Cancer Flashbacks With Paul Reed Smith

I am well aware that it has been a while since I last posted on here.  I do have a reason.  Trying to type with a toddler in the house means most of your writing looks like this "aklsjoun   saiolkjdfslak  klafjl;a".  And even if he were not "helping" me on the keyboard, it is hard to concentrate on writing when you have a two foot tall individual that moves just shy of the speed of light, that you are yelling things at like "get your fingers out of the dogs' eyes", "no, the remote control doesn't belong in the toilet", "we can't blow bubbles outside right now, it's 14' outside, and dark", "get your fingers out of the dogs' eyes", "where did you find that, get it out of your mouth", "get your fingers out of the dogs' eyes", "no, the table lamp is not a toy", and "get your fingers out of the dogs' eyes".  (In case you were wondering, learning the parts of the face was a very challenging time for our dogs' vision.  Maybe we will have to find them a "seeing eye person".)

So, because of the delay, I am writing about an incident that happened in June.  I think we have all been in a situation where a sound, or picture, or smell has brought you back to something in your past.  For instance, every time I smell VapoRub, I think back to that time as a little child that my great grandmother rubbed it into an open wound.  It still brings tears to my eyes.  Well, for the most part I feel I am over this cancer stuff.  Sure, I still have a few more years of CTscans, X-rays, blood tests, and all of the other monitoring.  I am not exactly sure how many years, because asking an oncologist how much longer you need to see him, is similar to asking your parents on a road trip "are we there yet?".  I think the answer has always been "4 or 5 more years" (for the oncologist visits, not the road trip...it just seemed like it took 4 or 5 years sometimes).  Other than the endless doctors' appointments, I really don't have much to do with cancer.  Oh there is still the solemn tone from friends you don't see very often asking "How are you doing?"  But for the most part, I am living my life.

I love playing guitar.  I play like I play golf, I don't play particularly well, but I don't take it too seriously and I enjoy doing it.  When I had my surgery, I was restricted in what I could lift.  Luckily, just before I was diagnosed, I had found some cheap used Paul Reed Smith guitars.  They were the lightest guitars I owned, and were pretty much the only ones I could lift and play for a long time.  They were the one thing that was able to get my mind off how bad things were for an hour or so at a time.  When I finished my chemo, my family all pitched in and bought me a nice Paul Reed Smith for Christmas.  The guitar means a lot to me for so many reasons.  First I just like the guitar!  But it symbolized closing the door on cancer.  It meant a lot for my family to pitch in and get me something like that.  And it was something I spent a lot of time with during my "chemo brain" months.  So, a coincidental introduction to PRS guitars, ending up having a pretty significant impact on that period of my life.

Which brings me to what happened in June.  Every year, Sweetwater Music has what basically amounts to "musician porn" at their campus in Fort Wayne, Indiana.  Literally hundreds of manufacturers are there showing off all their new toys, letting you play with them, and they bring in dozens of endorsed artists (some more famous than others) to trick you into thinking that if you just had that equipment, you could make all those amazing sounds too!  Well, Paul Reed Smith was on hand.  Not just the company, Paul Reed Smith the actual person.  In my past, I worked for a record company, regularly hanging out backstage and on tour buses of multi-platinum and even diamond selling artists (diamond is ten million copies).  I was never nervous or star struck hanging out with rock stars, but being the geek I am, I was excited to see a guy that designs guitars.  

One good thing is, I was right at home with my fellow geeks, because there was a full auditorium of us waiting to see him (although, I was one of the few that showed up an hour early to stand in line, and made it to the front row).  I watched his presentation in awe when he talked about all the technical things that make his company's guitars sound so good.  I had heard he was good about doing "meet and greets" with his fans, and throughout waiting in line, and his presentation, and...waiting in line again to meet him, I ran through my head exactly what I was going to say.  I was going to tell him, how his products got me through some dark times.  Thank him profusely.  And maybe talk to him about the technical nuances of a quality guitar (not that I know what I am talking about, but I can fake it).  

The problem with be one of the first ones in the auditorium for the presentation, is that means you are going to be one of the last ones out to stand in line for the meet and greet.  The whole time in line, I ran over my little monologue in my head.  Over and over again, as the line grew smaller and I moved closer and closer to this guy who really has no idea that his guitar helped me with my cancer fight (although his company does regular donate to cancer charities).  Then the big moment, I am standing before THE Paul Reed Smith...and I feel like I am at the oncologist's office for the first time, all the emotion came flooding back from that day.  I felt the fear, felt overwhelmed, I felt like I was going to burst into tears...but I WAS NOT going to do that...no matter what!

So, I stood before Paul Reed Smith, handed him part of my guitar to sign.  And was afraid if I said anything I would have an emotional outburst.  So, in an effort to hold back this flood of emotions, I stood there looking like I was probably about to punch him.  He asked me if I would like the autograph personalized and my big speech that I had practiced over and over again, was now reduced to one word, "Tom".  Yes, all that I had planned on saying, all that I wanted to thank him for was boiled down to me barely uttering my own name through clenched teeth.  He politely signed my piece for me and I briskly walked out of there, trying not to break into an all out sprint as I headed to my car, hoping if I went fast enough I could outrun this emotional avalanche.  But I was also hoping if I couldn't keep it together, I would be far enough away that no one would see me.

Now, let me just say one thing in my defense.  The surgery I had to help prevent a different kind of cancer, has caused me to be a hypoglycemic.  And sometimes when people have low blood sugar, they tend to get more intense emotions.  And, because I am a big geek, I got so busy looking at musician porn, and standing in line an hour early, and sitting through a presentation, and standing in line again, that I went about 14 hours without eating (not a smart thing for a hypoglycemic to do).  So I will blame part of this incident on that, so as not to appear to be such a wuss.

So, I didn't get to thank Paul Reed Smith.  And to be honest, I don't know what he would have thought about it if I did.  It's not like he found the lump, or performed the surgery, or administered the chemo, but he was still important to my recovery, even if that isn't why he got in the guitar business.  But this incident says a lot about us cancer survivors.  You never know what is going to help us get through a hard time.  It could be a book, a phone call, visits from a friend, or a cheap used guitar.  And it is hard to feel "done" with cancer when you are still going to doctors' appointments every few months.  They tell you it's over with, but in the very next breath, tell you to come back in November.  And just like any other major event in your life, you never know what trigger will bring you back a memory or a feeling, that you may or may not want to experience again.  At least, I got to meet him.  I got something signed to me personally.  And I got something to eat so something like that didn't happen again.

Back To Normal Levels After Testicular Cancer

One of the things many people worry about as they undergo treatment for testicular cancer is how will this affect them afterwards?  Well, I finally received my answer.

One thing I was worried about was testosterone levels.  One of my nurse friends said it would be good to have lower testosterone levels because it would decrease my future cancer risks.  However, commercials are constantly pointing out how my becoming a fat, lazy slob as I get older has nothing to do with me being a fat lazy slob, but low testosterone (that they would be able to fix).  Feeling like I was in a "damned if I do..." position I asked my urologist about it.  I was told that high testosterone doesn't increase the chance of prostate cancer, but it makes it grow faster if you do get it.  And low testosterone may make you more inclined to be a fat, lazy slob, but it doesn't really cause any health problems on its own (being a fat, lazy slob does though).  Worried that my levels would be half, he told me how most duplicated organs aren't working 100%  all the time anyway.  That is why people with one lung or kidney can still function, because the remaining one turns it up a little.  After going through a bunch more explanation in doctor talk which I kinda blanked out on, we decided to test my testosterone and the results came back that I was at normal levels.  So, I have to blame being a fat, lazy slob on something else...like the lack of global warming in my area making it too cold to go outside.

Recently, my wife went to her "female doctor" and somehow came home with an appointment for me!  I get enough doctors' appointments scheduled on my own without having to do someone else's homework too.  Anyway, I was told to go back to the Jerkatorium (official doctor lingo for a sperm bank) and see what my levels were, just in case we ever want to have another kid, which I am told we aren't having, but do this just in case we change our minds one day, which isn't up to me anyway, and it is always a woman's prerogative to change her mind so I should just keep my mouth shut...or something like that.  I will spare you the details of the inner workings of the Jerkatorium, because I have previously written about that.  But what I did find disturbing this time was the addition to the "library" of DVD "aids".  While carefully pushing them around trying my best not to actually touch anything in there, (because after all I know what people do in that room because I was about to do it) I noticed most of the DVD cases were empty.  I wish I could immediately decontaminate everything I am wearing as soon as I leave that room, so it certainly would never cross my mind that I should grab a integral part of the functioning of this room and bring it home with me.  Ewww!  Anyway, we will just fast forward to the results.  That came back saying I was normal too!  Not normal for a testicular cancer survivor, but normal for a normal person...assuming normal people go into a room, look at dirty magazines, leave their business on the counter, and occasionally steal DVDs.

So the moral of the story is, don't steal from the Jerkatorium because you DO know where that stuff has been....NOOO, that's not the moral of the story!  The moral is, not only is testicular cancer a very survivable cancer, but you can regain your normal life back.  You won't be half a man.  You can still have normal levels of testosterone and swimmers, and even if your tests results don't come back normal, you can easily fix the testosterone levels, and if you froze your swimmers like I did before surgery, you can still have children or use it for disgusting pranks to put on YouTube and none of your friends will ever eat or drink anything at your house again.

