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".

The Best Gift I Have Received Throws Up On Me...

When you are about to have your first child there are tons of tidbits of wisdom that people will tell you.  I gladly listened to everything people told me making mental notes along the way.  Having just made it six months with my new best friend, I feel I am becoming quite accustomed to this new life.  Some of the things people told us were about the negative aspects of having a child.  I think the big factor in this for us, is how badly we had wanted a child, how long we had been trying, and finally after the cancer/miscarriage/fertility treatments how much we went through before we were successful.

One thing we heard over and over again was how exhausted we would be.  Now, I will admit we aren't as well rested as we were six months ago.  I can't remember the last time we were able to just sleep in as long as we liked.  But I certainly wouldn't call it "exhausted".  One thing we have going for us, is our child has been an overnight sleeper since we brought him home from the hospital.  I think the shortest he ever slept overnight was maybe four hours when he was first brought home.  The other reason I don't think I am tired is I enjoy the time I get to spend with him.  Think of something you really enjoyed, like for me going to Walt Disney World, for you it might be reading my blog...if it is something you really had fun doing, you get whatever sleep you can and do it again first chance you get.

The other very cliched comment is that you will never know how much love you will have for the baby.  Waiting until forty-one to have my first child, trust me a lot of anticipation and love had built up.  I love my little guy a lot, and that love started the day my wife walked out of the bathroom with a pee-soaked stick.  What has surprised me is just how much I like being around him.  Even from the beginning when all he was doing was laying there and messing diapers, I cherished every second with him.  Now I will say this.  He seems like a very happy baby and everyone tells us he is a happy baby.  That certainly helps.  Even when changing a diaper he looks up and smiles and either grabs my arm or if I am careless enough he will grab the clean diaper and play keep away with me, which is apparently very funny when you are six months old.

But then again everything seems to be funny to our six month old.  A hand full of someone else's hair is freakin' hilarious!  Rubbing bare feet on daddy's head or whiskers is also a great source of amusement.  The phrase "peas and apples"  is the greatest joke ever told, ranking right up there with "The Aristocrats".  I have no idea why "peas and apples" induces uncontrollable laughter, but I think it's pretty obvious that he has his daddy's sophisticated sense of humor.

The other side is, I am probably one of those obsessive and over-protective parents.  When you have gone through your own health scare you realize just how precious and fragile life is.  Someone told us the other day that kids aren't that fragile at all, all three of theirs rolled off the bed at one point as babies.  That led to a conversation after we left that person about how after the first roll off (or at the very least the second roll off) wouldn't you take precautions to prevent future roll offs?  This person claimed there was no harm done...but there's one we think the jury is still out on.

I may have given my son his first real electric guitar this week as well (which means I did give him his first electric guitar).  Now I know what you are thinking, "He's six months old, he can't play an electric guitar" and you are exactly right, that is why his is half the size of a normal one.  And since it is difficult for him to strum and hold down the strings, I even brought out a thing that automatically moves the strings for him, so he can just focus on the fretboard for now.  See, doesn't sound near as crazy now, does it?

What I am getting at, is this is the greatest gift I have ever been given.  We waited a long time for him and went through a lot to get him.  Even when during a diaper change he accidentally peed in his face, which literally scared the crap out of him, all I could do was clean him up and laugh.  Being spit up on twice a day, doesn't bother me, I just add the clothes to the huge pile of other garments he finds creative ways to soil.  In other words, even the bad times are some of the best times of my life, so you can imagine how great the good times are.  And hopefully by next week we will be playing our guitars together...

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!

Tommy's Big Day Out, Where He Saw A Real Live (Gassy) Baby

Yesterday I had lunch with two more friends.  The one brought her children, including her baby that was born just before I started chemo, so I haven't seen the baby since.  Let the record show that I was brave enough to hold the baby the day she was born.  I was asked if I wanted to hold the baby yesterday, and I declined.  I returned the baby unbroken last time, and didn't feel like pushing my luck.

I am learning a lot about babies with all of my friends that are popping them out left and right.  The only thing I haven't been learning is how to create them as easy as everyone else seems to be able to.  One thing that I supposedly learned is that babies can be gassy.  This is one of those things I didn't need to know.  I am a little suspicious about this one.  I don't think baby farts can make that much noise, especially when it is muffled by a diaper, tights, dress, blanky, another blanky, another blanky, all in a travel seat.  I am more inclined to believe that it was produced by the friend sitting across from me who didn't have near the sound deadening material that the baby did.  If it truly was the baby, I would hate to hear what it would sound like if the baby was going commando.

And from what I can tell, babies are very fragile, which is the main reason I am afraid to hold them, plus the whole atomic fart thing that I learned yesterday.  I had already been hoping that when we do get pregnant we have multiples anyway.  This is for several reasons, my wife says she is only going to be pregnant once so if I want more than one kid, I better make sure there are twins or triplets.  Another reason, with my former and recent illnesses I realize how quickly I can become dependent on others, and the more kids I can have waiting on me the better.  I also figure with mulitples, I have better chances of one of them being a millionaire and taking care of me, or at the very least if I really screw up one of them really bad (through poor parenting, feeding them the same crap I eat, accidental dropping, stuff like that) I will have at least one more to fall back on.  And the lastly, I would like multiples because I am the guy so I won't have to deal with the extra tenants in my body for nine months, so what do I care?  When you come right down to it, us guys are carrying millions of potential little ones all the time and you don't hear us complaining...except sometimes on our birthdays.

There may be a high chance that we will have multiples.  For one, I read on-line (which is always true) that sweet potatoes increase the likelihood of having twins (or more) so I have been urging my wife to eat them every chance she gets.  Plus I keep a stack of them by the bed and shove them into her mouth when she snores, so she is getting a heck of a lot of them that way too.  The more likely reason for multiples is that we don't know if my swimmers have survived the chemo yet.  I don't take that test for about a month (and I haven't even started studying yet).  If my little guys are just as tired as I am from the chemo, chances are we will have to make a withdrawal from the "bank".  And we all know that when you use your bank deposits, the chances of multiples increase.  I say we all know that because the results of that are the corner stone for TLC's programming.  I don't want more than five though, because my wife's car can only hold seven people and she swears up and down she will never upgrade to a "mom-mobile".  I guess we could have six, I mean I don't have to go with her when she takes six kids out at once, do I?  That would free up a seat.

As you can see, the visit with my friends yesterday got me thinking about all of these good ideas, and kept me up most of the night.  Seeing the little baby made me want one even more, not enough to steal hers though...at least not after I found out how gassy she was.  I am thankful we didn't have one during this cancer stuff, I don't know that I would have been able to deal with that on top of everything else.  Plus in my weakened state, the basenjis may have plotted to overthrow the house and coerced the baby into an alliance with them and voted us out of the house (the vote would have been three against two, assuming my wife would vote with me, sometimes I think she is plotting with the basenjis).  I guess in addition to studying for my "swimmer's" test I should also read up on all these weird things that come with conceiving and having a baby(s) and also try kissing up to the dogs so they'll be on my side.

Tom's 2010 Comeback Tour

I am still fatigued, but I am continuing on my Comeback Tour.  And much like Elvis' Comeback Special, I feel overweight, I sweat and grunt with just a little bit of exertion, none of my clothes seem to fit the same as they did (especially my sequin jumpsuits), and some days I feel like I am going to die on the toilet.

Yesterday I met with an older friend who I enjoy talking to a whole lot despite the forty year age difference.  It then dawns on me, that when I finally do have a child, there will be a forty year age difference.  I wonder if my child will see me as a source of wisdom and great stories as I view my friend, or will I still be just an embarrassing parent?  My money is on the embarrassing parent, at least that is what I am aiming for.

Today I met with another good friend I haven't seen in a while.  The first thing she said was that my mustache looked good.  That is a good friend, to tell a bold-faced lie to you just to make you feel good.  Liz, I know my Mo looks ridiculous, you can admit it.  It was good talking to her.  Of course the cancer stuff came up, I mean it has been a big event that I have been dealing with, and she hasn't seen me since it all started.  But we also got to talk about a lot of non-cancer stuff, which was good.  She showed me lots of pictures of her recent trip to China, in which I learned I am not going to China unless I am allowed to bring my own toilet.  I have seen photos of friends' visits to China before, but her visit was away from the traditional tourist areas and I found them fascinating, and I am not just saying that because she sometimes reads my blogs, I am saying that because they were a lot better than most people's usual boring vacation pics (like the ones I show people that frequently involve a large cartoon rodent).

