Thought for the Day 10 July 2017

I went for my annual medical this morning. My doctor advised me to start the yearly routine from age forty and I’ve been going pretty much since then. That was in 1988 so it’s a while now. But it paid off big time, when I was diagnosed with oesophageal cancer in 2008. Because of my regular checks the cancer was caught and removed before it had spread through my body and I lived to tell the tale. Others with the same precondition as me weren’t so lucky. So the annual medicals have turned out to be well worth while and I would recommend that everyone should take my doctor’s advice. However, I do not look forward to this yearly ritual, mostly because the doc uses a spinning bike to get my heart rate up while he’s doing the ECG. I hate bikes. They abuse the most tender part of my anatomy and my knees don’t have fun either. So I whine and complain all through and the long-suffering doctor takes a deep breath and thanks whoever he thanks, that I’m only there once a year. Anyway, this year he said I was fighting fit – fighting for breath and fit for nothing!!!

No, seriously, he said everything was fine and my overall fitness had improved since last year. So, out of all this I have two thoughts for today:

“All cyclists must be masochists!”

Obviously that comes after the torture on the spinning bike. AND

 “It pays to have regular medical check-ups after a certain age!”

It’s best to start at forty but certainly not later than fifty. After all there are quite a few people who die between fifty and sixty and plenty who go before fifty.

It’s worth thinking about.

Cheers, Dave