And there are even some positives of being part of the One Nut Club!  I will close with this Top 10 List:

Top 10 Benefits of Only Having One Testicle

10  You only have to manscape half as much (if you are a manscaper).
9  When you test your levels, you health insurance company is actually paying for you to look at porn!
8  You have more room in your underwear.
7  Not as much to get sweaty down there.
6  People are afraid to use the phrase "Don't go off half cocked" around you.
5  When it is really cold out you can say "I am freezing my ball off!"
4  When your toddler is flailing around like a twerking jellyfish, your chances of getting hit in the nuts just dropped by 50% (anecdotal evidence).
3  Your self exams are done in half the time.  Don't forget to do them!
2  You can make the comment "I would give my right (or left) nut for ______"  then you could offer to go get it from the surgeon.
1  When you wear Speedos you only have to worry about stuff slipping out on one side. 

Constant Coughing or First Word?

Let me start this off by saying, I am not trying to be one of those people that has a health complaint every time you are around them.  No, I just have a health complaint that I would like to keep to myself, but unfortunately affects everyone around me.

See, about a month ago we traveled down to Florida.  It was sunny and hot everyday, most days getting into the 90's.  And as things usually go in that kind of weather, I caught a cold.  OK, I can tell that you are confused, here is what happened.  One night we went out to eat, and whatever it was did not agree with me, so I was up until the wee hours of the morning dealing with that night's dinner.  And as anyone with a baby knows, you certainly are not going to be able to catch up on your sleep in the morning, because the baby doesn't care how late you stayed up, he just knows he is hungry/wet.  The next night, I was looking forward to some restful slumber when the weather radio went off stating a tornado was in the area.  In the area of the country I spend most of my time in, I would have turned on the TV for a detailed report and if need be, pulled out the futon in the basement and dragged everyone downstairs until the danger was over.  Unfortunately, most homes on the Florida coast do not have basement and if they do they are called indoor pools.  My wife, being very supportive, decided not even waking up to the loud alarm next to her head would be the best course of action.  Not wanting to push everyone into a closet (the only interior room in the house we were staying at) I decided to check out the situation and move everyone in the safe spot only if the situation warranted. What I found out is that in Florida, where several sports teams are named after weather, they apparently don't have anyone at the TV stations that actually knows anything about weather in the middle of the night.  After only being able to find a tiny square of a weather map in the corner of the TV that amounted to about four pixels, I decided to just stay up until the Tornado Warning expired to make sure we were safe.  That left me up until the wee hours of the morning once again.  The next few days were spent preparing to come back home and driving the eighteen hours to get back home, which after it was all said and done, left me very run down, and with a strange tickle in my throat.

So, a few days after getting back from our pre-summer Florida trip I was in full nose dripping, wet coughing, hell.  I was kind enough to share this illness with my wife, who never seems to appreciate the gift of sickness.  Within a few days, my cold had disappeared except for a little headache that would not let up.  My wife wanted quicker relief and went to see our family doctor, who told her that she had developed a sinus infection.  Upon hearing this, I was a little worried that my "headache" was really a raging sinus infection like my wife's.  I called the doctor and told her I was feeling fully recovered except for the headache and she prescribed some antibiotics to clear things up.  Pretty soon the headache was gone...and an annoying, constant, irritating cough developed.  Not like the one before where random pieces of lung seem to be flying out of your trachea, this is just a cough that sounds  like the cough people do when they aren't really sick, but they are calling in sick to work, except this cough is real and relentless.

Here is where I am today, nearly a month later and feeling pretty good, just sounding like a guy faking a cough constantly.  And the best part about it, anything extra sweet, salty, or tangy, causes it to get worse!  The past two weeks, friends have asked me to come to their places of business to help them with projects, and in return they feed all the people that helped out.  The problem is, I am afraid to eat around people, because invariably the cough gets worse, and if there is anything to get you uninvited to future gatherings, it is sounding like you have the plague around people while they are eating.  So while everyone else is socializing and having a bite, I am running off to a vending machine and nibble/coughing in a hallway somewhere.

Well, today I realized how much this is really affecting my life.  My son, being six months old, is just now trying to verbalize and mimic actions and sounds that he experiences.  While sitting with him and feeding him, I had a coughing fit, and he looked me right in the eyes while I was trying to compose myself...and coughed some fake sounding coughs.  Now coughing isn't out of the ordinary for him while he is enjoying his bottle, because in his mind, he is very hungry, and trying to shotgun five ounces of milk in one second is the best way to stop his hunger pangs.  In reality, trying to suck that much milk into his stomach that quickly leads to choking, coughing, and spitting up all over me, a lesson I have had to learn the hard way.  After his cough we just stared at each other, he with his little grin on his face, while I try to figure out if he drank to fast or was he making the same sound daddy was.  The grin he gave me was very similar to the grin he gives me while we sit there and make fart noises at each other for hours on in.  You know, that cross-between-laughter-and-accomplishment type of grin.

This is why I am frustrated, not because of the constant hacking, or having to eat my meals alone in a dark closet so people won't fear infections from me, it is the effect this may be having on my impressionable young son.  No longer do I wonder if his first word will be "mommy" or "daddy".  No longer am I worried that his first words will be one of the phrases yelled frequently at the dogs ("Daisy, quit licking your butt!") or the words he hears daddy yell when there is a stupid driver in front of him.  No, I am frustrated today because I am afraid that the noise he has been hearing most the past four weeks will be the first one he verbalizes.  And in his little memory book, I just don't know how to write down the spelling of "hok-hok-hok-heh-heh-kuuuuurrrrrrkkkk-ptah".

Cancer Made Me Fat And Apparently Fat People Sweat A Lot

OK, so I guess cancer didn't directly make me fat, but it certainly helped me pack on some pounds.  Between the inactivity following my surgery, the inactivity following chemotherapy, and the fact that my chemo taste change didn't effect my love for all stuff fattening, I have gained weight.

I realized this has become a problem when my wife punched me in the middle of the night, ripped the blankets off my previously slumbering body and said, "You're sweating on the clean sheets."  We do have other sheets, and I could even wash them every single day, but she thought all of these things through and decided assaulting a sleeping cancer patient was the best course of action.

While hurting myself mowing the lawn the other day, I noticed I seemed to be sweating more than I had in the past.  I first attributed that to my high metabolism and my well toned body, then I realized I didn't have either one.  And it seems just about anything can cause me to break a sweat anymore, cleaning around the house, working around outside, walking the dogs on a hot sunny day, walking the dogs on a cold rainy day, walking up the stairs to get a Little Debbie, eating a Little Debbie, thinking about eating Little Debbies, typing "Little Debbie", and apparently sleeping.

There seem to be another side effect to my recent weight gain as well, my hypoglycemia seems to be getting worse.  This is a condition where my sugar will drop and I have to...well find something with sugar.  They make glucose tablets designed to get the sugar back into your system quickly, and you would think something made to shoot up your sugar would be made at least remotely sweet tasting, but it really taste like compressed baby powder, except drier.  This hasn't been a problem until I started getting more and more active lately.  Apparently your sugar doesn't drop when you sit around all day ingesting sugar.  Seeing some of the weird things people get disability payments for these days, I wonder if I can get the government to pay me to sit around all day ingesting sugary goodness...and maybe even pay for my sugary goodness as well.

But therein lies the irony in my whole situation.  I want to get more fit and be more active, which causes me to hurt myself, which causes me to be less active.  So, to make up for that, I try to eat healthier and avoid sugary stuff, which causes my sugar to nosedive, which forces me to eat more sugary stuff.  You see my dilemma.  I can't complain too much though, if the worst lingering effect of beating cancer is having to sit around on my rump eating Little Debbies and sweating.  But if I didn't complain about something, I wouldn't have anything to write about today.  So, here I am feeling a little better, but recovering a little slower.  Luckily I don't have any pressing projects anytime soon that will require me to exert myself too much and we have a large stash of crappy food to keep my sugar levels up.  I guess life ain't too bad after all.

I Did, I Did, I Did Hurt Myself...

I sat around yesterday, glad that the rain that threatened off and on was around, it gave me a great excuse to avoid re-ripping my incision/mowing the ditch.  Everything was going well until late afternoon, when I saw the sun poke out and illuminate the ditch in all its glorious overgrownedness.  In a moment of extreme enthusiasm and lack of clarity, I decide to rush out, grab the push mower, and hurt myself.

The push mower has not been started since before my surgery, sometime in August.  Of all the possible scenarios I ran in my mind on how to hurt myself, the one I forgot about was trying to start a push mower.  I pulled the cord...and pulled the cord...and pulled the cord...pulled the cord...pulled the cord...pulled my incision...pulled the cord, with each pull I came a little closer to ripping my incision and the mower got no closer to starting.  Even though I only have one testicle, I have enough testosterone to realize, if something doesn't work, you can always pour gas in it.  Which is exactly what I did, and the mower started right up...in my workshop.  But at least I knew that the mower starts.  I loaded it up with the lawn tractor, and headed down to the ditch.  I brought along my "whacking stick" which I use for chopping limbs (of trees...so far), hacking up rogue snakes (FYI, all snakes are rogue), and using for leverage/stability as I drop the mower off the side of the cliff we call a ditch.  I don't know how to describe exactly what this tool is.  It's about five feet long, and has a sharp hooked blade, which may have been an old way to harvest corn, or chase teenagers through fields while wearing a white William Shatner mask, or to run after Dr. Frankenstein's monster.  Today it was also used as a cane.