After that great visit, it was time for my cancer support group.  One of my favorites showed up today!  I was getting a little worried, because neither my wife nor I have seen her or her husband in our respective groups, but it turned out that it was just a coincidence that we kept missing alternating groups, and they are doing OK, despite being cancer patients.  The non-therapying therapist that I like is doing the snowbird thing and we were introduced to our winter non-therapying therapist, who tends to therapize a little more that I thought they were supposed to.  But to be fair, I really like our snowbird guy, so I guess I need to give this new guy a chance.  One of the subjects we discussed today was paying for long-term care of loved ones.  I suggested that if insurance refused to pay for long-term care of your loved one, you could always abuse them, then the state would step in and take care of them for you (which should scare the crap out of my parents that I even came up with that thought, I hear an American made Paul Reed Smith with double cutaways and twenty four frets makes children forget a lot of things and really want to treat their parents well in their twilight years...I'm just saying...).  Everyone seemed to be amused and laughed at my comment, knowing that I only half meant it, including the person that brought up the subject that seemed to laugh a little too hard, I don't know if they were so frustrated with insurance that they were actually considering my plan or not.  However, new non-therapying therapist didn't seem to be near as amused.  Heck, we are cancer patients, we can joke.  Does he want us to just sit around and talk about how much our lives suck right now?  Because I do that in my blogs and to my wife and to the basenjis, I don't need to do that in group too.  After all, that's why my wife goes to her group to complain about my complaining.  The two basenjis don't have a group, except each other, and since they are barkless dogs they don't say much.

And speaking about how life can suck, one of the best things about group is getting the experience of the group and hearing about new technologies, treatments, and treatment center reviews.  This chemo fatigue is really bothering me.  I feel like such a lazy bum because I can't lift much and I get so exhausted, even from eating pancakes and changing channels.  So I mention it to the group (and I can say this about group in specifics because it was about me) and all of the other people that have been on or are currently on chemo said I am perfectly normal...well as normal as an unemployed, one nutted, cancer patient that suggests elder abuse to pay for medical bills, can be.  They said shaking the chemo fatigue does take a while, a lot longer than all of the other chemo symptoms.  One suggested taking a regular midday nap until I get my strength back (I liked to hear that), while another said with chemo fatigue naps may have little effect (which I didn't like hearing as much, so I took a nap).  As usual, group was very helpful.  We laughed, we cried, we group hugged-which I still don't like group hugging, but I don't mind tolerating if it helps someone else.

I need to rest up for tomorrow as my tour continues.  After hanging out with a seventy nine year old yesterday, I am hanging out with two twenty year olds tomorrow.  I need two of them, just to give them a fighting chance.  Although I am closer in age to the twenty year olds, the seventy nine year old is still easier to figure out what he is talking about.  I enjoy the twenty year olds' company regardless and I am sure we will have a great time talking about what a wonderful person I am.  Plus, compared to the boys the twenty year olds hang around, my Mo will look normal.

Yesterday, After The Urologist

After the doctor's appointment yesterday, I decided to get out in the real world for a change.  Although I have done that the previous week, this time involved multiple errands, with multiple stops.

I started off by heading to my firefighter buddy's house.  I almost teared up a little bit.  He had seen my Mo for Movember when we went to lunch last week and had decided to grow one in support.  Since his Mo is about a week behind, it looks about as pathetic as mine.  One thing many of us newly mustachioed men are finding, is that the women in our life, although they fully support the Movember movement, are not really a fan of the Mo.  Either that, or they are just using that as an excuse not to touch us.  But the real reason I was at my buddy's house was to take his 1947 GMC pick up for a drive.  This project has been in the making longer than I have been alive, but it's almost done, except for the missing floor, but I still found somewhere to rest my feet.  Of course, the engine is highly modified and the mufflers are...well they just aren't there.  Did I mention it is 8:30 am and he lives in a quiet subdivision?  Well, we changed all that.  We finally get the thing going (many hot rod engines don't like to start in cold weather) and hit the streets very loudly.  Since we can't go very fast on residential streets, he stays in first and second gear and gets to the 20 mile an hour speed limit as fast and as loud as possible (OK, we may have creeped over 20 a few times, but the school buses were already off the streets meaning the rugrats were absent from the streets as well).  We sped from cul-de-sac to cul-de-sac laughing as neighbors run to the window to see what all of the racket is about just in time to see us speed away again.  We were doing great until there was a backfire that caused an air cleaner to fly about ten feet in the air, much to our amusement, and much to the confusion of the other car at the stop sign and the lady out for a quiet walk.  Still laughing, I rush out of the truck, being careful not to fall through the floor, and pick it up.  We head back to base and back down the hill that is his driveway.  As we do this, the cab fills completely with exhaust smoke.  My friend is concerned about all of the smoke.  I point out several factors for that.  First, we lost an air cleaner which means we were sucking in too much air causing the engine to run lean, and thereby smoke more.  Also, we were backing into the smoke.  And lastly, he had a window down to see as he backed up and there still was no floor in the car, which tends to let in a lot of exhaust when you are backing up for some reason.  We both laugh and he is put at ease...or at least he is sleepy from the carbon monoxide poisoning.  We hide the truck back in the garage to make the neighbors wonder who was responsible for all of the noise pollution...and regular pollution.  After a little chat about all the other wonderful projects we are going to complete, I head out to run more errands.

I hit Home Depot and find that out that if you go on a weekday, you might actually be able to find someone to help you.  I also found out that you don't get the "A" team on a weekday.  Surprisingly, for the first time in my life, I walk out of Home Depot without spending a penny.  This is partly because they couldn't help me, plus I am an unemployed cancer patient, and I am saving every penny for the Paul Reed Smith fund where money is raised to buy American made Paul Reed Smiths with double cutaways and twenty four frets for unemployed testicular cancer patients.  So far I have raised, well not much at all really, but at least I am on the way to raising the money, and sometime in 2023 I hope to have enough cash to finally get one!

I then head to a pool supply store, because Home Depot said that is the best place to get stuff to clean your fireplace bricks.  I don't understand either, but I didn't have anything else to do, so that's where I went.  The nice gentleman inside, who obviously doesn't have a whole lot to do running a pool supply store in Ohio in the middle of November, said yes they do carry stuff that will clean fireplace brick (who knew?) at their location about thirty miles away.  Not really wanting to travel that far, because I am not really wanting to clean the fireplace brick, I went to meet my carless wife for lunch.

My wife had to run some errands for her work Thanksgiving dinner.  She warned me that I wouldn't enjoy it, and she is right.  Watching someone else shop for groceries for another someone else is really boring.  So boring, I forgot to buy the things I was going to get while we were out.  We grab Subway, which according to their commercials is just like working out, and I drop her back off and don't work out.

Next I head to see another friend and her baby.  That was the plan, but no baby, no crying, no nothing.  I am very suspect that she still has this baby, I may have just seen a rental baby in the past.  This makes me suspicious about her pregnancy as well.  I should have tattooed the baby last time I saw it, just to make sure she is showing me the same one each time.  I don't know how baby rentals work, and if they give you the exact baby every time you get one, or if they just have a gaggle of similar looking babies.  Next time I will buy a tattoo gun and take it with me.  We have a great conversation with plenty of gossip (and why do I have more gossip than her when I don't even work with her anymore) and then she kicks me out to "work".  I have seen her "work" and that term is used very loosely.  OK, she gets her stuff done, so I guess it's technically work, but she enjoys it too much to get paid.  She should divert that money to my PRS fund.

I decide to go for the hat trick and see some other people that I used to work with.  I was only temporary help for this group of people for about three months last year, but they send me cards about once a week and are constantly calling or e-mailing to check on me.  Don't get me wrong, I don't necessarily need all that, but it does make you feel good to be remembered.  I just wish my previous employer would do the same, except instead of sending me a card they could send me cash, and instead of calling and e-mailing, they could send me cash.  I basically kept them from working for half an hour (I seem to be good at that today) and by then it was time for them to shut down and me to go pick up my wife from work.  I tried not to pick her up, but they warned me that eventually she would find her way home and she would be ticked when she did make it.

I wasn't really that tired while doing any of my running around.  I felt like I was really making progress, until I sat on the couch once we got home and immediately fell asleep.  And today, I feel like I ran a marathon yesterday, or at least what I perceive that it must feel like the day after one runs a marathon sans the bloody stumps for feet.  Tomorrow is another errand day.  Hopefully it will go just as smoothly and hopefully I will fare better the day after.  Until then I will just avoid that nap inducing couch.

Juggled And Poked At The Urologist's Office

Today was another big day in my recovery.  I had the last post surgery follow-up appointment with my surgeon/urologist.  I had some good news, and some not so good news that I am taking as good news.

