Random musings from the sick bed

What an odd 11 weeks it's been. Time seems to have flown as quickly as ever, despite the fact that I've spent most of it in bed or on the couch. Free of corporate politics, deadline pressures and a packed social diary, you'd think time would crawl. No. Life continues upon its rapid pace, but with a different focus. A more esoteric focus, perhaps, as my waking hours have mostly drawn in to books, TV and the internet, as anything more active than a short walk is just too much effort.

Here are some random observations from my sedentary life.

I shall be slower to bash the long-term unemployed.

Though few people will be so vocal in front of strangers, get any group of middle class professionals going on the long-term unemployed, or, indeed, on most people on benefits, and the attitude is pretty harsh. Why don't they just get a job? Easier said than done for many reasons, but after 10 weeks off sick I realise it may not be because they're lazy bastards, or because there are no jobs out there. It may be that their minds have atrophied beyond the ability to embrace a work ethic. Work is no different than a tough gym workout. Do it every day, you get used to it. The longer you lay off it, the more alien it seems. I'm back to work this week ... part time, as I have the energy, and on background projects ... and it is HARD.

Concentrating on a tightly-packed, activity-mandated eight hour stretch after weeks of complete freedom is a challenge. The bad bits of the job look worse, and the challenges steeper, after time away. How much more difficult if approached after a long break, when real fear would have built up about whether you could handle such things. The brain is like a muscle, responding best when trained to handle certain tasks. If you've allowed it to go stale for a long time, the re-entry would be difficult, if not impossible. Of course, my brain's far from dead. It just hasn't been thinking about anything modern or corporate. Instead...

Tolkien deserves his reputation, many of his imitators do not.

The first thing on my reading list, with weeks of time stretching before me, was The Lord of the Rings. These are perhaps the most critical books of my husband's formative years, and he still finds joy in re-reading them, and in a role-play version of the world on line. I've always been more of a Chronicles of Narnia girl, never making it past the mid-way point of The Two Towers back in high school. But I've enjoyed Peter Jackson's films and read plenty of fantasy indebted to Middle Earth, most notably George R.R. Martin's Song of Ice and Fire, of which I am an avid fan. So, in order to fill in a shocking gap in my core reading, and to bond better with my husband, it was time to knock off the whole trilogy.

It deserves its magnificent reputation. I don't think I was old enough on my first attempt, thus got bogged down in the gloom of the second book. But it really is a delight, and so obviously the mother of a genre. The complexity, the depth, the rich characterisation are all so much better than much of what's being written now. I emerged with not only an increased respect for Tolkien, but for Peter Jackson, whose accomplishment of putting together the films is even more obvious after reading the source material. Ditto my admiration for Martin who, on close examination, does indeed deserve all those comparisons to Tolkien. Sadly, modern writer Christopher Paolini doesn't fare so well.

My next book after LOTR was Inheritance, the fourth and concluding book in the series he started with Eragon. Having read the first three, I was compelled to wrap it up, but it was a trial. Maybe I wouldn't have been so hard on it had I not just emerged from Middle Earth. But it was badly in need of editing, far too derivative of Tolkien's original and just plain boring. Why his publishers didn't force him to combine books three and four and wrap things in a traditional trilogy, I'll never know. (Well, yes I do. Profit.) The fantasy genre in the hands of masters like Tolkien and Martin is worthy literature; Inheritance was just painful.

I finally understand Thomas More

I've been balancing my reading with a steady diet of BBC documentaries, fed up on demand on my iPad via iPlayer. One quirky little show was on the education of his daughter, Margaret More, using her as a focal point for looking at the details of a humanist education of the 16th century. (Arguably, one of the best ages for a liberal arts education ever.) The presenter emphasised that Cicero was an almost sacred text. Everyone would be familiar with him, and every lawyer would know him intimately as one of the founding fathers of the profession. Which triggered a revelation for me. I've never been able to fully understand More stubbornly sticking to his principles, leaving his family behind and going to the scaffold in opposition to Henry VIII's marital and church manipulations. But if you're a Cicero worshipper, it all falls into place. Just like the great Roman, you're taking a stand against tyranny. And like him, your stand will take you to a noble death. More was following a historical precedent established and well known by all those who shared his education.