I went to the top of the hill over looked the ditch and pulled the cord...pulled the cord...pulled the cord...pulled a muscle...pulled the cord.  Luckily, I brought down a gas can with me so I used the whacking stick as a screwdriver to take off the breather and poured some more gas into the beast.  The next pull, she roared to life.  I was dreading pushing the mower over the edge, because that meant I had to pull it back up again.  I slowly lowered it down, leaning heavily on the whacking stick, the mower started sputtering due to the extreme angle, and I started sputtering due to being fat and lazy for several months.  Each pass, I struggled with lowering it down and pulling it up, while jamming the whacking stick in to the ground and using it to help pull the mower back up again.  This was working fine, but I forgot one thing about living in the country, people (as in everyone that drives by) wave at you, and it's just not neighborly to not wave back.  So in the midst of this delicate balancing act of using one hand to lower the mower down and the other hand death gripping the whacking stick, I have to pause to wave at every car that came by (because they waved at me) and apparently I-70 was shut down and rerouted on our road.

Eventually, I finished the hardest physical part, next I had to mow near the road.  When mowing near the road, you not only have to look down for snakes to whack, but you have to be aware of traffic coming from the left and the right, and since we live at a "T" in the road, you also have to look out for traffic coming directly at your back.  I know what you are thing, if I am mowing the ditch, why am I worried about traffic on the road?  Well, several reasons, farm machinery is wider that your average car, so you have to be wary of it hanging over the side of the road, or cars avoiding oversized farm machinery and hanging over the side of the road, plus I frequently have to back into the road to mow this part, and I also have to mow around all the tire tracks IN OUR DITCH so obviously someone has managed to drive exactly where I am mowing before!

I have several theories as to why people drive in our ditch.  Some just misjudge the curve and come around there way too fast.  And this particular intersection is a one and a half way stop.  There is one regular stop sign, and one "Stop Except When Turning Right" sign (which in every other state is just a "Yield") and the third way you don't have to stop no matter which way you're turning.  This leads to confusion and thereby most people treat is as a What-Stop-Sign? intersection, leading to a lot of squealing and swerving around oncoming traffic.  There also tend to be a lot of drunks that like to run into the ditch and sometimes for fun, ram the electricity pole.  And finally I think a lot of people are just so busy looking for people to wave to that they don't pay attention to where they are going and run off the road.

So here I am, looking down for snakes to whack, looking left, looking right, looking behind me, looking up (because I don't want to be surprised by SEAL Team VI), pushing the mower with one arm, pulling on my whacking stick with the other arm, and waving at anything that moves.  I was about three quarters done when I started to feel that familiar "tug" down below.  No not my bowels, that was earlier, I am talking about my incision tugging to warn me that it doesn't like what I am doing and it threating to let loose.  So, after getting this obvious warning sign, I did what all men would do and decided the best thing to do would be to stop, leave the rest and go in and take it easy.  I did, I really did decide that would be the best thing, but I still kept mowing until I finished.  It was about this time that my wife and mother-in-law came back from the cemetery, or store, or family Catholic event, or where ever they were and I saw them stop in the driveway way away from where I was mowing and wait to talk to me.  Now it was pretty obvious that I was doing something, and it was also pretty obvious that whatever they had been doing previously, they were now sitting in an air conditioned car.  Since they were waiting for me to stop what I was doing, walk from the edge of the yard to the driveway (which I estimate is a walk of approximately ten miles, or at least that's what it feels like when you have been mowing, waving, and keeping your insides from spilling out), I once again used my superior Man Reasoning Abilities and decide to ignore them and keep mowing.  I finally finished the mowing and much like how a marathon winner will collapse as he/she crosses the finish line with tears of joy running down their face, I fell back on to the lawn tractor and let out a very manly man-whimper.

As soon as I stopped, I could tell that my incision wasn't doing well, and I had planned to just sit on the couch the rest of the night and hold my crotch, something that seemed to make even more sense now that I pulled my incision.  Then my wife came down and asked if I would go with her to Wal-mart.  For some reason I said "yes".  I think I said "yes" because she said we were only going for two things, and I forgot in Wal-mart Speak, two things is actually forty-seven things that we will grab them by alternately criss-crossing the full length of the store approximately eighty-three times.  I don't know how the math works out on that, I just know that's what happens.

So, for the rest of last night and all of today, I have been limping around holding my side, like that is actually helping at all, but since that is the only thing I can think to do, I keep doing it.  The good news is that I didn't push myself to the "pop" just the tug.  So I hope this will all be better soon.  And if nothing else, I can use this for leverage next time someone wants me to mow the lawn.

Summer's Here, Time To Hurt Yourself!

The past couple of days, I have had every intention of hurting myself.  No not in one of those cries for help sort of ways, but just in pushing my self more and more to get back to normal.  I still haven't tackled the dangling a push mower down the ditch yet.  I am really afraid that may undo all the healing I have been doing, so when I do finally get around to attempting it, I will do it as gingerly as one can dangle a push mower down a ditch without simultaneously chopping off body parts.  Just the fact that the engine starts to cut out because the mower is at such an extreme angle that it can't get gas, shows that maybe this isn't a recommended use of this particular mower.

However, that wasn't a problem yesterday.  I had intended to do it, but secretly hoped something would come up to keep me from having to do it, and luckily plenty of things did.  I spent some of the early part of the day helping my good friend with the project we are tackling.  After that I waited for a HVAC company that claims "1 hour service" to call me back....that's been about 36 hours ago, and I am still waiting for a call back on the message I left.  The reason, our thermostat decided that when the air conditioner kicks on, the house will cool down like it is supposed to, but the temperature reading will go UP!  And that keeps the air conditioner on.  You notice this when you look at the thermostat and it reads 87, while the other thermometer in the house reads 72 (and that is the real disparity in numbers we had when we first noticed the problem).  A little research on the company turned up information that all electronic thermostats from this particular company do this.  I won't mention their name because I don't want to embarrass Honeywell.  I finally called in to our HVAC company through a different line (not a repair line) and asked them if they could fix this.  They said yes they would replace it...in five days.  I asked if they carried any other brands than the one they installed and they didn't.  Frustrated I decided to runaway from the problem and went out to mow some of the muddy areas of the yard with the riding mower.

Now our mower is an commercial grade mower that we had to buy because someone keeps running into stuff bending the deck on regular mowers.  I won't say who that someone is, but it's not me and it's probably my wife.  Because of this, the mower weighs 1400 lbs. (about 650Kg) and because of its massive weight it gets stuck if there is any amount of moisture on the ground.  While attempting to mow the parts of the yard that were too wet before, I hit a puddle or moss or gnat pee, whatever it was, the mower became hopelessly stuck.  Now for reasons that I won't go into right now, I am the only one currently able to run this mower, so there was no one to drive the mower while I attempted to pull it out.  So I did one any red blooded American male would do that has a Jeep and at least one ball (which I barely qualify for), I hooked up the Jeep and dropped it in four wheel drive low and jerked the crap out of it.  You may have seen in the news where the day was .25 seconds shorter yesterday, that's because the massive torque of my Jeep pulling out this mower actually stopped the Earth's rotation for a brief moment.  After these shenanigans were done, it was pretty much too late to attempt the ditch mowing/incision ripping yesterday.

So today I got up and went to a hardware store to find a thermostat that didn't have "Honeywell" stamped on it.  I found one and then had to pick up a bag of concrete for another project we are doing.  I found the correct type of concrete (for the record, there are approximately 75 different types of concrete and no matter what your project, there will be exactly 1 (one) bag that kinda fits what you are needing to do, and it will be on a very high shelf).  I look straight at the bag...literally, because someone at Home Depot decided that this particular type of concrete needed to be about five feet in the air, and it dawned on me as I read "80 lbs." on the side of the bag that:  A) I haven't lifted 80 lbs. since my surgery, I am officially supposed to be closer to 30lbs., and B) I can't bring the Jeep in to help me with this one.  I briefly thought about asking for help, but two things occurred to me:  1) Guys are not supposed to ask for any sort of help whatsoever in a hardware store unless it is a veiled attempt to prove they know more than the person they are talking to, and 2) I have about as much chance of finding and employee at Home Depot to help me as I do of finding the Loch Ness Monster, Elvis, Jimmy Hoffa, and  a regular cast member from Alf.  Now Andrea Elson did walk by while I was contemplating the next move, but without Elvis, Jimmy, and Nessie she wouldn't have been much help.  So I did what any self respecting guy would do, I picked up the bag anyway, rather than get help, and waited for the "pop" down below.  I firmly grabbed the bag and just as gracefully has a Olympic weight lifter clean and jerks 1000 lbs., I put the concrete in the cart...OK, it was less like an Olympic weight lifter and more like a out of shape fat guy struggling to lift more weight than he lifted in eight months (outside of Golden Corral) all the while trying not drag the bag (which they for some reason make out of paper just slightly thicker than tissue paper) over anything that might snag it, causing it to burst open cartoonishly burying my feet in 80 lbs. of concrete, while at the same time trying to keep me from bursting open cartoonishly burying my feet in a large pile of my intestines.  Unfortunately for the person watching me on the security camera I was able to load the concrete without any comic mishaps (yes, they actually have a sign in the concrete section pointing to the security camera, maybe that is a sign you are way understaffed if someone can grab an 80 lbs. bag of concrete and no one notices nor is able to catch someone fleeing with 80 lbs. of concrete).

