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I'd pick up a huge can of shaving foam and think. "This will probably outlast me..."

I could no longer look to the future with the usual, unthinking, brazen confidence, so I tried instead to live in and for the moment, squeezing every last drop of life from every minute of every day, missing nothing, trying to appreciate it all.

At home, Gloria and I would share our similar sense of cracked humour, laughing in the face of this random adversity; refusing to give in to the sorrow which is always threatening to seep into our relationship, like a tributary of sadness. I am humbled by her bravery and comforted by her love.

Switching to radiotherapy was an eye-opener. First some jolly nurses draw a target on you and make a sort of tattoo to mark the spot. Next, you go to another room where they bolt the doors, lay you on a contraption, retire behind their screens and zap you while playing bad, young people's music at you. In vain did I pray for a Hip-Hop replacement...

The treatment itself is painless. For me, the rough stuff came later. Chemo had been no picnic but this was grim indeed.

For the first time, I was very sick and ill and frightened. I couldn't eat and developed an abscess, which froze half of my face and meant I couldn't shave.

I had changed from an average-looking bloke to a nauseous, wheezing, Captain Birdseye lookalike in less than a week, although I had neither the appetite nor the strength to eat a fish finger - let alone the inclination.

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