Maybe I do want to visit Jerusalem

The Holy Land has never even approached my top 20 travel destinations. To say I had no desire to go there is an understatement; I'd probably actively avoid it, given how many other destinations in the

world I'd find more interesting. Why, in that area alone Petra, the crusader castles, the ruined city of Palmyra or the beach resorts of the Red Sea all seemed a far better use of time.

I can thank Simon Sebag-Montefiore for getting me to re-think my opinion. His three part history of Jerusalem on the BBC was absolutely fascinating, liberating the city from religious hyperbole and modern strife, instead putting it in a historical context as a city drenched in the culture, stories and architecture of many notable societies. I was so captivated I downloaded the accompanying book and tore through it at high speed. It is an epic story filled with scores of fascinating characters, the majority of whom you've probably never heard of. The Caliph Hakim (aka the Arab Caligula) and the crusader Queen Melisende could both carry their own feature films. Architecturally, Sebag-Montefiore goes beyond the look at the usual religious sites to introduce a layered city where most buildings combine notable architectural elements from a variety of great empires. Of course, it's a tragedy as well, the most illuminating thing in this history being the fact that over 3,000 years more bloodshed ... and far more lost opportunity ... has come from arguments within religious groups than between them.

So if someone wants to drag me to the Holy Land in the future, I won't be so reticent. As long as I have my copy of SS-B's book on my Kindle to lead the way.

Giorgio suggests Sicily has arrived

One of my best Christmas presents was Giorgio Locatelli's new cookbook, entirely devoted to Sicilian food. That a Northern Italian, Michelin-starred chef would write what's essentially a hefty love letter to Sicily is a surprise. One compounded by his new television show on the BBC, where he wanders the island with his mate Andrew Graham-Dixon, art historian and Caravaggio expert. (Two intelligent, sexy, middle aged men wandering around Italy indulging in art and food ... this is pornography for the cultured woman.)

On my first trip to Italy, I spent the summer with a wealthy family outside of Milan, who shared their class' horror of Sicilians. Lazy, useless, a drain on the national economy ... take every bad opinion of ghetto dwelling American blacks, transpose it to Italy and you have the opinion. I kept my mouth shut about my origin. If Europeans went to Sicily at all, it was to get cheap beach villas, ignoring the poor ... and perhaps even dangerous ... inhabitants. The new cookbook and the TV show indicate a sea change. Europeans are looking at Sicily seriously as a cultural destination. The mafia is a spent force and culinary exports are highly prized. Looks like it might be time to be proud to be Sicilian.

PD James brings Austen back to life

Another favourite book of my sick leave was Death Comes to Pemberly, crime writer PD James' homage to Jane Austen. James takes Pride and Prejudice and extends it, with such literary dexterity in the early chapters you'd swear you were reading an actual Austen manuscript someone had just unearthed from her Hampshire attic. Many people have attempted Austen sequels, and I've read a fair number, but I've never read one that captures both the tone and mood of the original so well. Of course, James being James, our plot soon becomes a murder mystery. It's not the trickiest of plots; I'm not sure a fan of the crime genre would be that gripped. But it's enough for any Austen fan to delight. Particularly as James doesn't just bring the former Misses Bennett into the action. References to characters from other Austen classics waft through the plot, giving you a delightful sense that this is a real world, where all of those classic characters co-exist and might, on one eventful night in Bath or London, actually bump into each other at the Assembly Rooms. As with the TV show described above, this was so good, it too can be described as pornography for the cultured woman. Or just the literary equivalent of a very large box of Godiva chocolates. Pure bliss.

The Frette sheets are worth every penny

And finally ... I've always considered bedding to be an important investment. After all, even when you're healthy, you're spending at least a third of your life there. So I've never had an issue investing in the Hungarian goose down pillows and duvets, the high thread count sheets and the best blankets. But, admittedly, over the years I have wondered if the £300 I laid out on my various Frette sheet sets were worth it. I mean ... it seemed reasonable to me at the time, I got all three sets for at least 50% off ... but more than a few people's jaws have dropped at the price tag for sheets. (Not my mother, bless her. Joanlee knew a bargain when she saw it.) The oldest of those sheets is now a decade old, and still like new. And you know what? Given the amount of time I've spent in bed the past three months, that cotton is more than just a sheet. I sink into the crisp, heavy, cool luxury, settle my now chemo-balded head into that hungarian down, and feel like I'm in a 5-star hotel somewhere very far away. Not in suburban Basingstoke, fighting chemo side effects and a chest cold and watching time go by until I finally feel human again. Yup. That's worth the money.