Reasons to be cheerful, part one.

I've got to tell you, yesterday was a good day. Even by Ice Cube's standards. (I didn't even have to use my AK!)

Thanks to yesterday, I've been finding silver linings in the strangest things. (That said, I did just use the term 'silver linings' so it can't all be good. Apologies – at the end of the day, the bottom line is that it's difficult to write about cancer and not jump feet-first into cliché. Or brackets. You'll get used to 'em.) But back to my point. I'm under no illusions here – I'm well aware that cancer isn't always going to be this good, ta very much – but while everyone I love is doing their darndest to make the next few pre-op days amazing for me, I'm bloody well going to be chirpy about whatever I can. Besides, this'll soon be all doom and gloom (jeez, there I go again), plus I do like to take every possible opportunity to write a list. So then – reasons to be cheerful, part one...

1. A year ago this week, I had the first of two miscarriages. (Are you still there? Hang on, it gets better.) And thank Crunchie I did – if I hadn't, I certainly wouldn't be looking at the comparative bed of roses that is stage two. Instead, my cancer would have progressed in super-quick style thanks to the sudden surge of hormones. It's a good job P & I kept on trying, too ('trying'... I do love that term; basically a polite way of saying 'we're having sex all the time') because, in a roundabout way, that's how we came across old lumpy left tit here.

1a. Now that baby-making is off the agenda, P can have a bit of a rest.

2. Last Saturday (AKA The Most Miserable Day Ever), my folks delighted in telling my future sister-in-law about the time I sampled the contents of my potty as a toddler. (Oh get over it, it's not like I still do it. Well...) Ordinarily I'd be in bits about such an admission, but on that day they got away with it, the cheeky shysters. Believe me, in my mind's current embarrassment stakes, shit-eating is far preferable to total hair-loss. This revelation, however, is as good an example as I can give you of my parents' ability to crack a joke in any situation – and, by 'eck, am I grateful.

3. Thanks to my left'un (perhaps it'll get a more glamorous pet name, post-reconstruction?), it was looking like I'd miss out on Wimbledon. I had tickets for two days of the tennis, but I'll now be wired up to morphine (see, it's not all bad) during both of those, plus I'm not sure whether pyjamas are suitable AELTC attire. Anyway, in their infinite brilliance, my amazing company have managed to get tickets for P & I to go this Thursday, in order to take my mind off the following day's boob-removal (sorry to be blunt, but 'mastectomy' has fast become another word on my Most Hated list). And to keep me occupied tomorrow, P's organised a Secret Day Of Fun for just us two. If he's lucky, I might even let him have one last go on the left'un.

There. Three-and-a-bit reasons. It's not my style to bombard you with happiness, so I'll leave it there for now. And anyway, it's far easier to write cynically than chirpily, as I once discovered while doing a music review for my student mag. It was late, and my mates were waiting in the union with pints of something toxic and purple-coloured, so I chose the fast route and slagged off an actually-pretty-decent single. Forgive me, Dandy Warhols, for I have sinned.