No Spring Chicken #29

No Spring Chicken #29
12/December/2014 Each day is a new challenge to integrate chemo with normal life. This week I've got a cold - heavy lung congestion with lots of coughing. Mostly I'm lying low (outside of chemo on Tuesday and Wednesday and the nulaska shot on Thursday). But now and then I have to get up and do something. Like last night. The wind was blowing like crazy and that always bothers Janet so we slept with the sliding door (to our balcony) closed so she couldn't hear it so much. Well, that meant leaving the bedroom door open, so Clair came up and slept with us. So I wound up getting up with her when the power went out (around 9pm), and again when it came back on (around 1:20am), and again when she needed to go out in the morning (around 6:30am) and when she wanted her breakfast I should have given her at 6:30 (around 8:30am). So I didn't exactly get a good night's sleep, although, with a late afternoon nap yesterday I did get about 8 hours of sleep. Just broken up into little pieces. Now, in Clair's defense, I got up on my own a couple of times (it's an old man thing) and that got her going. This week's chemo wasn't too bad. The first try for a vein didn't work, so they had to do a second, and it was closer to my wrist than I like (too close to the elbow or the wrist means interference when you move the arm/hand), but what can you do? The treatments went pretty rapidly, so that is something to be grateful for. We got home earlier each day than we had on those days for prefious treatments. Which, in turn, left us with more time to rest up in the evenings. Now, I told the guys at chorus that I'd get Ric to swing by and pick up the cookies because Janet (for whom baking is a hobby) was going through withdrawals due to my not going to chorus and taking cookies each week. But Ric forgot this week. So the guys went without and she had to take the cookies up to church for their social hour on Sunday. Too bad, too, because they were pretty good Fruitcake Cookies. Now, fruitcake has a bad reputation, because most people don't know how to eat it. It should be washed down with a plentiful supply of beverage. Tea or coffee is good. Burbon is better. Some cooks help you out by putting burbon in the fruitcake. Or rum. Or both. Others make a hard-sauce (rum or burbon based) to "ice" the cake with. At any rate, there were good cookies. Since they went to church, they didn't have any hard sauce on them. But I'll still wash down their memory with plenty of beverage. Until this cold goes away, though, it will have to be Scotch. When I've got a cold that is the only alcohol that tastes good to me. And it only tastes good when I've got a cold. That is twice I've mentioned the cold. Jeff came up last weekend to distract me from the impending treatment, which is good. But he had a bad cold (bad enough he missed my show on Saturday and the game on Sunday). I seem to have caught it from him. Still, better that than spend the weekend worrying about the chemo treatment. Besides, we got some things worked out in my ancient naval rules, and he thought through some stuff that works similarly in his renaissance naval rules. We also planned out the basis of a scenario for the tournament at Enfilade next year (Memorial Day weekend). So that was good, too. Planned new rosters and re-added the pentaconter to the ancients ships list. After days of rain and lots of wind last night it seems sunny and windless this morning. Hmm. Nice to have some quiet time in the weather. Now I'm looking forward to how the Huskies do in their bowl game on Jan 2nd, and how the Hawks do against the 49ers this weekend.

12/December/2014
Each day is a new challenge to integrate chemo with normal life. This week I've got a cold - heavy lung congestion with lots of coughing. Mostly I'm lying low (outside of chemo on Tuesday and Wednesday and the nulaska shot on Thursday). But now and then I have to get up and do something. Like last night. The wind was blowing like crazy and that always bothers Janet so we slept with the sliding door (to our balcony) closed so she couldn't hear it so much. Well, that meant leaving the bedroom door open, so Clair came up and slept with us. So I wound up getting up with her when the power went out (around 9pm), and again when it came back on (around 1:20am), and again when she needed to go out in the morning (around 6:30am) and when she wanted her breakfast I should have given her at 6:30 (around 8:30am). So I didn't exactly get a good night's sleep, although, with a late afternoon nap yesterday I did get about 8 hours of sleep. Just broken up into little pieces. Now, in Clair's defense, I got up on my own a couple of times (it's an old man thing) and that got her going.

This week's chemo wasn't too bad. The first try for a vein didn't work, so they had to do a second, and it was closer to my wrist than I like (too close to the elbow or the wrist means interference when you move the arm/hand), but what can you do? The treatments went pretty rapidly, so that is something to be grateful for. We got home earlier each day than we had on those days for prefious treatments. Which, in turn, left us with more time to rest up in the evenings.

Now, I told the guys at chorus that I'd get Ric to swing by and pick up the cookies because Janet (for whom baking is a hobby) was going through withdrawals due to my not going to chorus and taking cookies each week. But Ric forgot this week. So the guys went without and she had to take the cookies up to church for their social hour on Sunday. Too bad, too, because they were pretty good Fruitcake Cookies. Now, fruitcake has a bad reputation, because most people don't know how to eat it. It should be washed down with a plentiful supply of beverage. Tea or coffee is good. Burbon is better. Some cooks help you out by putting burbon in the fruitcake. Or rum. Or both. Others make a hard-sauce (rum or burbon based) to "ice" the cake with. At any rate, there were good cookies. Since they went to church, they didn't have any hard sauce on them. But I'll still wash down their memory with plenty of beverage. Until this cold goes away, though, it will have to be Scotch. When I've got a cold that is the only alcohol that tastes good to me. And it only tastes good when I've got a cold.

That is twice I've mentioned the cold. Jeff came up last weekend to distract me from the impending treatment, which is good. But he had a bad cold (bad enough he missed my show on Saturday and the game on Sunday). I seem to have caught it from him. Still, better that than spend the weekend worrying about the chemo treatment. Besides, we got some things worked out in my ancient naval rules, and he thought through some stuff that works similarly in his renaissance naval rules. We also planned out the basis of a scenario for the tournament at Enfilade next year (Memorial Day weekend). So that was good, too. Planned new rosters and re-added the pentaconter to the ancients ships list.

After days of rain and lots of wind last night it seems sunny and windless this morning. Hmm. Nice to have some quiet time in the weather. Now I'm looking forward to how the Huskies do in their bowl game on Jan 2nd, and how the Hawks do against the 49ers this weekend.

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