i’ve started this entry so many times. i don’t even know where to begin. my life’s been a whirlwind since i last wrote. i guess i’ll just write down the facts and skip over the emotions for now, if not forever.

end of september/beginning of october my granddad went into the hospital because he was really sick and we thought it was food poisoning because it had lasted about four days. before i continue, i should point out that he was healthy and only fifty-eight years old. not my biological granddad, but no one knows where that bastard is, so he’s the only granddad i’ve known my whole life. anyway, he had to have surgery to remove a blockage in his intestine. turns out it was cancer. not just regular cancer, but stage four terminal cancer. the surgeon said he thought my granddad had until the end of the year, if that. he lasted another three weeks and (it was somehow) surprisingly died on october seventeenth.

it was/is a really difficult time for my family, my nana especially. there’s also a whole bunch of other family stuff that doesn’t make it any better, but it’s not my place to spill our family problems.

i suppose i go on to now: i’m in rome. i’ve been here since november tenth. it’s pretty great. i’m in a great place with amazing people and i’m so very lucky and happy. i guess if i’m really honest, i’ll admit that i’ve had quite a few dreams involving my granddad and his death. i’ve been lucky to have good people supporting me through that too. i’m still just slightly numb on the whole subject.

i’m in europe until december twenty-ninth. quite a bit of time left. i’m glad. i need the break. from everything. sorry, i guess i just haven’t really been thinking about it and writing about it now is opening it all up again.

in any case, i have to go prepare some dinner and then make apple crumble.

steve irwin, the crocodile hunter, has died from a freak accident while doing what we all love to watch him do. the inevitable finally happened.