The urologist was very nice and took a lot of time to answer our questions today.  Of course he had to check his handy work.  To be honest, my goodies have been fondled so much over the past few months I just kind of block it out at this point.  I don't remember what he did or what he said.  I guess I just go to my happy place in my mind.  Some people go to their happy place by remembering their favorite Christmas as a child, or by thinking about being on a warm sunny beach, I just imagine that my goodies are being cupped by a man in a white coat...I guess don't have a very good imagination for my happy place.  He asks how I am doing (after I pull my pants back up) and I answer honestly that I feel like a disgusting, lazy, slob.  I say I am still trying to fight this chemo fatigue, and if I lift anything over a certain weight or twist a certain way I still feel that "tickle" in my incision.  He says something surprising, that I probably will feel that tickle for another month and not to push it.  He basically said to stay away from weights for a while.  I didn't ask about the Shake Weight, because to ask about it would be admitting that I have one, but it seems to be my only option for the time being.  He did clear me to do whatever cardio I want.  That is the good news.  The bad news is that now I am expected to do cardio.

The doctor answered all of our assorted questions, including the ones we had for other doctors but asked him anyway.  He then told me to check my swimmers in a month to see if chemo killed them or not.  They gave me the option of going to the place I went to make my "deposit" or another place (both hospitals, not just in some alley).  I wanted to opt for the other place, because I have already seen all of the getting-in-the-mood literature at the first place and was hoping to see something new.  My wife didn't like my idea and wouldn't let me do that.  Lastly they needed to draw blood from me.  This is usually quite an adventure because my veins like to squirm and roll around when the needle comes at them.  I have been spoiled by the phlebotomists at the oncologist's office because all they do is draw blood all day and they are very good at it.  At the urologist it was people that are normal nurses that happen to be asked to stick people now and then.  First of all, I swear they must use different needle suppliers, because at the oncologist the needle slips in so smooth you think you are still being wiped off with the alcohol pad.  At the urologist, each and every needle feels like it is rusty, bent, and broken off and I watched them take it out of a new package three different times!  The first nurse jabbed the needle in and moved it around like she was churning butter or trying to shift a Mack truck.  When she started drawing blood from places other than through the needle she gave up and passed me off to another nurse.  This nurse was much nicer and talked very calmly, politely, and apologetically as she jabbed the needle into me again and again and churned butter and shifted a Mack truck (they must have gone to the same school).  I was just about to ask if we could do this another time, seeing as how my veins have about as much holes in them now as a clarinet, when she finally got some blood to get into the vial.  I am assuming it was my blood, but as vigorously as she was sticking and moving she may have actually gone through me and poked herself.

Finally we scheduled my next appointment for sometime in January.  I say sometime, because as I was trying to focus on my calendar to pick a day, the nurse kept spitting out possibilities and my wife kept talking about my other appointments as well.  Between trying to focus on three different stimuli (my calendar, the nurse, and my wife) all I could do was just say yes on the first day I heard that wasn't already highlighted in my calendar. The nurse asked if I wanted it written down, which I most certainly did, because I have no idea what anyone said.  My wife decided to keep talking about how I should have made it the same day as one of my other doctor's appointments, which is what I was trying to look up when everyone was asking me so many questions that I couldn't look it up.  For all I know it may be the same day or even time as another appointment, I still am not sure what the heck went on at the counter, I just went to my "happy place" again (that doctor has such soft hands).

All in all it was a good day.  I didn't really want to be told I was still on limited duty, but on the other hand I know I am not just being a fat, lazy, slob.  I am being a fat, lazy, slob that is not supposed to lift too much.  Tomorrow I will start to work on some cardio and maybe step up my Shake Weighting.  I should probably get some rest now, that twelve minutes of exercise tomorrow will really take a toll on me.

Back Home Again From Indiana

I am back at home, and more importantly, back at my own computer.  While there I borrowed my parents' laptop which has the convenient feature of having the cursor randomly jump on the page if your palm happens to brush the touchpad while typing.  Sure it was annoying, but at least it made proofreading interesting.

Yesterday, I definitely felt the effects from my big day on the town Friday.  I don't know how much longer I can blame this on the chemo and when I have to just admit I am a big lazy wimp.  For right now, I will still blame chemo.  But at least I felt good enough to pretty much stay awake all day and watch the crazy dogs.  All six were in rare form, ranging in size from, I don't know, like nine pounds to about two fifty.  Just a rough guess on those numbers.  My wife and I ran into a hippo costume for dogs, and thought it would be a wonderful gift for my sister, who when she is not working to save the lives of your pets, has a hobby of finding new and innovative ways to torture her own pets, such as dressing them in hippo costumes.  I will have to say, her dog looked nothing like a hippo, unless hippos are about a foot high and run around at high speeds doing figure eights and back flips.  Something I did learn from the experience is apparently all dogs have the innate urge to chase hippopotami, all dogs except African bloodline basenjis, which is quite ironic.  I guess since she was the only dog in the room who's bloodline would have actually seen a hippo, it was nothing novel to her.

And speaking of that little African bloodline basenji, Daisy was a completely different dog this weekend.  She was letting people walk up and pet her.  She was very affectionate.  She was exploring the house.  Then we crossed back over state lines and she turned back into her old abused and neglected self.  Well, she is a little better, but certainly not the dog she was at my parents' or even in the car.  But it does give us hope that a normal dog is in there somewhere, er...as normal as a basenji can get.  We may have to move out of state or build a house that looks like the inside of a car, but at least we have options.  

Back home, I am wore out.  Tomorrow we have to get up at around five and head to a urologist appointment.  I am excited and apprehensive both about this one.  I am anxious to hear what he thinks I can do physically and how my recovery is coming along.  However, he still can request the dreaded CAT scan, and I have no idea if he will or not.  If I were a betting man, more that just two bucks on lottery tickets once a week, I would bet I will just have a few ultrasounds on the boys, I mean, boy.  Ultrasounds require significantly less effort on my part than a CAT scan.  You just lay back, flop out your junk, they run some magic wand over the goodies, and tell you to pull your pants back up.  That's something I can handle, even in my post chemo, lazy, wimpy state.  

So tomorrow I will have the final piece of information in my cancer treatment.  I certainly won't be done by any stretch of the imagination.  Cancer treatment involves years of watching, testing, and of course waiting long after what most people consider the "treatment" part is done.  But at least tomorrow, I will know the plan.  This is the last doctor I have to get my medical test road map from and for that I am excited.  Hopefully it will be a plan that doesn't involve sliding into a big metal tube and pooping sensations.

Going Out On The Town, No Matter How Annoying That Town Has Become

Today was the day that we hit all of my favorite haunts from college...well the second time I went to college.  We went all of the places I used to go to except for the half that have went out of business. 

We started the day off at a pawn shop.  Now pawn shops in this college town are different than other pawn shops.  You have the advantage of having a bunch of over privileged kids, who have their parents (or their parents' credit cards) buy them the latest toy that they desperately need.   Then the weekend comes, and not wanting to ask their parents for beer money, they take their new stuff to the pawn shop and go straight to the local watering hole.  This is a good thing for bargain hunters and a bad thing for parents.  There is a trick in dealing with pawn shops, and the most important is, you have to know about the products you are thinking about buying.  Pawn shops are just like any other business or politician, they will try to get as much money out of you as possible if you aren't paying attention. 

The first one we went to is not one of my favorites, but you never know where you will find treasure, and I have gotten a deal or two there in the past.  Today was certainly not one of those days.  They had their usual assortment of crap and rip offs all marked up about ten percent more than you can pay anywhere else, including new.  We leave that store quickly and head to the next pawn shop.  It had better prices, but worse crap.  We hit one more pawn shop today, which had decent prices but sub par crap, even for crap.

We also decided to hit the music stores.  As predicted, I walk into my favorite, and hear my name yelled out.  Even though they have plenty of good prices and lots of good stuff, luckily, I didn't need any of it.  I say luckily, because I am still a broke, unemployed, cancer patient so it would have sucked to find something unbelievable and not been able to buy it, especially if it was an American made Paul Reed Smith with twenty four frets and double cutaways. 