Eventually, I made it home and the first thing I had to do, with the air conditioner running like an out of control Trane, was replace the thermostat.  The thermostat contains slightly more wires than the Space Shuttle, except with fewer directions.  After approximately 47 hours of cursing, reading, taking a Spanish course, reading the other manual, taking a Hindi course, calling tech support, and some Eeny Meeny Miney Mo, I was able to hook up the thermostat with a minimum amount of smoke and sparks.  As I was wrapping up, a large storm hit, effectively ending my mowing/stomach shredding/toe slicing plans for the day.

I don't know if the events keeping me from mowing the ditch are a bit of Divine Intervention or just me being lazy and slow, but I will welcome the postponements no matter what the reasons.  I just don't know what I am going to break to get out of it tomorrow...

There's More To Recovery Than Just Recovery...

Today I spent the morning with a good friend who is recovering from her own serious health condition.  We got into a conversation about how hard it is to recover from a serious illness, not necessarily physically but mentally as well.  There are so many aspects to recovery that get overlooked because caregivers are focused on, well recovery, but just physical.  The medical profession seems to think if they fixed your ailment, you're done.

One thing I noticed since my cancer diagnosis, is before I found out I had cancer, I did routine checks for testicular cancer.  I had a doctor in 1998 tell me it would be a good idea to check and I did the checks often, sometimes twice or more a day depending on how many other people were in the pool at the time, but every since I found the cancer, I hardly check.  The ironic thing is, I have about half as much to check after the cancer, so you would think it would be easier to check now.  However, I could probably count the times I have checked since then on one hand...not that hand the other one, the non-checking hand.  I don't know why, but I have developed an aversion to checking myself since I had actually found something.  Luckily, since I still manage to see one professional or another approximately every forty three minutes, I am getting checked enough right now by other people, so I don't need to worry about it, my family doctor, my urologist, my oncologist, my friend's overly curious dog, that TSA guy behind me in line at Arby's the other day, well at least I think it was a TSA uniform, or it could have been a bus driver's uniform, who ever it was he was very gentle and paid for my Arby-Q.  I brought this issue up at my cancer support group to see if any other of the self examiners had the same mental block after diagnosis, but unfortunately the breast cancer survivors weren't there that day.  There were a few prostate cancer survivors, but they didn't look flexible enough to perform self exams.

When down physically for so long, it takes a while to get back in the swing of things.  The doctors pretty much force you to be a couch potato through weight restrictions and other warnings of dyer consequences if you overexert.  After weeks, or even months, of continuously watching daytime TV, it's hard to get back into a routine of getting up, moving around, and even concentrating on anything that doesn't involve paternity testing, especially during Oprah's last season!  And even when you do start to move about and get braver and braver, there can be certain obstacles in your daily life that look insurmountable.  As part of my mowing routine, I have to dangle a push mower down a very steep embankment about five feet, pull it back up, and try to keep my toes out of the way the whole time I am struggling with it.  This is something that leaves me physically drained and crippled on a good day, I will admit, I am scared to death to do it when I still haven't been released to do that sort of thing from the doctor that performed my surgery.

Then there is just the mental recovery.  Believe it or not, you feel like your brain gets flabby from not being used while you were recovering.  I tried to keep my brain sharp by first reading Yahoo articles on-line, then working my way up to on-line versions of magazines, then newspapers, and even tried to read a few books on-line.  It was months into my recovery before I realized I had just been looking at porn the whole time, which I would stop, but I am not quite done with this article.  The point being, when you brain isn't working as hard as it had in the past, it takes a while to be able to stare at a computer screen for hours on end again (especially if there is no porn on that computer screen).

One last part of mental recovery I will mention, kinda relates to one of the first things I mentioned, and that is the fear that you are not quite well yet, or that it will come back.  There is a reason that until recently, oncologists would never use the word "cured" they would just say "remission".  I don't know that I will ever get over the fear that the cancer isn't quite gone, or that it's hiding somewhere else, or that it's just not big enough to show up on tests yet, or that it's lying dormant, or, or, or, or....with so much of cancer being an unknown, how do we as patients feel secure in our "cured" diagnoses?  And am I sure our families/caregivers/support networks have the same fears, whether they will verbalize them or not.

I guess in many ways, recovering  from a serious illness is like a "recovering alcoholic".  Sure, Bill W. never plans on having another drink, but he knows that threat is always lurking in the background.  In much the same way, I don't ever plan on having cancer again, but I know there is a possibility, however slight, that it  could be hiding somewhere.  Maybe I should do some more internet "reading" and a self-exam just to make sure there's no cancer left.

If Coughing Were A Sport, I Would Be An Olympian!

So a couple weeks back I wrote about having a cold.  Well, the sniffling stopped, the sneezing stopped, and the coughing...well it never went away.  In my typical, stubborn, I-don't-want-to-go-to-the-doctor sort of way, I decided the best thing to do was to ignore it and keep coughing.  That changed the night my wife asked why I was breathing so fast.  I said I wasn't breathing fast, especially since I was just sitting there, not exerting myself with heavy exercise like bending over to tie my shoes, reaching for more cookies, or grabbing the remote to change the channel.  When she pointed out that I indeed was breathing fast, I started getting worried.  One possible cause could be pneumonia or any other number of pfunny gnamed illknesses.

So, first thing the next day I called the doctor and scheduled an appointment for later that day.  The two things I can always count on with my obsessive-compulsive doctor is that no matter what I am there for I have to be humiliated with the scale, and that he will be at the very latest on time.  And that is exactly what happened, after finding out I was fat (again) I was taken back to see the doctor...early!  While the nurse was pointing out that I was fat and taking my blood pressure, she scared me by telling me how rampant pneumonia has been this year.  My doctor came in and had me take several deep breaths, much more than usual, which seemed like a pretty sadistic thing to do to someone that was having trouble breathing.  Finally, he told me to take a deep breath, and breathe it out as fast as I could, which resulted in my coughing very hard, getting light headed, and almost falling off the exam table.  That caused him to giggle a little and tell me that people usually get lightheaded if they come in in my state and do that, which made me wonder why, if most people get lightheaded and almost fall off the table, why didn't he put himself in some sort of position to catch me?  Anyway, he narrowed it down to walking pneumonia or viral bronchitis, and told me to go to the hospital right away to get an X-ray.

Because of my medical past, I have been pummeled by radiation so much to the point that my oncologist wants to limit the amount of exposure I have from now on.  For those that don't know, radiation builds in your body over time.  It starts from the day you were born and keeps adding up until the day you die.  I told my doctor that my oncologist (and his good friend) had ordered a chest X-ray as part of my six month post-chemo check-up for the next week and asked if there was anyway I could just get one set of X-rays that would take care of what both my doctor and my oncologist wanted to see (plus then I would only have to pay one co-pay).  He thought that was a great idea and wrote the prescription.  My doctor sent me on my way, but not without first giving me two free inhalers.  He is one of those doctors that feels if drug companies are constantly going to keep coming around and bugging him, he is going to take all the samples he can, and try his best to keep from actually ever writing a prescription for anything, just give away free samples.  I don't think that is what the drug reps had in mind, but I certainly appreciate it.

I rush to the hospital just in time to spend the next half an hour filling out paperwork and answering questions between coughs.  I finally got in to have my X-rays done and my doctor called the next morning to say I just had bronchitis (which isn't that much easier to spell) and that it looks like I am still cancer free.  I still have another week before I hear that officially from my oncologist, but the surprise X-ray and results have definitely cut down on my scanxiety this time around.

So, going on week four since all this started, I am still coughing and according to my doctor, can expect to still be coughing for another two weeks.  I am thrilled.  In the meantime, I will steer clear of salty foods, keep making people around me scared that I am contagious, and keep my wife and basenjis awake by hacking all through the night.  Let's just call it payback for all the kicking that they supposedly do "in their sleep".

I will close by telling the story about the Evil Casket.  The Evil Casket started chasing this poor girl one day.  No matter where she went the Evil Casket came bouncing after her.  The faster she ran, the faster the Evil Casket bounced.  She ran into her house and locked the door, the Evil Casket knocked the door down.  She ran upstairs, and the Evil Casket bounded right up the stairs behind her.  She ran into the bathroom and locked the door, and the Evil Casket broke that door down too.  Cornered and desperate, the poor girl reached for something, anything to use as a weapon against the Casket.  She opened the medicine cabinet, grabbed the Dimetapp, threw at her pursuer, and....the coffin stopped!

Taking A Houseplant, Worms, And My Wife On A Roadtrip

One of the things I have done for my wife in the past is take her on surprise trips.  In fact, my proposal to her was a surprise trip to Niagara Falls, where for the balance of the trip, rather than enjoy the beauty of the natural wonder, she stared at her recently acquired ring, studying to see if I remembered all the specifics she told me to make sure it had.  Since then I have surprised her with other trips like a trip to Holiday World (which has FREE Pepsi products!!!) and the Mothman Festival in Point Pleasant, West Virginia.  OK, so the quality of the surprise trips has definitely been declining.  Anyway, a very good friend had offered me her lakeside cabin for the weekend.  I call it a cabin, but it is more the size of an Army barracks, except the cabin can sleep more people.

Two months ago I started planning this trip as a cool, cheap thing an unemployed cancer patient can do for his wife's birthday.  It required me to make all sorts of plans, cover stories, basenji babysitters, and secret acquisitions of everything from the keys to the place and groceries to worms (for fishing).  This kept me a lot busier than I had thought it would.  Everyday last week it seemed I was running around gathering stuff between the hours that my wife left for work and before she came home.  I had to run around, buy food and supplies, and get back into my regular lounging-around-the-house clothes by the time she got home so she wouldn't realize I was running around all day buying worms.

