It's been the 'Year of the Virus' for me ... if I've not been afflicted, my PC has. It was more or less terminal for my computer - a new hard drive was needed after weeks of fighting off viruses.

In the Spring, whilst on a short break I became ill with what [I thought] was a nasty dose of 'flu. I seemed to recover and even wrote a poem [Delirium] [link] about it. However it wasn't 'flu and within a couple of weeks I became very ill - pneumonia.

I lost nearly two stone in weight and cannot remember much about the six weeks I was ill. Luckily I could be treated at home so that it was much easier when I did begin to recover.

About a month into my convalescence I felt some vaguely familiar twitches around the left side of my mouth and left eye. I woke up in the morning to find the left side of my face 'dead' half my tongue numb and no movement in my left eyelid ... all classic signs of a stroke especially in a man of my age.

Luckily I knew what it was - I'd had it twice before: Bell's Palsy. It's a viral infection of the facial nerve and [thankfully] not permanent or particularly painful - even if I did look like Quasimodo's love-child, but it is a bloody nuisance - eating, drinking and speech are all badly affected [compare it to a visit to the dentist when your jaw has been 'frozen'].

This particular attack lasted for over three months - compared to about six weeks with earlier attacks. There's a cover picture with the poem HELL'S BELLS which gives you some idea! [link] My ID picture was taken shortly after my face had begun to go back to normal - though I still had difficulty with my mouth [thus the straw in my glass].

Since then I had one pneumonia relapse - a shorter, less serious one and I'm gradually getting back to full fitness. I'll need to be ... I've just become a Great Granddad.