I did see something unbelievable, but not necessarily in a good way.  A quick lesson for people not up on the latest 1980's music gear.  The Roland TR-808 Rhythm Composer, is a vintage drum machine that is pretty much useless today, but is still collected by some people who remember that the "808 kick drum makes the girlies get dumb".  However, nobody really cares about the sister models such my TR707 (if you are, I will give you a great deal on one) or the one I saw today the TR727...at my favorite music store...WAY overpriced.  The reason no one wants these drum machines is that they are old and outdated, hard to program, and most of all the 707 and 727 never made the girlies wanna get dumb they just made them airsick (the two people out there that are fans of Roland, Boeing, and early 90's rap are laughing their butts off right now...if they were reading this, which they are not, because they don't have access to the internet in their group home).  The ironic thing about these drum machines is to use them correctly, you have to be able to read music, which to make a totally prejudice statement, I will ask how many people wanting to use a drum machine have any idea how to read music?  So, as the owner of the music store came over and I saw the TR727, I immediately started laughing.  He instantly set me straight in a way to say that wasn't his choice to purchase that item, nor would he have purchased that item, and yes he knows it is overpriced, but they paid way too much for it and are trying to recoup their money.  I told him that the only person that is interested in old vintage 80's electronic crap like that is me, and unfortunately, I have one!  He couldn't get mad at me because he knew I was right.  I then offered to sell him my TR707 and he respectfully declined.  We then left there and headed to the next music store.

This music store promised lots of equipment and arms...yes weaponry.  We get there and it seemed to fall a little short on both.  We look around the store at the sparse amount of music instruments and I am not sure if this is a music store or if we caught a high school garage band between sets.  At least with my teenager mustache I would fit right in.  We didn't look long for two reasons, he didn't have much of a selection, and if we actually bought anything, it would leave a gaping hole in his inventory display.

Finally, we decided to go grab some food to take home.  The food my wife wanted was in the heart of campus.  I decide to go the easy way...by the stadiums...not realizing the home basketball opener is tonight.  After four hours of cursing at alumni that actually still keep up with the university, we make it past the stadiums and onto campus where the students are taught everything but what a crosswalk is and how a stoplight works.  There were students all over the road, but I wasn't able to run over a single one of them, not even a fat sorostitute that is just there to make her "sisters" look better.  It dawns on me that we are driving around in a glorified "mom-mobile" with out of state plates and two older guys (one with a cheesy pervert mustache), people must have thought we were a same-sex couple coming to school to pick up our daughter.  I tried to pick up a few random daughters, and that didn't work either...not even the fat sorostitute.  We get to the restaurant and I talk my dad into ordering his own stromboli, neglecting to point out that is it basically just a twelve inch pizza folded in half.  The funny thing is, my wife pulled the same trick on my mother when they called us with their order.  We got our food, picked a way off campus that was nowhere near the stadiums and got out safely.

All in all it was a good day.  Going to some of my old haunts showed me that although chemo is still messing with my taste buds, the appetite is back with a vengeance and then some.  And it also showed me that chemo still refuses to give me my energy back, although I feel I am getting stronger everyday.  To celebrate, the family will gather tomorrow to eat even more than we ate today and then sit around and do nothing but argue over which of the six dogs to blame our farts on.  I can't wait!

Dogs Just Sniff You To See What You Taste Like...

Today I did absolutely nothing.  Well I did take a nap and walk the dogs, but outside of that nothing.  Still not completely able to shake free of this chemo stuff, I am trying to develop a rhythm and a routine (no not gymnastics).  By the way, I was told that some may not realize that when I "walk the dogs around the yard" that the yard is five acres, so it is a little more than just standing on the porch holding the leash at arms length while they do their business.

This weekend though, I am hoping things will change.  I will pretty much be forced to do stuff and get into a decent sleep routine.  We will be traveling to my parents' with the dogs for an early Thanksgiving celebration.  To honor my still being alive, they are carving a turkey to look like a malignant testicle...OK, I am making that up.  But I do feel that this Thanksgiving will have a little more thanks than usual, even if it is only coming from me. There will be plenty to do during the day, like sleep while the girls shop, but that is not why I think I will get into a routine.  There will be five people and six dogs.  I try to make it a habit to never be outnumbered by dogs, especially when they can count.  And most dogs can count.  If you don't believe me, get two dogs together and give them treats, but give one of them one more treat than the other.  You will quickly see that I am correct about dogs and arithmetic.  So, there certainly will not be any sleeping during daylight hours, that is when the dogs will all be together and they can plot.  I do not think I can stop them or outrun them in the state I am, but I am getting well enough to knock down my sister when the dogs come after us, and that should be enough diversion for me to get away...and possibly my wife, she is on her own though.  At night time, we all retire to our separate bedrooms, where we will be at parity with our puppies.  Again, my sister will be the sacrificial lamb, but she is the one that let herself get outnumbered so I have no pity on her.

One of the activities my father and I have planned is a trip to some of my old stomping grounds, including one of my favorite stores.  Keep in mind, I have maybe gone into this store once a year for the past ten years, yet the employees still greet me much the same way they greet Norm when he walks into Cheers.  Don't ask how much money you have to spend to be remembered after ten years...seriously, please don't ask.  The only depressing part is usually I have money to haggle and deal with, even on stuff I don't want, and this time I won't.  Between being unemployed and the financial hit we took from cancer surgery and treatment, there isn't a whole lot of "fun money" to be had.  (It turns out that the great insurance that I had through my employer, kind of sucks.)  I thought about selling my body to raise some cash, but I was having trouble giving it away before the surgery, and now after the surgery I am considered "B-stock" or "irregular" and will have an even harder time.  Plus my wife says, she is not willing to pay me for that and even if she did, it is still "our" money anyway.  That just doesn't seem fair.  Because, this place just may have an American made Paul Reed Smith with twenty-four frets and double cutaways.  I wonder if they would be interested in trading one for an irregular body?  Nah, I don't think Phil nor Eric would be interested.

So, between avoiding the canine uprising, looking broke and pitiful at stores (but not so much that they kick you out), and eating turkey, I should get my sleep pattern back.  And getting out will help me to be less sedentary than I have been around here.  However, if my family really wanted me to be active and cared about my health, they would get me that PRS...

Healing In Jeep Country

Today I tried to push myself a little further.  Still coming out of the chemo funk, I started the day off again by taking the basenjis on a long walk around the yard.  Benny wasn't quite chasing as many invisible rabbits as he had yesterday, so he was only bouncing around at the speed of sound rather than the speed of light.

During the last storm, one of our apple trees split in two.  Yesterday my mother in law discussed taking it up to the burning pile.  Her idea was to cut it up into pieces, pick the pieces up, throw the pieces into the lawn tractor's trailer (which means the pieces would be only slightly larger than a loaf of french bread), take the trailer loads up to the burning pile (which since the trailer has the capacity of a five gallon bucket would be approximately 134.5 trips), pick up the pieces out of the trailer, and throw them all the burning pile.  This would involve me running the chainsaw, which I am still afraid of.  As I have said before, motions that require me to move in one direction haven't seemed to bother my surgery.  Motions that require multiple directions, such as holding back a ricocheting basenji, do tend to put stress on my stitches.  Holding a chainsaw up in the air, moving it back and forth, and fighting the kickbacks and dodging the tree as the weight shifts as it twists and turns on the ground, would probably not be the wisest thing for me to do just yet.  So, my solution was hook the Jeep to the tree, drag the whole darn thing up to the burning pile where it's out of sight, wait until we get enough rain to actually be able to burn the burning pile (which will be a long time) at which point I will be able to hold the chainsaw, make a few cuts and just lean large pieces against the pile.  She wasn't on board with my idea, because she didn't think of it.  So as we discuss which is easier, otherwise known as why we should do it her way, she happens to mention that we can't do it today because she has a doctor's appointment.  BINGO!

So, while my mother in law is at her doctor's appointment, I hook my tow strap up to the tree.  There is one limb buried in the ground from the fall that I will have to do something with before I hook up to it.  I carefully put my weight into the tow strap, and after rocking the tree a couple of times the limb snaps and the tree lays flat on the ground, and more importantly, I don't feel any sharp pains in my side or groinal area from pulling on a tree.  I then get the Jeep and pull into position.  I go to put it into the very powerful Four Wheel Low.  Jeep must deem this way too powerful to actually use, because first you have to put your transmission in neutral, then you have to let the  Jeep roll very slowly, then grab the transfer case handle and move it down, sideways, diagonally, and down again before you actually engage Four Wheel Low (I am not making that up).  I imagine corn mazes are easier to negotiate than shifting in to Four Wheel Low.  I then start to back up, when the transfer case pops out of Four Wheel Low.  I guess I didn't correctly navigate the maze.  I again, shift, push, twist, angle, curse, shove, and pop, and now Four Wheel Low is engaged.  I back down the hill to the tree, which I swear was moving, because no matter how many times I backed up, I was always about four inches from hooking up to it.  I finally hook up (pray) and start up the hill.  The Jeep chugs on like it's not a problem at all.