My plan went fairly well and she even bought my cover story, that we were going to see my grandma in the nursing home.  That story was actually too believable.  While I was mowing the lawn the night before our departure, my wife baked a fancy cake and bought a houseplant all for my dear grandma that we weren't actually going to see.  So, being the resourceful person that I am, since this trip was a surprise birthday trip, I grabbed some candles and decided she just baked her own birthday cake.  Now in the past, I have tricked family members into wrapping their own presents, this is the first time I had someone bake their own cake.

The good news is, my wife was happily surprised and not mad that she baked a fancy cake...for herself, and a cute houseplant got to go on a road trip.  The place we stayed was huge!  At first it was overwhelming and even deciding what bedroom to sleep in resulted in an hour long dilemma.  The irony was, that with this gigantic lake house at our disposal, we basically only really hung out in two rooms.  Even though the fishing was non-productive this weekend, I was able to sneak her favorite camera into the car, so what she didn't catch in fish, she made up for in pictures.

As for me, the topography surrounding a house built on a slope next to a lake and some in progress repairs on the front porch, compounded by the amount of stuff we had to haul in and out, really stressed my incision.  In my usual stubbornness, I didn't bother to take any precautions as I was rappelling down to the cabin from the car with loads of luggage and groceries...and worms.  After climbing up and down the hill, loading and unloading the car, and fishing, and just walking to the lake, luckily, I feel great.  So, even though this was a trip for my wife, it ended up being a boost for my own morale as well.  One more sign that this cancer stuff is getting further and further behind me.

So, I don't have to sneak around buying worms anymore, and I don't have to worry about all the people that were in on my wife's surprise trip slipping up and spilling the beans.  I did a bunch of stuff I shouldn't have physically this weekend, and I am none the worse for it.  Although with the storms, it wasn't the best trip, but it was still pretty good!

The Sarasota Redemption

I have been busy lately...and lazy lately, too.  We had to make an emergency trip to Florida, which as far as emergency trips go, Florida is not a bad place to emerge.  My wife volunteers for a basenji rescue organization, which means I volunteer by proxy.  Two basenjis didn't work out at their "forever home" and needed to go back to the foster in Florida.

When we were first made aware of the situation, we decided we would stay a few extra days and sneak in some rest and relaxation.  With only a week to make plans, we called up our friends down there who always say to come down anytime, who told us we couldn't come down then, they had guests already.  I thought that was rude, I mean, they have known their mom their whole life and have only known us a few years.  Who needs more time to catch up?  Regardless, we thought about option two, a friend of mine who loans me his vacation home down there who, without asking me, decided to stay in it himself.  So, this left us without a place to stay.  I frantically searched the internet all the next day trying to find some options without much luck, at least not in the price range of an unemployed cancer patient.  At the end of the day, we were discussing our options when we get the call that we will not be leaving the next week, we need to leave the next day.

The good news, we can stay with our friends, of whom I will now take back the comments I made in the previous paragraph.  The bad news, we literally had less than twelve hours to put everything into place.  Phone calls were made and we were able to put our plan into motion.  The next morning, I met another volunteer and received two very timid and scared basenjis.  I brought them home to the house, where they cowered in the corner of their crate.  Our oldest basenji immediately walked up and peed on their crate.  Not exactly the welcome I was hoping he would give them.  Since we had a night of driving ahead of us, I decided to let them look out the sliding glass door from their crate for a little bit while I grabbed a nap.

After waking, I put the crate in the bedroom, so they would feel a little more secure and opened the door expecting them to fly out of their confines.  After half an hour, and still no flying, I gave up.  I could get the one to eat out of my hand, but not come out of the cage.  I continued preparation until my wife returned from work.  After another agonizingly long time she was able to coax them out so we could take them to pee before our trip.  The female decided to pee in the middle of the hallway, no sense waiting until you get outside.  After a very scary trip outside (I am still not sure what was so scary out there, but they were definitely scared of something) we load up the two rescue basenjis and our two basenjis and start our fifteen hour trek.  The trip down was fairly uneventful, delivering the two rescues back to their familiar foster where they immediately got back into their old routine.  We then made the hour trip down to our friends.

After our last trip to the area, I was a little afraid it would end up the same, me curled up in a ball in pain after hurting myself again.  Luckily that didn't happen.  The trip went great.  We took the Curly Tail Mafia out for some fun (our two basenjis and our friend's shiba inu), we ate at some great places, we had lots of fun with our friends, and snuck out and had some fun on our own too.

In my cancer support group yesterday, I said that week was the first week since all this started that I didn't feel like a cancer patient.  I enjoyed myself and feel like this is starting to be behind me.  I say that as I stare down and impending scan.  I told the group I may "graduate" to the survivors group, but I am going to wait and see how bad my scanxiety is this next time.  Maybe Florida was the answer, and if my wife really loved me and cared about my well-being, she would let me move down there.  She could come too if she wants.

Cannot Express It

Lately I have been having trouble, mental trouble (which has resulted in me missing in action from here).  I have not had the best of luck lately, but at the same time, I kinda have.

Losing my job in August was at first devastating.  It was a job I loved to do and, when I lost it, I hated not being a part of it anymore.  As I decompressed in the days following my lay-off, it dawned on me (with a little help of my wife saying I wasn't as big of a jerk anymore) that I didn't love my job like I used to because I was no longer working that job.  There were two bosses I absolutely loved.  One passed away and the other retired.  When they were gone, so was the vision behind my job.  I kept trying to follow that vision and keep the mission going, while most of the people above me didn't understand the vision and wanted my position to go in a different direction.  The constant internal tug of war of wanting to do what I was hired for and having to do others things was wearing me down.  Being away from that helped me see it clearly that I wasn't as happy in the job as I had been at one point.

When I was diagnosed with cancer a couple of weeks later, the lack of a job (but the benefit of a severance package that may or may not have existed) made it possible to recover without having to ask off work or worry about getting things done in my absence.  And as I have said on here before, if I hadn't been laid off, I probably wouldn't have gone to the doctor when I did (because of time) and wouldn't have been diagnosed until my cancer had progressed much further.  Yes, I would rather be employed in a job I love and have two healthy nuts, but life can't go well for everyone all the time and I don't mind taking my turn at having some bad luck.

And I can see other positives as well.  I was struggling to get my boat I am restoring on the water.  I had hit a point where I just couldn't figure this one part out.  Having cancer stopped all work on the boat and winter postponed it even more.  The past few months I have been poring over three different engine manuals until the warm spell this week.  With months of reading manuals fresh in my head, I finally figured out what my problem was in about an hour and will have it fixed soon.  So, as with many of the negative things I have gone through lately, I have managed to find a positive thing that has come out of it as well.

I have been struggling with the concept of God's Will or Divine Intervention.  After all, does God really get involved in little things like whether the hydraulics on my boat work or even bigger things like my cancer?  I mean, surely there are bigger issues in the world that He is watching.  Either way I thank God for the good things in my life and I also thank Him that the bad things aren't worse.  I can comprehend my own life, but it's others I have really been struggling with.  I have met many people in my support group that I have gotten to know, appreciate, and care for.  Some of them seem to get shit on by life again and again, and I don't understand why.  You hear their absolutely bleak diagnoses and you wonder, why?  Now I say that with this caveat, doctors aren't necessarily the best with their "You have X amount of time left..." predictions.  I personally refer to these people as the "Living Dead" because they have been walking around in some cases dozens of years after the doctor told them they would succumb to the disease.  But it's more than just the cancer, other people dear to me have had things happen to them that put me at a loss to understand why things like this would ever happen in a world with a loving God.

Now don't for a second think that my faith in God is wavering, just my understanding.  In my own life, I can point to how every negative thing that has ever happened to me has either made my life better in the long run or made me a better person.  And the cliché is true "Sometimes bad things happen to good people" (and by the way, I just purposely misspelled "cliché" so I could use spell check because I don't know how to make that stupid little accent).  My problem isn't so much why do bad things happen to good people, but why don't bad things happen to bad people?  Or why don't they happen to bad people more often?

One theory I have come up with, from personal experience with bad people, is that sometimes bad things to bad people but they are such assholes that they don't even see it as a bad thing.  "My sister-in-law got burned up in a house fire when lightning struck her as she fell off a ladder while crashing through her skylight, and I got $1000 bucks in the will.  Kick ass!"  OK, I do know of someone who had an experience like that happen (although not as dramatic), but their reaction was exactly what I said (if not worse).  I also think that some of these bad people tend to brag about how great their life is, while trying to convince themselves that their life is as great as they say.  People that are truly happy don't tend to go around bragging about the stuff in their life.  If people that seem truly happy tend to tell you about the stuff they have, it is usually because they are offering to share it with you, such as my good friend who frequently loans me his Florida vacation home for free.

