January 17, 2026. A Tinker's Cuss.

I have been in touch with the Assisted Dying Group, and they will send a doctor to assess me for a quick and durable death. I saw a cardiologist last week and she confirmed - once again - that my situation is terminal. She was from Manchester in the UK, and the previous week, she had taken her son to see Oasis in Melbourne.

I am not afraid of dying, but I am afraid of living this way for much longer.

A few days ago, Razor was fired from his position as the All Blacks' head coach; so there are people, as well as me, who are in a really bad way. It's a tragic thing to be fired from your lifetime dream.

I have thoroughly enjoyed most of my life, but I was badly ripped off by a business partner around 25 years ago. Were I not to die, I would have to live with ruminating thoughts about this situation for the rest of my days. I gave him his start in business and everything I had, and he turned around and stole everything he could. Some people believe their own press kits, which they wrote themselves. These days, he promotes himself as some sort of crown prince, as if he hung the moon himself.

I have found that the best thing to do with an impending death is to dream a lot. This helps press the bad thoughts out. Poetry also helps; it is a beautiful thing.

I read about Jorge Luis Borges, the famed South American literary giant - blind, I believe, and a writing genius. He says that when he was a kid, his father would pace up and down while reading poetry. Young Jorge couldn't understand the words, but he felt that something was happening to his whole body, mind, and spirit. It wasn't happening at an intellectual level. Maybe this is what the Aborigines call Dreamtime. Any state that takes you out of your own thoughts has got to be a good thing, right?

I have always believed in the power of poetry. Composing a poem is sometimes all that one can do when one is in an untenable situation.

It's not that I am throwing in the towel with this death trip. The whole process will obviously take months, and I will be hosed down with morphine throughout. I will be kissing God. God loves me.

The only regrets I have about an impending death are that I can't take Kelly with me, nor my dogs, nor my Volkswagens.

As a child, I spent many long weeks in the hospital. This was a terrifying existence. Each night, a blonde-headed nurse would come by and kiss me goodnight on the forehead; I still remember her scent. Her kiss elevated me into a very pleasant dream. It was a stolen thing. Now Kelly does that, and it's a magic thing.

"What I do is me: for that I came." (From As Kingfishers Catch Fire by Gerard Manley Hopkins)