Now there is a reason Jeep makes it so hard to get into Four Wheel Low.  The top speed is around twenty miles an hour in low, which isn't that fast, but you could run over the cast and audience of the View and not even notice, or pull half an apple tree without a problem.  I get the tree to the burning pile and unhook.  I feel good that I finally did something!  I decided I will put all my gear back together later on today when I wash the Jeep.  I go back to the house to cook lunch.  My mother in law comes home, glad to see the tree is gone and still wonders why we didn't do the multiple cuts, multiple trips, and multiple handling of each chunk of tree that she suggested.  

Feeling good that I have done so much already today, I decide to take a break before I wash the car...until it's dark.  BUT, I managed to stay awake all day, and that is an improvement.  And I did do some physical activity today which is also an improvement.  I am getting back to myself slowly but surely.  I am sure I will get the car washed tomorrow, provided the U.S. Forest Service doesn't call me asking me to pull some Sequoia's out of the ground.

I Feel Good Enough To Look Like An Idiot

Today I started to slowly move back into my routine.  I am starting to put more and more stress on my surgery.  I meet with that doctor on Monday, and this may sound weird, but I am afraid he will release me because I don't feel like I am ready for it yet.  There are still certain things that I do where I feel a little tug at the site of my surgery.  I may feel it when I am twisting my torso and trying to lift something with a little bit of weight to it, or if I am pulling something from left to right, or if my wife asks me to do anything I don't want to do like wash the car or go shopping.

The past two days, I have been both getting back to my old routine and testing the strength of my surgery by walking the dueling basenjis.  Daisy the abused one, will stay by my side and not put a bit of stress on me other than wondering how much longer I have to stand out in the cold in my Homer Simpson PJs before she will finally pee (that answer is, until the bus load of kids drives by to laugh at us).  Benny, the spoiled basenji however, acts much like Haley's comet in the sense he takes long elliptical orbits around me at a velocity nearing the speed of light.  Each pass by me ends with a sharp tug that I didn't notice before my surgery, but now sends a shock wave through my body.  I completely understand now how the moon affects the tides.  Regardless of how silly I look out there with my Homer pants and orbiting basenji, I do feel like I am slowly gaining strength.

Also today, a friend I haven't seen since chemo stopped by to take me out to lunch.  He was on the clock, but that didn't seem to bother him much.  I was able to walk at a normal speed, eat food that actually tasted like food, and got to hear plenty of stories that were wholly inappropriate for the lunchtime crowd at a small town Frisch's.  Maybe this chemo and surgery thing is finally gone.  He drops me back off after lunch, and I was feeling so good, that I fell asleep on the couch for a couple of hours.  I guess I am not as recovered as I thought I was, but I am making baby steps.

With my new found sense of freedom, I decided to work in my gardens.  Well, they are AeroGardens, but they are probably cheaper to maintain and a lot less work than a real garden.  In my attempt to try to eat healthier and expand my food palette to things that are green, I have replanted my garden and commandeered a second.  Well, I didn't really commandeer it, we bought if for my mother-in-law to grow tomatoes in the winter and after six months of growing it produced two tomatoes...small...and hard...in the middle of summer when there were plenty of other  bigger, not hard tomatoes around.  So, she regifted and gave the present back to me.  After my hours of toiling in the fields, up on the window sill, I planted lettuce and herbs.  Hopefully, I will be fully healed by the time they start producing so I can reap the bushels of fresh produce I will soon have.  And if history is any indicator, I should be healed just fine, and it will be summer.  I felt a little weird having two AeroGardens at once until I read their catalog this month and saw the article about the lady that has twenty three AeroGardens!  I am still not sure if that article was a sales pitch or a cautionary tale.  I am just wondering how many powerstrips it takes to supply electricity to twenty three different AeroGardens.  I am sure it's up to fire code.

Tomorrow I plan to push myself a little harder.  I may get back up in my workshop and see how that goes.  I can stand up there and stare at all the projects I wasn't able to complete this summer until I am tired and come back down to the house and cry myself to sleep.  Either that or I can just stand outside all day in my Homer PJs and let the dogs do their maypole dance around me.  If you hear little kids laughing on the school bus out my way, you will know which one I decided to do.

I Was Too Tired From Acting Normal To Blog

If you haven't guessed by the delay in posting, being a real person kicked my butt!  The whole day was a lot more work than I had planned, but I enjoyed most of it.

First, I forgot how much time it takes to actually get going in the morning.  I had my time all planned out, including stopping for a not so nutritious breakfast at the arches, time to eat it, and getting to my volunteer meeting early to chat.  My schedule went just as planned until I walked out the door...and back in...and back out...back in...back out, I was like Lindsay Lohan and jail.  It had been so long since I had actually planned on being out and about all day, I kept remembering all the things I would need to make it through the day.  I finally got on the road a little later than I hoped, so I figured I would just eat in the car.  I also forgot about school buses.  By the time I had stopped for them stopping at EVERY SINGLE KID'S HOUSE, time for breakfast was gone too.  And if we are so paranoid that kids can't walk to a bus stop anymore, if two kids' houses are side by side, can't they at least stand in the corners of both of their yards so the bus can stop and pick them both up at the same time?  Anyway, I finally make it to my meeting, with minutes to spare.  So much for my plans so far today.

First I explain my silly, pathetic excuse for a mustache.  After that, the meeting went fine, except I was expecting to take a few notes, and instead I was given two three ring binders.  I am not really complaining, because that meant I didn't need to take near as good of notes.  My next plan was to grab a bite to eat, when I was asked if I could do some volunteer work for a few hours.  Since the volunteer work is also training for the job I hope to get, I jumped at the chance.  I mean, I have eaten breakfast every other day this week, one day won't hurt.  The volunteer work was fun.  Part of what I went over was "new" Americans with Disabilities Act information, information that was out of date about ten years ago, but we had to print out these sixty two pages of "new" stuff.  I think if people with these "disabilities" saw what was written about their needs, the would sue the Americans with Disabilities Act for prejudice and defamation under the Americans with Disabilities Act.  I worked on a few other projects and soon it was time to meet my friend for lunch.

I get to Cracker Barrel (our usual spot), explain my pathetic and nearly invisible excuse for a mustache, and as usual we both order breakfast for lunch, which comes in handy because I am using this lunch as breakfast...and lunch.  I should be getting used to this, but I am still a little taken aback as my seventy nine year old friend is telling me about the latest cool apps for our Androids.  We spend lunch trading apps and solving the worlds problems.  The big difference between us being that he actually was an elected official at one time that could solve some of the world's problems, and I just sit around and complain about them.  Don't get me wrong, I don't just sit around all day complaining about the world's problems, I sit around all day and complain about a lot of other things too.  You know like, why isn't my favorite show on, how come my ice cream is so hard, how come the people that are employed by the unemployment office never seem to work, why does my butt have to hurt from sitting around all day, stuff like that.  Our check comes and we do the typical wrestling over who gets to pay.  One of these days I am just going to pay the waitress in advance and really get the jump on him.  It's getting close to my next appointment so my friend and I part ways vowing to finish saving the world next week.

I drive towards my cancer support group and I get stuck behind another school bus!  This one has literally about thirty cars backed up behind it, which I thought was against the law when I took driver's ed, and won't pull over for two minutes to let them all pass while he stops at every   single   house!!!  Luckily I have been stuck behind this bus before so I allowed myself a little extra time to get behind him and cuss.  I get to group with a few minutes to spare, and I am a little bummed.  First of all I am bummed walking around with this pathetic excuse for a mustache that I am tired of making excuses for and two of my favorites from group are missing this week.  However, there are still enough of us cancer patients to have as good a time as a room full of cancer patients can have.  And then the one my heart really goes out for walks in.  He always looks tired, and I imagine from his treatment he is exhausted.  My heart breaks for him because he has two young children and a very poor prognosis...that is until this week!  Let me clarify, he still has the two young children, but now he has a different prognosis.  His doctors finally found something that is not only working but working extremely well...especially for something that they didn't know if they would be able to treat at all to begin with.  I must not be the only one that really feels for him, because there were instant smiles and cheers around the room, and that is not an easy thing to do with a room full of cancer patients.  We eventually get to the subject that we have gotten on several times and that is how much we all hate CAT scans.  We talk about it a lot.  And we relive every single thing we hate about them.  We also talk about how someone was told that the ones in the city aren't even very good so we are all pretty much going through CAT scan hell for nothing.  All this talk is very interesting considering the next day I have an appointment to hear when my next CAT scan will be.  We also complain about something you wouldn't think the cancer patients would complain about.  We have complained several meetings about "Breast Cancer Awareness Month" and for several reasons I won't get into the conversations, mainly because they are supposed to be confidential, but one person in the group said the most profound thing about it that really summed up the conversation and how everyone in the room (including the breast cancer patients) felt.  They said, "Breast Cancer Awareness Month has turned into Christmas.  Everyone is wearing pink and buying pink, but it has been so commercialized that people don't know the reason the are doing all the pink things anymore."  Wow!  They so succinctly put into words what so many in that room frustrations were with the month.