This stuff has been bothering me a lot starting at my cancer support group meeting two weeks ago, and it seems people that I care deeply about have been having horrible things happen to them since.  I told my wife today, I don't know how much more I want to go to the group meetings, because seeing people I care about hurt so much is affecting me negatively.  If I could understand the "why" it would be so much easier.  I have had some shit happen in my life, but overall, I think I have come out of life OK.  I would like to have a fun well paying job.  I would like to know what it feels like to go out and have a drink with friends.  I would like to leave the house and not panic because I left my glucose tabs or stomach medicine in my other jacket.  On the other hand, I am glad I have a family that loves and support me.  I am glad that the tough spots in my life have shown me who sticks by me in the long run (and I am glad that so many have).  I am glad I have two basenjis that are crazy.  I guess it boils down to this, maybe I would be better off married to Christy Turlington, or Mila Kunis, or Keira Knightley, or all three and a few others to be named later.  Maybe I would be better off if my last name was Disney.  Maybe I would be better off with a normal body that wasn't battered from arthritis, worn down from cancer treatment, twisted from GI problems, and with a weird eyeball on my eyeball.  But the question I ask myself, would I give up everything in my life and roll the dice again?  Maybe not get the same life, nor same friends, nor same family, etc.  I don't think I would take my chances like that.

I don't know if God has a "plan" for us.  I don't know how much of a role He plays in controlling our day to day life.  What I thought I had figured out I don't know anymore.  I don't know what I know or believe or how to express what I do think.  I don't know why bad things happen to good people, nor why good things sometimes happen to bad people.  All I know, is I think I am blessed, regardless of the things I wish were different in my life.  And I will continue to pray for the ones that I care about that their lives get better soon.

Sometimes Doctors Just Make Up Words...

If you read my blog from yesterday, last night I noticed a little bump on my eye.  Not on the lid, I have a little tiny eye ball on my eyeball.  Most people would never notice it was there, but I know it's there and that's what bothers me.  Although, when the light hits it just right, it's like a have a little glimmer in my eye.  I guess that can be kinda cool, even if the reason for the glimmer is depressing me.  Today I called the local ophthalmologist, who just happens to be closed on Fridays, which meant I had to go down the road to Wal-Mart's vision center.

The doctor at Wal-Mart was very nice (WOW, there is a group of words I never thought I would see together) and very quickly identified the problem.  I simply had a pingueculum, which I am sure you already guessed by now, but it was the first time I had ever heard of that word.  Apparently it is a Latin word that means "screw you I am here to stay and there isn't a darn thing you can do about it".  At least that is what I think it means from the explanation the doctor gave me.  Apparently in sunny climates nearer to the equator, people get these all the time from all of the sun.  Lately, here in Ohio if we want to see the sun, we have to look it up on the internet.  So, the probable cause of my penguinlump (or whatever it's called) is dust, which is very common up in our area.  He said it was no big deal, that many people get them.  In fact, he informed me there is a smaller one forming in my other eye too that I hadn't noticed yet.  Wow, I am twice as lucky as I originally thought.

Easy enough, so what is the cure you ask?  There basically is none.  They are there for life.  He tells me that I can have it surgically removed, but they usually come right back.  Well, that's good to know.  (Although, my wife did do some research and apparently a new type of surgery only has a 4% chance of them reoccurring).  He said that I should probably start using fake tears to keep that area from drying out, because when that area dries out it gets irritated, and when it gets irritated it gets bigger.  Even better news!  The other thing is to wear sunglasses.

I hate wearing all glasses.  Now anyone that knows me at all, knows that I think girls in glasses are hot (that's why I keep putting sand in my wife's contact case), so it's kind of ironic that I hate wearing glasses myself.  I have owned two pair of sunglasses my adult life.  The first pair was for riding a bike.  You only need a few bugs in your eyes and to be riding a bike blind for a few minutes on a busy street to realize you need glasses to protect you.  And a couple of years ago, my wife gave me the ultimatum that if I didn't get some sunglasses she wouldn't let me on a boat.  Outside of that I have never had nor worn sunglasses.  Now just for clarification I do wear safety glasses, especially when dealing with metal shavings.  You only need to hear one story on how they have to grind the metal out of your eyeball, before you decide you don't want to deal with that.

While at Wal-Mart, I bought my eye drops, so half of my assignment was done.  Now I had to do the dreaded search for sunglasses.  The good news is, winter in Ohio isn't a really busy time for sunglass counters, meaning I didn't have to wait in any long lines.  The bad new is, winter in Ohio isn't a really busy time for sunglass counters, so their stock is limited.  We finally found a store with a good selection and I think I was made to try on every pair...twice...some four times.  The selection process went sort of like this.  I find a pair I like.  My wife wrinkles her nose and gives me at least three reasons why she hates it and why my choice sucks.  She grabs a pair of tortoise shell framed glasses for me to try on.  I say I don't want tortoise shell frames they look to feminine.  I grab another pair and we repeat the whole process again.  This goes on for at least four hours (according to my internal man-clock) with the salesperson usually siding with my wife (a female conspiracy).  Until we had it narrowed down to two pair.  A pair that costs $50 and a pair of Ray-Bans that cost $150.  Since I never plan on buying another pair of sunglasses for the rest of my life, I justified the $150 Ray-Bans.  The main reason is they have those springy little arms that not only feel better against my noggin, but also won't break when someone who hasn't worn glasses for most of his thirty-nine years (plus one) rips his glasses off the wrong way.

The part of the evening that baffled me, is we passed through a shoe sale and a purse sale and my wife started drooling.  I told her I didn't really have any room to do any complaining after my purchase, and for the one and only time in my life, I would watch her by a purse or pair of shoes, without pointing out the thirty-seven other pairs she has just like it.  My wife looked at me, definitely stunned, and what surprised me, is she didn't buy anything!!!  I think it was like going fishing versus buying fish sticks at the grocery store.  I guess buying shoes and purses is no fun if there is no sport involved in aggravating me by it.  I am tempted to use this reverse psychology in the future, but I think I would be pressing my luck (plus she reads these sometimes).

I now have every thing I need to treat my pingpongdudrum.  I have the eye drops and an expensive pair of sunglasses.  The article also mentioned that staring at LCD monitors can aggravate pingearcolumns, which not only cuts down on my planned study of internet pornography in the future (unless I have my sunglasses on), but is my excuse for any typos from now on.  I am not proofreading for my health!

After Cancer You Can't "Don't Worry About It"

Today I arrived early for my cancer support group.  Shortly after two others came in and we were talking a bit before the rest of the group arrived.  One person had missed that previous week and was asking about my results.  I told her I received the results of all my tests and that the lumps in my kidneys were just cysts.

This brought on a conversation amongst the three of us, all sharing the common bond of cancer.  When the lumps (or doctor's speak "masses") first showed up on my CT scan, I was told "It's probably nothing to worry about" and "Don't worry about it".  All three of us in the room had heard that message at one point or another in our treatment, and all three of us found it impossible "not to worry about it".  After you are told you have the Big C, any unknown is something to worry about.

Here are suggestions of things I can "not worry about".  A mechanic saying the tires will need replacing by next winter but in the mean time don't worry about it.  Not getting home in time to see a favorite TV show, it is now available on-demand so don't worry about it.  You forgot to send a obscene e-mail forward to your friend, you can always send it later, don't worry about it.  The restaurant you choose doesn't serve Pepsi, don't worry about it....well, that one actually is a pretty big deal.

My point is, doctors that haven't been through a cancer scare in their own life, don't know how hard it is not to worry about something when there is even the tiniest hint of a chance that it may be related to cancer.  A friend that has helped me a lot through my journey is living eight years cancer free.  For the past eight years they have flown through every exam without a problem...until this last one.  They had a questionable result and were told not to worry about it.  They told me that they did worry about it a lot.  Luckily it turned out to be nothing to worry about, for real.  But my friend's point to me was, the "not worry about it" syndrome never goes away, no matter how many good results you get in the mean time.  It's a perfectly normal reaction.

Later in group, completely unrelated to our pre-group conversation, the topic came up where two people mentioned how their "don't worry about it" diagnosis went on for years and later turned out to be cancer.  Now I am not saying that one shouldn't listen to their doctor's advice when told not to worry about it, but those of us who have lived through cancer and those of us who know someone who should have worried about it, we can't not worry about it.  Luckily, more often that not it really is nothing to worry about.

The ironic thing is as I was preparing to write tonight, I noticed a raised bump on my eye.  As most of us do in this modern age, I did a little internet research on what it could be.  Most of the things on the internet say "don't worry about it" but see a doctor immediately.  I bet you can guess what I am going to do as soon as the doctor's office opens.

How To Gut Your Past And Hurt Your Gut

The outside temperature was bitter cold and I didn't feel too bad, so I finally decided to head up to my shop and clean out snake alley.  Overall things went OK, I might even say better than expected.

I felt like I was preparing to board the space shuttle, it took about fifteen minutes to get ready.  I wore thermal socks, a pair of pants, a pair of ski pants over them, a shirt, a sweatshirt, insulated steel toe boots, then it's time to put on the abdominal brace, then a jacket, then another jacket, then a balaclava, then put on my hood, then my gloves, then the handwarmers inside the gloves, and then I am ready...to pee.  So I peel everything off, pee and start all over again.

Working in the shop wasn't too bad.  I actually had to unzip my jacket and switched from my balaclava to a hat. With the amount of snakeskins I found originally I had expected to find them throughout the area I was working in, but they were just at the front.  It appears that it is just one rat bastard snake messing with me.  Every year I try to make the area less and less hospitable for the serpents, but yet they still manage to sneak in.  I think I finally found the place they are getting in at.  So, between giving them less places to hang out, I hope that blocking the spot they come in at will really aggravate them enough that they decide to go somewhere else, maybe your house.  I don't care as long as it isn't where I am.

