For all their tremendous hard work in organising our get together Friday evening .
When Annie should have been sitting down enjoying a most welcome glass of wine with the ladies she was at the reception desk sorting out the problems over the bookings of the rooms caused by the Ibis Hotel .
We were in for a very special treat in that we had our meal in a private room at the Montcalm Hotel which Just delightful .The tables had of course a 'Teal' theme and looked stunning and we had Teal ribbons on the backs of our chairs but some had Pink ones ...those that did were invited later in the evening to swop places with other Pink ribbon owners on the table opposite to meet others and continue the natter on the other table ..Wonderful idea !
We had goodie bags on our chairs ..not had the chocolates yet ...will share with hubby after our dinner tonight ..Thank you ..a lovely touch .....
Andy the meal was Just superb from start to finish !
Thanks to Annie the music played through out the evening was our own choice with some really lovely music and songs .
I will let our dear Gwyn tell you about her most amazing gift from Jackie ...........
This time last year as I was about to finish my chemo at the end of May little did I realize that fast forward a year ...... That I was to meet some of the most amazing ladies that I have ever met all with one thing in commen , Having Joined a group that in a quote from our dear Gwyn is a 'group that no one wants to Join' . Not one of us wanted cancer but we have gained friends through Joining 'Ovacome' .
So thank you for all of your love and support and the 'Friendship' that means so much to many of us .
Annie ...... Thank you for making this happen ...
Jackie ...... Jacks150 ..My dear friend and room mate ...Thanks for your excellent company .
We must not forget the ladies who would have loved to have been there on Friday and Saturday at the members day who were not able to make it to London .
I really did enjoy the last of the speakers Prof Iain McNeish ..well done to Ovacome for he was very interesting to listen to .
Thank you to all the ladies at Ovacome and nice to put faces to the voices on the phone !
Love Jan xxxx
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Jan76
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What a lovely post thank you, I haven't much to add, you've said it all...you have described the table beautifully, the meal was wonderful, the people special...and my gift? well more later.... it brings tears to my eyes every time I look at it (in a nice way) I can't believe that Jackie could be so thoughtful as well as everyone's contributions in it, something I will treasure for the rest of my life (which I hope will be long)....the poor man on the train had to suffer me telling him all about it, (before I settled down to read it) a price he had to pay for sitting in my reserved seat..(poor chap).
It was so lovely to meet you Jan my lovely, lovely friend thank you also for meeting me at the station lots of love x G x
I said to Jackie on the train down it would make you cry ...... Our Jackie is a clever girl you know ..... I for one would like a copy in some format ...It is so very special and so was Lizzie .....
I can Just see you sitting on the train telling the guy all about your stay in London Ha ha ha .....
When I think of you Gwyn I think of your wonderful zest for life with tons of laughter all around you xx
What a lovely kind post. We all got together on Friday just to support Ovacome and make sure that we were helped anyone who wanted to attend Members' Day the next day and needed a bit of help and encouragement to make that happen.
Our Ladies' Get-Together on Friday evening was quite unexpected and an evening I shall treasure for the rest of my life. Your description says it all. We talked momentarily about sharing the photos and the music track with each other. I'm not sure we resolved how to share the photos because there were too many other wonderful things to talk about. I have promised, however, to copy the sound track on to CDs for you all and to include the list of tracks and the people who requested them.
BIG QUESTION - who was it that said their request wasn't on the track? Please email me to tick me off and send me the track and I'll add it to the playlist before creating the CDs. I don't have a disk drive on my Mac Book Air, so guess what I'm going to buy with the generous present - an external CD Drive. This is something I'd really like and will resolve the problem I've had so far sending a copy of the CD to Laurence (The husband) and to you all.
We certainly didn't forget our friends who were unable to join us. If they'd sent in a track request we played it and thought of them - and of our dear friend Julie too.
I agree with your about Professor Iain McNeish. His talk was informative, enthusiastic, pragmatic and intuitive. He was by far the best speaker and did you see how he blushed when we have him a roaring applause and whooop whooop at the end! He even told us we can eat cake again!!!! ha ha
At last the mystery is solved! Thanks for that reassurance. I received your request very late last week and had bought it from I-Tunes but somehow it had failed to download. I've just downloaded it and added it to the Ovacome Friends Playlist. I've enjoyed processing everyone's requests. It's so interesting to hear the different sorts of music choices friends have made.
Now all I have to do is to get that external hard disk and copy everyone who's asked the CD and playlist. That'll be later in the week. Granny duties tomorrow and dr appointment.
Loads of late night hugs and love to everyone xxx Annie
Any one who tells us we can eat cake again deserves lots of whooops ..bless him ..not that I eat a lot of it ....Jackie and I did have a chocolate moment on the train back .....
The Prof talked with passion and lots of it too ..any lady who has him as their consultant is very lucky indeed .
Not having a camera with me and my phone has not the tec to do good photos I would be so pleased to be forward any photos via my email .
Will send you some money for a copy of the CD and play list ..but only when you have time to do so .
No more money shall change hands Jan. I think my abiding memory of the last two days was swopping mounds of pound coins to pay for taxis, gifts, refunds, drinks and who knows what else. I'm pounded out!
I'm looking forward to going into the Apple Shop to get my external recordable CD/DVD drive with my wonderful generous pressie from you all and then I shall copy all the songs and send you all the CD and playlist. This time I shall make sure I send the letter to EVERYONE - sorry Chris!