I leave the meeting and left to do a little shopping that I had been meaning to do, but hadn't been able to.  One of the places I had to stop was a former employer.  I was hoping I didn't see any of my former coworkers, because I didn't want to explain that I had been laid off from the job I left them for, and that I had gotten cancer, and that I knew I had a stupid, pathetic excuse for a mustache but it was for a good cause.  Luckily the only person I knew there was too busy talking to notice there was a customer, so I was able to get in and out without any problems.  I finished up my shopping by stopping at one of my pre-chemo favorite restaurants for some take-out.  It doesn't really sound good to me, but I am really hungry, and out of habit, this is the place I love to go when I am really hungry.  I walk in and the smell hits my chemo nostrils and overwhelms me.  I am not sure why I came in here, I am really not wanting this at all.  Still, I order my usual and head home.  By this point, I am not only hungry, but completely wiped out from my day pretending to be normal, and dying of thirst.  Obviously, I have not recovered from chemo as much as I thought I had.  I get home, still not looking forward to my former favorite meal, but yet I still devour it and it doesn't taste bad...doesn't taste as good as it does when I am not on chemo, but it doesn't taste bad either.

What did I learn?  I learned that I am still recovering.  I also learned that I can kind of pass for a normal person.  I learned that it is possible to get too tired to blog.  And finally I learned that I am tired of making excuses for my pathetic mustache and wish it would come in quicker, but as hair falls out every time I touch my head, I don't have high hopes on that one...but more about that in tomorrow's entry.

Scared To Be Normal

Tomorrow I will have to act like a real person.  I say act, because I don't see the oncologist until Friday and the urologist a week from Monday, so they will have to be the ones to officially call me a person again.  But tomorrow, I go through a lot of the motions a person goes through.  For the first time since I was initially diagnosed with cancer (8/31/10, you never forget the date you were diagnosed) I will be out on my own, all day.  I have thus far only been out for short periods of time or with a chaperon.  You know someone to drive when I feel tired (which has been most of the past three weeks), someone to tell me that is too heavy and I shouldn't try to lift it, someone to say they told me so when I am holding myself in pain after lifting it, and someone generally to provide physical and moral support.  That also means I won't have my wife around tomorrow to persuade that McDonald's sausage biscuits and hashbrowns are full of protein and that the oncologist suggest that we get some on the way to the blood test.  She also won't be there later in the morning when I claim that the oncologist said I was in dire need of Dunkin' Donuts to keep my strength up.

On one hand I am actually excited about tomorrow.  I get to meet with a volunteer group I strongly believe in.  I will hopefully hear something on one of the jobs I applied for.  I get to meet a friend for lunch.  And I get to go to my cancer group.  The problem is, each of those things are spaced just far enough apart in time and distance, that it won't make any sense for me to come home in between.  So, I will leave the house at 8:30am and won't get home until about 7pm.  That's almost like having a job...except that I won't be getting paid, I will actually be enjoying what I am doing, and if anyone starts yelling at me or treating me like crap, I can get up and walk away with no repercussions.

The downside is, I should probably try to stay awake for the whole day.  That is a giant step in my life right now.  It probably wouldn't look good napping during lunch or while talking about volunteer leadership.  However, the good thing about cancer group, is if I take a nap there, every other person in the room will understand.  I know this because it frequently happens during group...coincidently it's usually when I am talking.  But that truly is my biggest fear tomorrow, and I am honestly afraid, that I just won't have the stamina to make it through the whole day.  As much as my cabin fear has been bothering me, I don't know that I am ready to be out of the nest out on my own.  After all, I got winded eating a piece of cake today.

But that is not my only apprehension about tomorrow.  My Mo' looks absolutely pathetic.  It didn't take much for me to remember why I never got the urge to grow one before.  Again, at group I am not too worried about it, because everyone will know why I am growing it and some may be doing it themselves.  It is everyone else I may encounter throughout the day.  I wish I had a t-shirt that says "Yes, I know I have a ridiculous, pathetic mustache.  It is for a good cause.  Ask me about Movember".  But I don't.  So, as I go to the restaurant tomorrow to meet my friend, it is very likely that the fifteen year old cleaning the tables will have a thicker, better looking mustache than me, and I am afraid that she will make fun of me for it when she picks my head up off of the plate to take it away.  I guess on one hand, I could blame the fact that I have half the testosterone that I did pre-surgery.  However, if I do that, I may have to explain why, which will be good for the Movember movement to talk about testicular cancer, but I don't know that I should walk around tomorrow telling everyone I see about my balls...er, ball.

So that's where I am at.  I have to get up at a normal hour.  I have to stay awake all day.  I have to walk around with less hair on my lip than an old lady.  And I have to keep it together, because after all, this means I am almost back to normal, and that is kind of an emotional thing to deal with as well.  There is part of me that is dying to get back to normal, and a certain part that is scared and not sure if I am ready yet.  Oh and if Murphy's Law exists, I did some research and people on my chemo, tend to lose their hair between the third and fourth week, which pretty much starts tomorrow.  So, if I am going to lose it, I am sure it will fall out during my volunteer meeting or lunch, either of which are going to make a very awkward scene.  Hopefully I will have enough strength at the end of the day tomorrow to tell how things went.

Do Mo's Help You Boss People Around?

I have slowly been getting better over the past two days.  I have slept a little better.  I still don't feel like I am getting "well rested" though.  Lately my attempts to catch little cat naps on the couch are interrupted by flying dogs as a basenji will soar onto the couch about the same time that I close my eyes.  I am getting cabin fever worse than ever now, and it's not just because of my health this time.

We have finally decided to get our fireplace fixed.  It requires me to stay here the whole time to tell them what to do.  Part of me feels bad, because they are doing some heavy lifting things, that they could certainly use a hand on, but I am still not able to lift that kind of weight.  Just getting the stuff out of the way for them about killed me!  Instead, I just stand around, watch them work hard, and tell them what to do.  This must be what my wife feels like.  No wonder she does it so much, it's kind of fun.  However, it's also kind of depressing.  I certainly don't want to just sit here doing nothing, I would like to pitch in when they need it.  After all, the sooner they finish, the sooner I can get back on the couch and waiting for the flying basenji show to happen next to me.  Also, the sooner I could leave and spend money I don't have.  And it's not that I am wanting to go out and spend stuff, I am just wanting to go out period.  I just wish I didn't feel exhausted by the time we got to the end of the driveway.

The only good thing about being stuck around here is Daisy, the abused and neglected rescue basenji, has been becoming more and more accepting of me with my recent house arrest.  Today she actually sought me out, which doesn't happen very often.  But what also doesn't happen very often is someone using a hammer drill on the fireplace causing the whole house to oscillate and beat to the point that it sounds like there is rave going on in the next room.  Maybe the noise scared her, or the vibrations, or maybe she just doesn't like raves, but she came down stairs and flew onto the couch, doubling its basenji population.

The workers say that the inside stuff will be done tomorrow, which means I will at least be able to do some things I have been putting off.  One of the things is e-mailing people back.  We have been through a lot the past couple of weeks, and all the well wishes and cards have been nice, certainly appreciated and in fact needed, but on the other hand, I have been putting off responding to them.  I guess that is my little way of avoiding the situation.  Don't get me wrong, I can certainly see the bright side of everything that has happened the past two weeks, but I don't know that I want to directly talk about it.  There are many people that did send their kind words, thoughts, and prayers to us and I kind of feel obligated to open up about things more to them.  In a way, I don't want to.  At least in this blog I can control the amount of information, and what information, I send out.  When someone is talking to you directly, you feel like you have to address the things they have said.  In my mind, it has been long enough since we have been through the worst of all of this, I can pretend nothing happened and just get back to talking to friends.  Does that seem right?  I don't know if it does or not, but that is what I am doing.  And the other thing I am doing...

Today is the first of MOvember.  I didn't shave my Mo today and I already feel like a Tom Selleck wannabe. I really don't know if I will be able to stand this for the whole month.  I am almost wishing I lose my hair so I will have an excuse.  You don't necessarily lose all hair from chemo.  Sometimes you just lose head hair, or head and facial, or head, facial and body, so if I lose my head hair, I may have to lie and shave off the Mo too. We will see.  My intent is to keep this Mo, as pathetic as my Mo may be, for the whole month of Movember.  I have decided on the Groucho Marx.  If that doesn't start conversations, I don't know what will.

