I have been completely overwhelmed with the feedback I have received regarding my post earlier this week regarding me taking a step back as far as my role as evangelist and community driver is concerned. I am not entirely sure how to respond to people like Eben De Wit and Ahmed Salijee from Microsoft DRP, who I have worked closely with as a speaker on events like Tech-Ed and DevDays. Willy-Peter Shaub has thrown his toys out of the cot online as well as offline. Ruari Plint, Microsoft MVP Lead, has offered his continued support should I decide to take up the baton again in future. It is a real honour and privilege to work with individuals like these, and to everyone a huge thank you. I really struggle to see myself in the same light as what you do, however it has allowed me to see that there has been some impact over the last few years, no matter how small. At the moment I need to be selfish and put myself first, and as all of you have pointed out this whole process is all about balance, something I am trying hard to find at the moment

I also went past the doctor on my way to work this morning. The last few weeks I have been extremely tired, no matter how much I sleep. My body is also constantly sore and I my legs especially seems to go numb even after only sitting down for 10 minutes. I am very happy with our chosen doctor and as always he listened intently and did a very brief physical exam, where after he prescribed a sleeping tablet and a pain killer for the inflammation. He also put me on medical leave until Monday, in which time he wants some tests done. I will admit having medical aid again after so long has been a life saviour for both me and Michelle, who was recently diagnosed with Hidradenitis Suppurativa. She has been suffering with it for the last few years and no other doctor has ever been able to diagnose the condition, or even knew of it. The next step is to convince our medical aid, Discovery, to accept it as an actual condition. Michelle will be seeing a dermatologist in the next week to start this process to have the medication she needs placed on the chronic medication list.

We have also learnt that we will be hearing the patter patter of little paws again in the next few weeks. Xena, our 2 year old Sharpei Cross had apparently gone into heat, and we didn't not release that the 8 month old Chow, Cody, was ready to become her boyfriend at the time. She has started showing in the last few day and we are quite excited about watching her raise the little one's. We also had two of our smaller dogs re-homed earlier in the month, and it seem like the timing was just right, as we had been discussing getting another big dog. It has been more then 3 years that any of the bigger dogs has successfully mated, and when we moved on the farm all the small females where spaded to avoid any problems living in the city. Our only concern is what the litter will look like, since Cody is a full blown chow with black hair and Xena has the Sharpei skin in brown.