The area I was cleaning up was what I refer to as the "Engine Room".  Yes, I have some many spare motors that I have a room in my shop dedicated to them.  Besides having a bunch of engines in this room, I also have all the trappings of my bachelor life.  After being up there for ten years, I have come to the revelation that I am not going to use that stuff anytime soon, plus some of it is ruined, and when I get divorced, my nineteen year-old girlfriend(s) will probably want different stuff anyway.  I had about ten of those plastic tote box thingys to go through.  I had three piles:  keep, donate, throw away.  When I was done I had three boxes of keep, three of recycle, one donate, and about eight garbage bags of throw away.  Yes, I will probably be sued by the garbage man tomorrow.

There were some pleasant surprises though.  For some reason, anything I place in this part of my shop seems to mildew almost immediately.  It's like a little Bermuda Triangle for mold.  It doesn't really hurt the engines, because I coat them with Vaseline before they are stored (it's an old racers' trick).  The only problem was when initially buying the family size economy five gallon bucket of Vaseline, explaining to my wife what my intentions for that much Vaseline were.  When I opened up case after case, most of the stuff I cared about was mildew free!  There were things I thought were going to be ruined that were just fine.  There were other things that I thought I had lost, because I didn't remember putting them in these cases, that I found.  And still other things that I had just plain forgot about.  What I also found were more things to sell on ebay, things that I have already been selling well.

I finished just as it was getting dark outside.  With help from the abdominal brace, I managed to make it through the whole ordeal with out any reinjury of my surgery, it was just every other part of my body that hurts.  I don't know why it feels like I have been on a bike for five hours, when I didn't have a chance to sit down at all, but every single part of my body hurts.  I came down to the house, very slowly and groaning, and jumped in the shower.  As the hot water from the shower defrosted my blubber, I started to loosen up a little. The pains subsided just a bit, and I toweled off...that's is when I somehow managed to pull my incision.  I don't know how I could do all the twisting, tugging, pulling, moaning, whining, and snake detesting without any problem, but the simple act of toweling off manage to hurt it.  I guess I will just drip dry from now on.

So, I feel good that I finished a project that I have been wanting to do for a long time.  I am glad I was able to rescue a few mementos of my bachelor life and clean out my engine room.  I am hurting all over, but I think my incision isn't hurting as bad as it has in the past.  Hopefully tomorrow the tightness and soreness of the rest of my body will mask the pain in my incision.

Oncologists Do Care About Swimmers Sometimes

As I have mentioned earlier, the thing that has been bothering me lately is my questionable swimmers.  At one point I was told they were normal at another point I was told they were abnormal.  Giving someone hope then recalling that hope is worse than not giving the hope in the first place.  At least that is how I feel about it.

Last week I had a heart to heart with my oncologist and told him how much it was bothering me and that I didn't feel like waiting around until May to check the swimmers again as my urologist/surgeon had suggested.  My oncologist was in a hurry and didn't really seem to be very interested in the conversation, but he said he agreed with me, made some suggestions and sent me on my way.  I assumed that was the end of it.

Then this week my oncologist called while I was gone.  The first reason I like my oncologist is that he didn't wait until I was home and leave some cryptic message, he talked to my wife and gave her information he knew I wanted to know.  I am sure he broke fifteen or twenty "rules" about divulging medical information, but as the patient, I appreciate it.  My wife has been to just about every oncologist appointment with me, and oncologists' calls are usually pretty important.  One doesn't generally want to wait until the "next business day" to start playing phone tag.

The information he gave was my lab results saying that my "tumor markers" came back good.  I have no idea what the heck "tumor markers" are, but if he is happy about them I am too.  Whoopee tumor markers!  What really impressed me though is that the subject I thought he was blowing off, he actually cared about and thought about after the appointment.  He said he consulted some colleagues and they agreed that May seemed like a long time to wait to see if my swimmers could go in the deep end when they should be back to the pre-chemo ways much sooner than that.

What is really cool, is that my oncologist came up with a way to not offend my urologist, by simply not telling him I was doing any of this.  He suggested we go to a "fertility specialist" that will have me tested right away. I mention this to my cancer support group, where there has been another individual in a similar position.  Somehow during the conversation I mention that wives are not allowed in the room during the "testing" to which they replied that they got to "test" as a couple.  I feel cheated!  I mean the first few times were fine being alone.  After all I had a lot of reading material to look through, but now that I have seen all of those sticky pages, I wouldn't mind going through the test without having to touch something that cracked when you turned the pages.

All of this has put me in a much better mood than I have been during the scanxiety.  I have a plan again, and hopefully will gain some good news or at least have a good game plan mapped out.  If nothing else, I get to watch some "documentaries" again.

Sometimes A Late Night Is Just A Late Night

Last night I planned on writing as soon as I finished my project.  But at 4am I didn't feel much like writing.  The good news is, I can tell it not scanxiety related insomnia, because if it were, I would be ready to do the same thing again, but I am not.  I have been dead tired all day.

I doubt I am alone.  If you are doing a boring, tedious project (especially if it is for someone else) sometimes you are glad to find an excuse to quit that project and do something else, even if that something else is sleep.  When the project is your hobby and it is something you are excited to finish, nothing will get in your way.  And that is what my issue was last night.  I only had a few things left to finish, and I didn't want to wake up with a mess in the floor reminding me that I can't play until I finish what I had started.

I had also planned on writing the night before, but in preparation for my pet project, I decided to clean to the equipment I was installing last night.  Two hours of scrubbing later and my wrists were shot and flopping around like a sock monkey's arms.  I could barely hold my Pepsi much less write.  And I said barely hold on to my Pepsi.  Even if I were just a head, I could find a way to drink my Pepsi.

So, with my late night romp last night, my wife accused me of just being a normal insomniac and wanting me to find some prescription relief from my doctor.  There is a big difference between staying up late occasionally and scanxiety insomnia or even regular insomnia.  For instance, with my scanxiety, I went to bed only out of habit and then usually just laid there staring at the ceiling for another hour or two.  I could get four hours of sleep or less and be ready to do it all over again the next day.  Last night, I was dead tired when I finished my project and I think I actually fell asleep on the way to the bed.  And today, even though I slept in late, my butt has been dragging all day.  I don't think I will have any trouble getting to sleep tonight.

Outside of last night, ever since my oncologist appointment, my sleep pattern is almost that of a normal human being.  Hopefully this means my wife will quit bugging me about needing some sort of sleep aid, until my scanxiety returns in three months with my next oncologist appointment, then we can start all over again.

Braced For Impact Wrench

With the heatwave we had today, I knew it was a good day to get outside.  With temperatures soaring just above freezing, I took my wife's car to my workshop for an oil change.  I put on my "abdominal brace" and waddled to work.

Up to this point I have only been wearing my abdominal brace when walking around the yard.  I haven't been doing anything that requires bending with it on, because quite frankly you cannot bend with it on.  For just walking around the yard, it doesn't do too bad.

With the snow beginning to melt, I also put on my heavy snow boots.  I was up in my workshop with the abdominal brace's lattice work digging in to my back and immobilizing me from the waist up, and clomping around in the heavy rubber steel-toed boots that really don't bend at the ankle at all.  I was stumbling around up there like an arthritic Frankenstein after hemorrhoid surgery.

I will say this much for the abdominal brace, it did help my ailing incision with only a mildly intense pain in my back.  I don't know if it was from trying to bend over with this complicated contraption on, or just the nature of the brace itself, but I feel like I have been bailing hay for eight hours, then decided to lift weights for another eight hours, all after spending the night sleeping on the hood of a '54 Cadillac...sideways.  In other words, my back is really hurting.  But the oil is changed and that is all that is important.  Now I don't have to worry about the car breaking down while my wife drives me to the emergency room.

My incision area is still bothering me, I am assuming it is the stitches dissolving like the doctor said.  Even though the brace causes severe back pain, that is a lesser evil than severe abdominal pain.  Until I heal I will just continue to wear it and walk around in the snow like a cowboy mummy.

The First Three Month Cancer Results Are In!

I took an unwanted break from writing mainly because I couldn't focus long enough to write.  Between the doctors' appointments last week and the appointment yesterday, I was thinking about results, questions, possibilities, outcomes, etc.

The good news is that my results from my first three month cancer check-up were clear!  I didn't really expect any result other than that, but no matter how much I try to tell myself everything is going to be fine, it is kind of hard to convince myself completely.  After all, I didn't expect to find cancer in the first place.  But that is behind me, and I have three months before I start worrying again.

I was more anxious to talk to the oncologist about my swimmers though.  Although I trust my urologist, I feel like he was a little rash when he told me to basically forget about any baby making for another six months.  I have been anxious to get back to baby making, and not just because of the fun involved in mixing the ingredients.  There are several reasons, but I think there is a part of me that feels like I will be moving past all of this cancer crap once the baby stuff gets back on track.

My tests revealed that my swimmers weren't the strong swimmers we initially thought.  I suspect part of that is my fault for getting tested as soon as they said I could.  In my haste to move on with my life, I ran to the spankatorium to find out if we could start again.  I wonder if I would have waited a few more days if the problem swimmers would have completely left the pool.  That is where I differ with my urologist.  His idea is to just do another test in May.  Well, my first problem with that is that I don't know that we have to wait the full time frame to see if I rushed things the first time.  My second problem is that his math was way off!  The amount of days he said we should wait would have landed me somewhere in March, but then he said May.

There is a part of me that is a little embarrassed about all of this too.  I don't want to become a regular at the jerknasium.  I walk in and they tell me they have my favorite magazines laid out for me already and the video is cued up to where I stopped it last time.  But I want to know when the games can start again.  I don't care if I have to go in there a thousand times, I want to know exactly when it is safe to start again (although admittedly after a thousand times I may be a little chafed).