So, that is my life now.  I am bossing around workers.  Laying on the couch rubbing basenji bellies.  Growing a mangy looking Mo.  And hopefully, getting around to returning tons of e-mails.  I guess there are a lot of people out there that would give their right nut to be in my position, but I did do that, and I am kind of growing tired of it now.  Oh well, the workers should only be here for two more days.  I should get released soon by the oncologist.  Then released from the urologist two weeks from today.  And I am alive and able to grow a Mo, so I guess I can't complain too much.

I Have a Sleeping Problem...And a Possible Solution!

My wife wants to drug me, and I may let her.  She has been complaining about my cancer insomnia since all of this began.  At first I didn't think it was a big deal.  Sure I would only get four hours of sleep, but I was operating just fine on four hours.  But back then, how much sleep did I need when I was unemployed, wasn't allowed to lift over ten pounds, and pretty much ordered to sit around all day by the doctor.  Now as far as my surgery goes, I am supposed to slowly be trying to regain my strength.  And I need plenty of rest to recover from chemo as well.  One of my cancer supporters told me that I probably wouldn't have any trouble sleeping once the chemo kicked it.  In one way she was right.  If I am anywhere but in bed, I can fall asleep at the drop of the hat, which can be a problem in the bathroom.  Yesterday for instance, I was constantly falling asleep on the couch.  However, around 9PM, the sleepiness left, and stayed gone!  At around 4am, I finally forced myself to go to bed, even though I wasn't tired, and laid there for at least another half an hour wide awake.  At 9:30am, I woke up wide awake again and even though I laid in bed, I couldn't fall back asleep.  There was a basenji that was glad of that fact, because if I am awake in bed, then I can rub her ears.  Finally, after an hour of laying in bed wide awake, and carpal tunnel from all the basenji petting, I get up.  And I stayed wide awake for two hours, then fell asleep on the couch again.

My wife keeps bringing up the idea of sleeping pills when we are around the oncologist, the nurse, pharmacist, vet, sandwich artist, or anyone else that will listen.  I have been against them, because I keep having visions of Elvis.  No, I don't think that I am going to overdose on prescription pills and die on the toilet, I am afraid I will get fat, wear hideous jumpsuits, make cheesy movies, and turn into a glorified Vegas lounge singer.  The oncologist's nurse jumped on my wife's side (of course she would, it's women conspiring against me) and suggested a few things up to and including over the counter sleep aids, before I hit the prescription stuff.  I don't know what to do.  I just know I am feeling really tired and I wish I could get one really good night's sleep.

I have big plans for my birthday.  I plan to run/jog a five kilometer fun run, even though the only running I have done since my surgery was into the hospital a week ago, and if it weren't for the adrenaline, I wouldn't have been able to do that.  I would like to do a thirty mile bike ride, even though the thought of hopping on a bicycle seat after my surgery makes my sole remaining testicle want to hide.  And the most physically demanding thing, I plan on going to Walt Disney World on my birthday.  And I am NOT going to be one of those jerks who gets a doctor's note to rent a wheelchair once they get there just to cut in line on all of the rides.  It's pretty obvious what is going on when you see them leap out of that wheelchair everytime the ice cream cart rolls by.  My contention is that if you really need a wheelchair, you will bring the one you always use.  But anyway, the point is, I plan on walking around Disney on my own power.

So between needing to up my physical activity and not being able to look at the inside of this house anymore, my wife and I did a little Christmas shopping today.  After about fifteen minutes, I was exhausted.  Part of that was because after fifteen minutes, I had looked at all of the stuff I wanted to see, then I just had to follow my wife around for the rest of the time pouting.  Anyone that has been shopping with my wife knows exactly what I am talking about.  I wouldn't have minded so much if she was shopping for an American made Paul Reed Smith with twenty four frets and double cutaways, but I found a used one at the first place we went and pointed out that it was a bargain at $1600.  She acted like she didn't care at all!  To me, we were done shopping with that find, but we left the store (without the guitar) and bought stuff for other people!  I made my best but-I-am-a-cancer-patient face, but it had no effect on her.  Probably because that look is permanently on my face ever since the chemo kicked in.  I think she has grown an immunity to it.

We went to Cracker Barrel after that and then to the grocery store, and I will admit, I am dead tired.  But for some reason, I am not sleepy tired.  I wish I could explain it better because if I could, maybe I could find something that would help me.  So, if I can't sleep tonight, I may break down and get one of the over the counter sleep aids.  Until then, I will just search the internet until I find an article saying that playing American PRS guitars helps you sleep well, and practice making an even more pitiful cancer patient face.

Talking About Cancer Can Be Fun?

Chemo is still messing with me.  Yesterday I felt great.  I actually got out in the real world (briefly) without supervision and wasn't too tired.  Today I have been tired all day and yet when I lay down it's hard to sleep.

Yesterday was group meeting.  If you don't remember my group post, I will give you the real quick down and dirty.  Basically there are two groups, one for cancer patients/survivors and one for loved ones/caretakers.  There is no set agenda or leader.  There is a therapist in the meeting that starts it, but he stresses he is not there as a therapist (even though they only let therapists do that part of the meeting).  I feel especially lucky because our therapist is also a cancer survivor, so everyone in the room is going through or has been through the same thing.

I was kind of torn when they said that cancer fighters and their loved ones don't attend the same meeting.  After all, this has been a long tough journey that we have both been on, neither of us by choice.  Throughout this its seems we have been side by side, it just doesn't seem right talking about the journey, without the person that has been riding shotgun the whole time.  They explain it is so the cancer patient can freely talk about any abuse (such as not receiving an American made Paul Reed Smith guitar with twenty four frets and double cutaways) and the caretakers can freely talk about what a joy it has been to be around me and to cater to my every need (almost, there is still the issue of the PRS guitar).  My wife seems to enjoy it.  I think she likes making the other caretakers jealous about what a wonderful patient she has.

Yesterday though, we had a real small group.  I have enjoyed the groups before, but yesterday was different. It seems in the big group, you always steer the conversation back to cancer.  Sometimes it can be a little depressing.  But yesterday, with a group of five to seven of us (some came late, some left early) it was more like a normal conversation, with cancer as the common thread we all had.  Yes, a lot of what we talked about was cancer, but we talked about everything else in the world.  And we laughed.  We laughed at our pain.  We laughed at our joys.  We just seemed to all enjoy a conversation where everyone in the room had the common experiences.  One thing about cancer is you may all have the "C" word, but there is the surgery group, the radiation group, the chemotherapy group, the "just watch it" group, and those of us that have had the combinations of treatments.  Yesterday, we had all been through chemo (I was the newbie) and we just had a grand ole time complaining about treatment.  And everyone got a kick out of me, the chemo one-shot-wonder, going to receive treatment with books.  It is hard to concentrate in the chemo room, especially as a first timer, so no one really read books and I was the only one in the room without some sort of electronic device sitting in front of me.  As soon as I mentioned I didn't bring an MP3 player or a computer/DVD player, everyone in the room laughed at me.  Being the only one at chemo not tethered to some form of electronic entertainment I felt like the only kid on the playground that while everyone else had brand names, I had clothes my mom made.  At least I assume that is what that felt like, being a Navy brat on the playground in the 70s and 80s, pretty much anything went at the schools that catered to military kids.

I think yesterday was the first day I didn't look at the clock to see when it was over.  OK, that is a slight lie.  I am still drinking of ton of fluids from the chemo, so I did look to see if I could hold it until group was over or if I had to get rid of the fluids before then.  But our conversations went everywhere.  I am not allowed to talk about the conversations.  I would make the joke "What happens in group..." but that joke is so overdone at the point, I will just say that it is proper etiquette that we are free to speak in there knowing that the person we are talking about will never hear that we said we are being abused because I still don't have the PRS guitar.  Plus if all the non-cancers knew all the cancer secrets, everyone would want cancer.  Did you know if you show your tumor at Sizzler, your meal is half off?  You are also asked to leave immediately (especially if you are like me and have testicular cancer) so it is best to do it towards the end of the meal.  Unfortunately we don't have any Sizzler's here so I can't use that benefit.  There are many more cancer secrets, but I have already said too much.

But the one thing that our conversation really reminded me about yesterday, is that we all hate cancer treatment.  There are certain tests we all take that we all dread.  There are parts of our treatment that we all dread.  And every single one of us hates the waits.  I had a conversation one day with a gastro-intestinal pre-med student who said that they take turns doing procedures on each other (endoscopes, barium X-rays, etc.) so that they not only know how to do the procedure, but that they know what the patients are experiencing as well.  I think that spoiled me.  More than likely, your oncologist is not going to know exactly what it is like to be in your shoes.  They can tell you what they have heard or read  about chemo, or radiation, or even the surgeries, but they probably don't know.  And that is where getting together with others and talking about your experiences, and knowing you aren't the only one, really helps.