Anyone know yet whose song was omitted from the playlist Friday. I thought it was Anne who mentioned it but I've checked and her choice was California Girls by the Beach Boys.
I'll second everything you said, Jan. It was a lovely evening, followed by a very interesting day! Many, many thanks to Annie (Whippit) and Sue (PRchick) for all their efforts i organising this!
Thank you ..... it was great to meet you as well but it went sooooo very quickly ..thats Just the one sad part of our lovely time together ..not enough of it to talk more ....
You said it all Jan. One of the nicest evenings I've ever had with some of the loveliest people I've ever met. And thanks again to Annie, Sue and Andy.
One never knows what lies ahead in life and maybe thats a good thing but I have found from lifes past experiences that there is often something so positive that comes from the negative .
We are the positive .... and you could see that at the weekend and do so agree with you .... Lovely ladies .......
Just want to add loved meeting all the ladies and had a great two days we must all do it again next year and hopefully get a few more ladies to join us. Love to everyone and hope you are all in good health.
Good to see you are home and not to tired from working today bless you .... have been wondering how you got on after our hectic time . It was so lovely to meet you xx
Now its back down to earth again and Monday is loaming .....
Hope you are resting and putting your feet up now !
I hadn't realised Babs was working today and she probably isn't even home by now. We were meant to be going to a wedding party this evening as I'd accepted the invitation but never imagined I'd be this tired.
Babs, you're a super woman! I ditto everything said about having a wonderful time with you all. xxxx Love Annie
What can I add? Andy is VERY embarrassed at the moment as I keep telling him all the nice comments. Anyone who wants to say it directly can follow him on twitter now they know how!! (@Chef_Ives) (Annie, do you remember what to do? LOL)
As for the rest I am just so so so happy to have met you all. It truly was a special time, wasn't it? The characters we expected to be larger than life were exactly that, the shyer ones were just lovely too! Gwyn is utterly nutty and lovely, Annie and I were clearly separated at birth, Margaret is so beautifully determined, Linda is so smiley and outgoing, Lynn so calm and serene, oh I could go on and on!!! And isn't Madz stylish?! Everyone was new yet not at all new -- it proved to me beyond a shadow of a doubt that these friendships we make here are no less real and meaningful than the traditional face to face kind, and can be as deep or deeper as we base them on such a huge shared experience. They break us free, as we connect across different ages and locations and backgrounds, and would simply never have had this chance in the normal way. That extends to everyone who didn't make it to London too, and we have to make some other opportunities to get together happen. Long may we all continue to be here and chat about life, the universe and everything.
There were more than a few things we might have changed but nonetheless I will always be grateful to Ovacome for enabling this, in organising the day and setting up this forum, as well as all the excellent other work they do. We are the members, the fundraisers and above all we are the body of experience and the voices for OC, and its up to us to keep communicating with them too, as well as asking for more engagement on their side. So echoing Jan's sentiment in the lovely original post above, I agree it was lovely to put faces to voices and email tags there too, and I look forward to speaking with Louise, Sonia et al again more in future too.
Love
Sue xxx
Waxing lyrical after a very food and wine filled day
Your time together sounds so wonderful, just wish I could have been there. Love to you all
Thanks Jan for putting all our thoughts into words. Nothing much to add. Enjoyed meeting everyone. It certainly was a very happy experience. I did enjoy the Members' Day and especially Professor McNeish's presentation. He cetainly knew his stuff and didn't fail to answer every question asked of him (and there were a good many of them!).
It would be good if some of these events could be moved out to one of the more central areas once in a while! I did note that there is to be a Europewide seminar (I think Louise mentioned this, but cant remember whether this is for OC or cancer in general) in October this year in my home town of Liverpool. I await further information from Ovacome about this, but it would be another opportunity to meet up if the agenda is of interest to us? Just an idea. Ovacome may know of other similar events around the country?
Would love to see some of the many pics taken on Friday night. I only took a couple on my phone, which weren't brilliant!
Love to all, including of course all those who couldn't attend the event - maybe next year?
Yes do agree with you Collette that the members day could be moved to other areas of the London thus allowing people who cannot travel to far a chancce to attend .
I can remember the date in October its the 19th and 20th ...cannot remeber the agenda though !
Me also for any pics please ..can send my email to anyone who has pics of us all over the weekend .
Do hope our time together took your mind of your worries xxx Thinking about you x
I totally agree with everything you have said. Especially the bit about me being great company! (Only joking but glad I was).
I was amazed at how well we all got on. As sue said it is amazing how close a friendship you can get online. When we all met it was like we had all known each other for years and we were having some kind of reunion.
The weekend went far too quickly and I wish we had more time to get to know one another better.
I did have an advantage over some people as doing the poetry book I had photos of several people so knew what you looked like.
Love to all my virtual friends and especially my dear friend Jan who was also excellent company (also thanks to Brian for the directions).
Yes you were great company and every thing worked out Just fine and Brian was well pleased his directions were of help .... So was I .......
So do agree with the fact that it all so very quickly ..we needed more time !!!!
Acording to one little chap in our class to day I should have gone to the Natural History Museum while in London . If I had gone we could have swopped notes as he has been loads of times ....
Take it steady this week xx hope all goes well for Weds .
Ditto to all your posts, not long home from work and admit to being a bit tired after the weekend but wouldn't have changed it for the world, just great to meet everyone and share such a special evening. We must get together again soon and spend more time chatting and getting to meet more of our friends
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Just a thought?
All Gone but WOW !!
