Update...

I haven't blogged in a long-time, sorry. I haven't really had the time, or felt like writing recently. Busy, busy, busy. So I'll try and do a catch-up blog now while I fight the temptation to sleep on the train to work.

Lump: A couple of months ago I got really ill. I'd noticed a small lump in my neck for a while, but being a man I hadn't done anything about it. Then it got huge over the space of a weekend AND REALLY PAINFUL!

I went to the doctor who thought it might be an infected gland and put me on anti-biotics for a week. They didn't do anything and I spent a week unable to move my neck or sleep well.

Went back to see the doctor and he decided to send me to a specialist at the local hospital.

In the UK we have free health care, but it's not fast health care, so a couple weeks later I got to see the specialist. He examined me by placing giving me a disgusting tasting anesthetic ad placing his hand down my throat. Was horrible but not the end of it. He then stuck a tiny microscope up my nose and fed it down my throat. This was also deeply unpleasant. Feeling the resistance in your nose to something being shoved up there and then 'pop' it's through is really disgusting.

Anyway, this doctor sent me to see another doctor to do a biopsy (yes - haven't mentioned the C word yet, but it's was definitely floating around my, and families head).

Had to wait about another 3 weeks to see the biopsy guy. He was great. Was simple and painless. A very fine needle injected into the lump and a sample drawn.

The biopsy doctor simple said, "It's a cyst" and drained a lot of the yucky white fluid out. Was great news - and went so way towards calming the whole Cancer threat.

A few weeks later I went for an MRI scan. Don't know if you have ever had one, but I found it deeply unpleasant. I'm not afraid of small places, but I was trying to stop myself from freaking out in that thing. I had to enter an almost mediatory state and try and syncopate rhythms in my head from the deafening sound of the magnets or the MRI. Was a long 20 minutes.

Anyway - the good news is that the scans and biopsy confirmed it's a benign (non-cancerous) cyst. I'm back to see the specialist on Monday when I guess they'll take about 9 months to find an operation slot to have it taken out.

Free healthcare is a wonderful thing, but when you find a lump it almost makes you more ill with worry because you have so long to think about it. Definitely time to consider some private health insurance.

What else?

Life: Well - life is great. Still the happiest man in the world, being married to Yanti. The two terrible kittens (Tifa and Yuffie) have pretty much destroyed the house to the point where we have given up caring about the mess :) Tooooo cute.

Fat: I'm getting fat again. Yanti is an amazing cook and never puts on any weight. I on the other hand just have to look at her food and I gain 2 kilos. I have to formulate a plan to drop 10 kilos. I'm not doing my crazy diet again. Want to learn to balance my input. I'm thinking about restricting what I intake during the day so I can eat the wonderful food Yanti makes!

Celebrations: It was Yanti's birthday on the 24th so I booked her a Spa day and we had a nice meal at a very authentic Thai restaurant we found.

It was also Eid. The first time Yanti has been away from her family for Eid and she got incredibly home sick. Bless her, shes strong but it's sometimes very hard for her in he UK. So different to Jakarta. Worse in many ways. But she's happy - and studying for a degree in computer science while looking for permanent work in the UK. Hard to translate your skills when people in the UK don't have a clue where Indonesia even is on a map.

Its my sisters wedding this weekend so we're heading up to York on Friday. Been a crazy year when I look back. So much has happened I'm amazed I found time to breath.

Work: Oh - and finally, Dirge of Cerberus - Lost Episode, the Game I've been working on for Square Enix is out in the USA. It's on 'Amped' only at the moment, but next moth I think it moves on to all networks. It's also coming out in Japan real soon for the new batch of DoCoMo handsets. The game was a real hit at the Tokyo Game Show this year. I'm very proud of our work. I hope the projects we do in the next year are even better!

Well - the train is pulling into London now so I'm going to end. I'll post some pictures of the Tifa model I made using 'Hexagon' (3D modeling package) and Daz Studio (posing software) after this post.

Really getting into doing 3D pre-vising of concepts. Finally found a workflow that lets me get good results in a more realistic time scale. As I get better with building assets for Daz Studio I'm thinking about creating content to sell. We'll see...

Nic

posted by Nic @ 10:45 AM 1 comments