So now I am left with a myriad of emotions.  Part of me kind of wishes the groups are always that small, because I really enjoyed yesterday.  On the other hand, although some of my favorite people from group were there, there was at least one missing.  I used to think I may not go anymore after I am given the all clear.  One of my favorites (that was missing yesterday) has been coming for years after he was given the all clear.  And after yesterday, I think I understand why.  So, I will wait for next Thursday, where I can commiserate with other cancer patients that don't have American made PRS guitars, and find out where else we can get dining discounts.

Me and My Boat Hate Cancer

Today was like the past few.  I woke up having to pee, having to drink, and just as tired as when I went to bed. I am doing a little better today though.  I only had to take one nap.  Although the cabin fever is driving me crazy, I can't seem to find the energy to do much anyway.  The best solution I can come up with is that someone tie me up like a marionette and move my arms and legs for me.  If that happens, there are all kinds of places to go and things I would like to do.

But there was one thing I had to do.  Supposedly the temperature is going to flirt with the freezing mark tomorrow.  I have been putting off winterizing one of the boats and still didn't want to do it today, but I have put to much work into it to have it ruined now.  This boat isn't huge by most standards, but on its trailer, it comes up to my chest.  This is a little bit of a problem for a guy that is still recovering from having his abdomen sliced open.  On one hand it seems like my surgery was a lifetime ago (and I guess in a sense it was), but I still feel the tug on that side when I make certain movements, and I actually won't get the all clear for my surgery for another two weeks.  I gather my tools and antifreeze and very carefully manage to climb into my boat, trying to only put the strain on the unsliced portion of my body, while keeping my sliced up part straight and slowly angling it up and over the side of the boat.  I finally manage to get in, with just a slight pull on my incision, I slide the boat cover off to give me plenty of room to work, and I get ready to settle down next to the engine when I see...all of my tools still sitting on the table.  I now have to get back out of the boat, which is actually more difficult, and I use the fat-kid-getting-out-of-the-swimming-pool approach.  I get on my stomach, spin to swing my legs over, I have to stop and think which leg has to go first, because at one point all of my weight will be put on one leg, and if I put it on the wrong leg, I will end up putting all of my weight on my butt on the concrete.  I shimmy down in a move that would have made James Brown proud (and I think at one point during the maneuver I actually did end up jumping back and kissing myself...at least I hope that was myself).  I gather everything and place it on the back of the boat and start to board again looking like a drunk gymnast on the uneven bars.  The good news is, the actual winterizing went surprisingly easy.  I closed the boat back up, put my tools away, and start to get a little down.

See, this boat has been a three year project.  I was one mechanical piece away from having it on the water.  Life being what it is, all summer I struggled to find time to finish the last little bit.  When I was laid off, my immediate thought was to finish it up while on severance and waiting for a job and this project would be finally be done.  Then I got cancer.  It is times like these that make you really hate the disease.  I have said before I feel like cancer took two months of my summer, and it took this too.  The part that really bothers me is work inside the boat has to be done at certain temperatures.  If it is too cold, you can crack the fiberglass just by getting into it while it's on the trailer.  As I am shutting my shop back up, I got mad, I got depressed, I got sweaty, and I got tired again.  Now I am even more mad.  I can't even get mad without getting winded!

After a two or three hour nap, my parents call.  During the conversation, they mention they are looking for another vehicle.  I get mad at cancer again.  I had planned on getting one of my spare vehicles rebuilt for them after the boat.  The reality of the situation is, that if I had finished the boat, I probably would have spent too much time on it the rest of the summer to finish that vehicle for them, but that isn't the point.  The point is because of cancer I will never know.  For the past two months, cancer has controlled what I can do, where I can go, what I can eat and drink, when I sleep, when I stay awake, just about every aspect of my life and I am getting really (curse word) tired of it!!!  Even when I get furious about it and want to do something, all I can summon the energy to do is nap.

Tomorrow, I go to my cancer group.  It can be a depressing setting sometimes, but I still walk out of there feeling better.  It really is what it advertises to be, just a place where you and your cancer colleagues can talk about how you are feeling and how to deal with it.  My only apprehension about going tomorrow, is I have some errands I would like to run as well.  I am afraid to do my errands, because at the rate I have been going I will be exhausted by group.  Again, cancer is acting like a helicopter parent.  You aren't going to the music store and the bike shop before group are you?  You may get tired.  And you better take a jacket, it is supposed to be a little chilly tomorrow and you know how you get when you are fighting cancer... 

The only bright spot of today is that I am still tired, because I did limit myself to one nap.  I have been fretting over getting the boat winterized, so at least that is one thing I don't have to worry about now.  So maybe, with a little less on my mind and still being tired, I will go to sleep before 3am.  And tomorrow I will get to talk to the people at the cancer clubhouse.  If I can run two or three errands on the way, it will be a good day.

Chemo: My Everest

I feel like I just climbed Mt. Everest!  No, I don't have any life changing sense of accomplishment.  As I look up the stairs getting ready to climb them to go to the bathroom, much like the people on Everest, I think to myself that I don't know if I can make it or not.  And much like the people on Everest, I consider just going in my pants.  Just like those climbers, when I reach my goal, I am out of breath and fatigued.  And finally, just like an Everest climber, I spent upwards of $30,000 to get where I am today.

Why am I comparing myself to an Everest climber?  In some ways our bodies are going through the same thing right now.  Altitude sickness is caused when there is less oxygen to breathe.  The body reacts by eventually producing more red blood cells.  During chemotherapy, your red blood cells are decreased, thereby your body is not able to absorb as much oxygen.  The body reacts the same way, you have to wait for more red blood cells to be produced.  I just hope that the body produces red blood cells while I sleep, because that is about all I have been able to do without getting winded (and to be honest, even that got me winded at one point today).

The thing that sucks most about this, is the cancer insomnia is still messing with me.  I seem to be sleeping anytime except when people normally sleep.  Yesterday, I was able to fight the urge to sleep most of the day, just taking a brief nap late morning and then again in the afternoon (hey, I am really tired, it was hard to resist sleep even that much).  But last night, as I lay down, for the one and only time during the whole day, I felt wide awake.  And I felt that way until 3am.  I finally fell asleep, woke up early in the morning as usual to drink and pee, the back asleep until almost 11am.  At this point, I am still dead tired, but I have a meeting to go to, so I start getting ready.  The shower and breakfast seemed to jolt my system awake and I felt good as I start to go out to my car.  Before I get out the door I hear the tornado sirens.  I walk up the stairs, and start feeling tired again.  I really want to go to this meeting.  The news channels are all doing their best to scare the hell out of everyone, which on one hand I don't care about, but on the other hand, if I do run into this tempest that they are alluding to, I don't know that I have the energy to do anything about it.  Reluctantly, I just decide to pull my Jeep into my workshop, because now they are saying they have "heard reports" of hail the size of housecats.  I like how they can't say that there is hail the size of domestic felines, because everyone would know that they are just making up crap.  BUT, if they say that they "heard reports" they can say any darn thing they want to, when they are still probably just making crap up.  Luckily, I come back down to the house and see an e-mail stating that the meeting was being cancelled due to the impending tornado and small-mammal sized hail.

I was able to stay awake for the storm, which turned out to be a whole lot of nothing.  One of our apple trees broke, but it was so full of woodpecker holes, I don't know if it was broken because of the wind from the storm or just a squirrel with a thyroid problem.  As soon as the storm passed (but the all the Chicken Little reporters were still keeping up their Stormbuster 7000 Radars on TV), I fell asleep on the couch.  I wake up four hours and one basenji later (I swear there wasn't a basenji laying on me when I fell asleep) and I am still dead tired!  Shortly after that, I decide to do something and I played guitar until I was completely fatigued (about thirty minutes), and then I had to resign myself to collapsing on the couch again.  At one point, I did muster up enough energy to get a vigorous two minute Shake Weight routine in, so I guess I will only look a third like one of those guys on the TV commercials after today's workout.

The whole rest of the night, I have felt like I am walking around with wrist weights and ankle weights on.  You know those weights that people sometimes buy to get exercise, but they are so heavy the result is that they put them on and do less than they did before?  The point is, I am walking around with my arms hanging down like a gorilla with a bad back.  What really sucks is as tired and worn out as I am right now, I am not sleepy tired if that makes any sense.  So, that is why I am writing blogs at midnight.  I guess I should at least get off here and go lay in bed and stake my claim before the basenjis do.