IF MONEY IS TIGHT FOR YOU RIGHT NOW, PISS OFF. I have no interest in taking money from people who cannot spare it, okay? I love you and I need you to take care of yourself first, I need you to do nice things for yourself first, okay?

Okay!

Hello friends. As you may know, I nearly died back in February, and recovery is extremely difficult.

But you know who it's kind of harder on? My partner, Lee. His partner of 19 years nearly died last month, spent weeks in the ICU, and then has required a lot of extra care even once he finally made it home - and Lee has been the one that has had to shoulder most of that care.

It's easy to be sick and skirt death. It's a lot harder to be the one watching that happen. It's easy to be looked after when you're recovering. It's a lot harder to be the one that does the looking after.

Lee was at the hospital every single day that I was in there. Every single day. Even the 10 days where I was completely unconscious and intubated and he couldn't do anything other than sit next to me, he still came to the ICU every single day and did just that. Much of that time, he spent it being told that things were getting worse. He had doctors checking with him about my medical directives. Can you imagine how stressful and scary that is? I certainly can't.

When I was on general ward he was the one that was bathing me and feeding me to take some burden off the nurses. When I came home he was the one that did everything for me as I gradually regained the ability to do basic everyday things. When I have been struggling and upset he has been the one that has comforted me.

He has been through so much, and he deserves something nice after this horrible experience.

It's Lee's birthday on the 11th of April, and I would like to get him a really special present. Like most people our age, he's hard to shop for because he usually just gets whatever he wants - unless, of course, the thing is too expensive to simply buy for himself.

So that's what we're here to do. We're gonna buy him a very expensive thing that I know for a fact he wants - he has been saving up for it for months, in fact, and is barely halfway there. So wouldn't it be cool if we could just... get it for him?

Hell yeah! So what's the gift?

Well - it's a, uh, mathematics software program.

It's called Mathematica - he's used it before and he loves it to absolute pieces. Like, he talks to me about this program at least once a week.

Look, we all have our weird hobbies, and Lee loves maths. He loves it SO much. And I love HIM so much, so I want to get him the program that he loves.

Now, if you look at that site you'll see that it's a subscription only sort of software, so you might think "oh, what's the point" - but oho, my friends, if you check the fine print, there is a very nice detail. If he gets the Personal Plus Plan, yes, it's still a subscription, HOWEVER:

The Personal Plus Plan retains desktop access if subscription lapses.

This means that for using on his personal desktop computer, it's essentially a perpetual licence. So as long as he keeps it installed on his computer, he can use it forever!

So that's what we're gonna get him!

Now, the personal plus plan of mathematica costs $390 USD, which at the moment works out to be about $566 AUD. I am not expecting you all to pay for all of that. I've rounded it down for this fundraiser to discount my own base-rate contribution, for starters, but more importantly, whatever you don't raise I will do my very best to make up the difference on. I have some money in savings myself and I am happy to spend them on this.

So if you would like to buy Lee something nice for his birthday after a really, really shitty couple of months, please contribute! Even if it's just a dollar so you can feel like you're a part of things, that is totally welcome.

While I'm keeping this a secret until his birthday, feel free to leave a comment for him on this gofundme with your happy birthday wishes and messages of support and love for what he's been through - I will print them out and put them together in a card for him that I will give him on his actual birthday when I reveal this present!