. He said he was worrying about my being ill. Poor love, he was probably worrying about coming back to a house with only one toilet, where on a bad day he has to do 'sneaky wees' outside in the garden (in freezing temperatures!) as I'm in pain in the bathroom. I know at Nanny's there are 2 toilets and no people with IC. Anyway, this is where it gets bad. He just needed a hug, and some reassurance that Mummy would be fine and the day would be fine. But no. Firstly his Dad grabbed him, made him look in his eyes, and said really intensely 'Don't listen to your mother too much however she talks about her illness'. Then, when, freaked out a little, he wandered off to find some breakfast, his Nanny said 'what's the matter, you're not scared she's going to die, are you?'. Nobody has ever mentioned this possibility to him before. It's a bit like saying 'don't think of a pink elephant'.

Now if this was some comedy sketch on how NOT to talk to your six year old about chronic disabling illness, it would be funny. But it is my SON's LIFE. And then at the handover , his Nan takes me over to one side and gives me all this shit about how I am too public about my illness and need to keep it more secret from the children (how exactly, said PPB later, given that you spend most of your time trying not to talk about it and being falsely cheerful, but just sneaking off to the toilet and sitting down a lot???).
'Stop involving your kids,' hard-core Nanny said. 'Everyone gets ill. Deal with it. Leave them out of it. Stop moaning.'
And then the paternal party were off. A puff of pikey smoke and they were gone on their pikey broomsticks, leaving me with a mixed-up six year old grieving for a time when his Mummy was well, his Daddy used to pretend to be civil to his Mummy out of respect for him, or possibly even out of respect for the fact that I had his child and am raising him single handedly along with his big sister! (this time, he just shoved the suitcase in the boot and stromped off, like a 14 year old boy), and handovers were times when sure BEB felt sad but he knew everyone loved him. This time, the bottom had fallen out of his world. And I could not replace it.

The soft play centre did nothing to help.
He kept bursting into tears.
We came home, had cuddles, played some playmobil, he had a bath.
We have another pointless row with his father's family which descended into me yelling at them about what they said to my son, which I do regret - wish I'd saved it for cold lawyers' paper.
We all have dinner at the table. 'Mum', he says; 'I won't talk to them if they talk to you like that'.
I cry at the fragmentation of his world, which I disguise by needing the toilet.
We cuddle the cat.
We watch Happy Feet 2.
We eat chocolate.
My son keeps crying.
I tell him his Daddy is not perfect. I tell him his Daddy did, in fact, leave me when I was pregnant and that it is, in fact, not ok to miss 3 nativity plays in a row. Which are truths I have wanted to come out with for a long time, and there is never going to be a good time.
We have about five million stories and cuddles in my bed. I stroke his hair. I let him have his music on.
Bedtime: 'Why was this the worst day ever, Mummy?'

I used to think that unless your ex was a serial killer, a child pornographer or an evil rapist, it was probably best to have a fairly shite father than no father, and so consequently have assisted my children in seeing their poor excuses for 1. a half-Irish, charming but selfish and lazy, sweet but cruel, affable but cold as hell father...  and 2. a charming (oh I love the baloney) but common (sorry, I just can't find another word here), well-meaning but completely ineffectual, practical but a total bastard when it comes down to it (what kind of dad doesn't come to 3 years worth of nativity plays?) father.... These fathers do not bring much to the table.

When I add it up, right now, it's about £420 a month. Which split equally is £210 a month. Which is £50 a week, each. That's what they bring to the table. So the children can be fed, with a bit to spare for their mum. Or they can do their football, their swimming and half of their piano classes. Or they can have some new shoes. They can't live in a heated house, or travel around from place to place, or wear new school uniform. And that's if I split the money equally. I'm not meant to. It's meant to go mostly to one child, because that's the way the cookie crumbles.

I used to think that unless your ex was a serial killer, you're best off involving him, for the child's sake.

Right now, I am not so bloody sure. In fact I am less sure than EVER. In fact, I'm pretty sure I am WRONG. So stick that in your batman suit and climb the fucking houses of parliament, you wankers, if you can be bothered that is.