I had a heart to heart with my oncologist about this yesterday and he kind of agrees with me that the sooner the better.  I asked him how to keep from offending my urologist and he said to not even go through him.  He suggested working through my wife's doctor to order the test since she is the one I am trying to impregnate (my wife, not the doctor).  He called this plan the "backdoor way" of getting my tests done.  I go out to the car, excited about my oncologist's idea, and as soon as I said the words "backdoor way" in relation to getting pregnant, I was immediately vetoed.  However, once she heard what the "backdoor way" was and that it had nothing to do with the plan that was conjured up in her mind by those words, she was more receptive to it (figuratively and literally).

So, that is where I am currently at as far as getting cancer behind me.  I am clean.  I don't plan on getting recancered anytime soon.  I just want to be that One Nut Wonder.  Now off to the Backdoor Cave and make a call with the Back Phone, to put the Back Plan in action.

Fears Subsided But Validated

I met a friend for lunch today.  She is a fairly good friend and she asked how my appointments went yesterday.  I told her about how the nurse mistakenly told me my swimmers were OK and how my wife and I thought it was OK to start trying for baby again and her face went pale.  Luckily (?) we are not preggers right now, so I don't have to worry about any damage done from my chemo cooked swimmers.  But her reaction today showed me that maybe I wasn't over reacting yesterday.  It is one thing if God gives you a special needs child, it is another thing to do something that caused your child to be a special needs child.  That is why most of us don't smoke, drink, do drugs, bungi jump, work in nuclear power plants, or watch Jersey Shore while pregnant.  I can't imagine the amount of guilt I would have had if we had a child that was born facing challenges their whole life because of something I had done, i.e. chemo side effects (knowingly or unknowingly).  So, I am feeling a little better about that issue today.

Other bad news I almost got was that our dear rescue basenji darted out the front door when a delivery driver came to drop off a package.  My wife and I were both gone at the time so it had the potential to be a very bad situation.  Luckily it was very cold and snowy yesterday so she ran all the way from the front door to the back door to be let back in.  She made it back there before my mother-in-law could even put on her coat to go chase after her.  I guess it is a good thing that African dogs don't have much fur, otherwise she may have tried to stay out longer.

Daisy the abused and neglected basenji paid me back this morning  for her little excursion by eating part of a stuff toy causing the stuff toy to re-emerge while I was trying to sleep...three different times.  The mistake I made was telling my wife and mother-in-law about it.  To understand why that was a mistake I will run through my first waking moments today.  I wake up to the unmistakable noise of a dog puking, and knowing I am too late to do anything about it.  I lay my head down in disgust, not wanting to deal with it, then I hear that same sound again, but this time I am awake so I am able to throw a dog blanket under her to keep it off the carpet, and success!  I lay back on the bed to revel in my success, when I hear a third mess being created and instantly deposited on the carpet.  I drag myself out of bed, walk the dogs in the bitter cold, then come in to clean up the messes.  I come out from my cleaning just to get asked to explain everything in detail to my mother-in-law.  I finally think I am done talking about dog regurgitation, when my wife calls.  I mention Daisy ate another stuff toy, with the usual outcome, and I again get asked about time, coordinates, etc.  And now for some reason I am writing about it...

I did briefly try out my "abdominal brace" today while I walked the dogs, and it actually works very well and allows me to walk normally.  I don't know if I will use it out in public or not.  It would have a rather slimming effect the way it compresses the gut to hold everything in place, except that the adjustable scaffolding in the back, the contraption that allows it to brace, is a huge bulge that sticks out so much it won't even fit under clothes.  I guess I will have to find a long jacket.  I plan to use the brace tomorrow as I take advantage of the bitter cold and clean out the snake haunts in my shop and hopefully leave them with nowhere to hang out anymore.

So that is my life about now.  It's just a rootin' tootin', doggy pukin', snakepit bootin', workshop lootin', Daisy losin' 'n' return to roostin', tummy boostin', no swimmer shootin' kinda week.

Apparently, My Swimmers Should Stay In The Shallow End...

Today was my scan and my urologist appointment.  Two things I wouldn't necessarily say I was looking forward to, but I was anxious to get them out of the way.

With the foretold doom and gloom from the purveyors of precipitation prediction, I left the house a half an hour early and with all the inclement weather...I ended up at my doctor's office an hour early.  I am not sure where I drove through a time shifting wormhole, I think I should have taken a left turn at Albuquerque, but whatever the reason, I suddenly had an hour to kill.  Luckily my scan orders weren't for any specific time and the hospital was less than a mile from the urologist office.  I thought an hour would be more than enough time to get irradiated.  I forgot, however, about hospital bureaucracy.  After all the red tape and going to this desk, then that one, then the other one, I flew into my urologist's office with less than five minutes to spare.  I don't get the scan results until I talk to my oncologist next Friday, but the lady didn't have the "Oh, crap!" look on her face when she looked at them that the nurse that did my ultrasound had on her face when they found the cancer.  I am taking that as a good sign.

While signing in at the urologist's office, the receptionist was asking the usual litany of questions, among them was if I had a procedure done.  I wasn't sure what she meant or why she was asking (maybe it looked like I had lost weight in the groinal area) so I said I had the one procedure in September.  She responded by asking if that was the only procedure.  I stated that I only had one left, so there wasn't too many more procedures he could do.

I go back to the exam room and tell the doctor of the problems I have been having.  First he discussed the results of my testosterone level test.  He said I am at the bottom end of normal, which isn't bad considering I  have only half of the production facilities.  Next, he looked at the area that my general practitioner had suspected that a stitch trying to push its way out.  He grabbed a package containing some fierce looking tweezers, and digging around down there, pulled out a stitch!  It was like a magic trick...that hurts and bleeds a little.  Next we addressed the thorn in my side ever since the operation (figuratively and literally).  He came up with two scenarios.  Option one is that I could have scar tissue that is constantly building up, and for some reason the walking is breaking it apart causing the pain.  I am still not sure I understand that explanation, which is probably why he gave it to me to shut me up and get me to quit whining.  The other thing that could be happening is that my stitches are dissolving.  Apparently they dissolve at different speeds in different bodies, and the fact that he pulled one out of me today is evidence that they haven't dissolved completely yet.  He says as these stitches are starting to dissolve they get weaker and break, which could be that "popping" feeling I have been experiencing.  The only solution he had for me was an "abdominal brace" to use just when I plan on doing a lot of walking, since every time it has let loose, I have been doing a lot of walking.

So I went to Wal-Mart, which in itself is a lot of walking, and found their assortment of braces and supports.  Most focus on the back, but I did find an abdominal one under a pile of dust.  It basically looks like a back brace that has been slid around to the front and had $10 added on to the price tag.  I haven't really walked with it yet, since I was already hurting pretty bad from walking around trying to find it, but I did try it on.  Basically, you strap on this elastic and velcro thing fairly snugly.  Then, there is a ring that you pull and through a complex series of cables, pulleys, and winches in the back, it supplies the added support.  I must say, just from walking around a little bit to test it tonight, it feels really good.  I am just fortunate that this is happening in the winter, where I have heavy jackets to cover up this contraption!  My wife says is looks like some S & M mechanism.  I will admit I am not that up on S & M paraphernalia, so I guess I have some research to do the next time I can't sleep.

There is one final bit that I have left out about today.  The urologist discussed the last test I took and I will admit, it has me more than a little bummed, even on the verge of depressed.  When I went to read my dirty magazines, the nurse called and said I didn't have many swimmers, but I had swimmers.  I specifically remember asking her, if they were good swimmers and she said they were.  Today, I found out that was not the case.  I don't have many swimmers, and a good portion of the ones I do have are not very good ones.  I don't remember the exact term he used, I just know as he was describing them, I am thinking of little sperm swimming in neverending circles, a few ramming repeatedly into random objects, and other sperm just wiggling around aimlessly screaming "I want a juice box!".  The good news is that I am producing the little guys so the chemo didn't shut down the factory.  However, it appears that the factory hasn't yet been retooled after the chemo (pun intended), and that I haven't completely gotten rid of the affected guys yet.  It can take as long as seventy two days for the little guys to regenerate, so he wants me to wait another three months, and test again.  And I am definitely NOT supposed to try to have kids in the mean time.

First of all, I know this wasn't a big setback.  We have frozen guys, and it isn't out of the ordinary at all for the little guys to be affected like this.  When the factory starts pumping out quality product again, the baby making attempts can resume.  What I will admit was absolutely devastating to me today was that two weeks ago the nurse told me I was good to go.  When you hear so much bad news, the good news really lifts you up, and to get told today that what the nurse told me was incorrect seemed like it knocked me down lower than I was before.  I know it shouldn't bother me.  It is a minor set back.  But it is bothering me.  A lot.  Four months from now, I should be able to move on with our plans for baby making.  It is just that I thought I had a bulk of this cancer crap behind me, and today I get told I have this Klingon that won't get off my butt.

Trying to always find the bright side in everything, I admit it was kind of tough today.  I was just blindsided by that news.  The one thing that kept me from really getting down in the dumps was I had told my good buddy Willie before today that I would stop by his house that is within a mile of my doctor's office.  As usual, Willie cheered me up with random fire department stories and tales of the latest thing he hid from his wife and got busted on.  It worked out well that I saw him within five minutes of the news today.  I guess one of the few bright spots is by May, there should be some new magazines in the jerkatorium for my next test.