Monday, March 31, 2008

The Force was still with me today

The Force was still with me
The Force was still with me today when I went to the hospital to pick up my next prescription of drugs for the chemotherapy cycle that starts on Friday. The parking lot was almost empty or what passes for near emptiness in the middle of the day. There were no cars circling the full parking lot. I found a spot where I could drive through and be facing out when it came time for me to leave.

That was sweet.

When I was walking back to the Pathfinder after I got my prescription, I happened to pass a nursing staff member while in a cross walk. She said, “You look great.” I smiled and thanked her.

That was even sweeter for me.

Doug
Doug and his friends Rob and Derek went to the exhibition baseball in the Los Angeles Memorial Coliseum on Saturday. The report4ed crowd was over 115,000 baseball fans and I am guessing that most of them spent a lot of time standing in various lines, food, restroom, and so on.

Doug said he enjoyed the game but was not ready for baseball in a football stadium. He also felt the organizing could have gone better. I can agree with him because the left field seats are only 260 feet – 80 meters. The Coliseum had a 60 feet – 18 meters high fence in left field to reduce the number of home runs. This compensates somewhat but it is not how baseball was meant to be played.

Saturday and Sunday Dining
I went to Burger king on Saturday as usual for my dinner. I was ready for a hamburger, fries, and a cold beer for dinner. I asked for extra tomatos, onions and pickles. I was going to eat at home by myself because was at the baseball game. I would not be bothered by the extra onions and other condiments.

When I got home, I discovered that my Whooper was sort of flattened or crushed and there were none of the extras that I had asked for even though the wrapper clearly indicated that there were to be some extra condiments. The only part of dinner that went according to plans was the cold beer. I had a cold can of Heineken’s Beer with my disappointing hamburger.

Sunday was much better because Doug and I went to Fatburger for diner. Everything turned out the way we had ordered and expected our food to be. Of course, there was no cold beer, just cold Coca-Cola and that was great with me. I think the counter clerk made a mistake and gave us larger than we were supposed to have drink cups. I didn’t realize this until I tried to get a lid for the cup and ended up having to use a large lid.

Oh well, mistakes happen and sometimes they benefit you.

Woman of the Moment Encore
I do not have as many images of Aiko Tanaka as I do of Eiko Koike. Maybe when Aiko finished her website, you can find more images. Some of the images are significantly older, like the ones I posted yesterday. I will make an effort to find and use the newer images or at least the ones that I think are the newer ones.






Be well and stay happy.

Sunday, March 30, 2008

The Force was with us - Recovery Part 20

The Force was with us – Recovery Part 20
The Force was with Doug and me when we went to the hospital on Thursday and Friday.

Parking is usually bad to really horrible, depending on the time of day. We got lucky on Thursday and found a spot right in front of the MRI building. I felt like Han Solo, sliding the Millennium Falcon into a grungy parking bay on some forgotten world, when I parked the Pathfinder right next to the building’s front doors.

After I finished the MRI, I drove over to main hospital building for my dressing change. We sort of took a look into one parking lot that we usually try to park. It was clearly a no-go choice; there were cars parked in the aisles, waiting for someone to leave. I tried another lot on the other side of the building; it was a lot that we rarely use. A car pulled out just as I turned the Pathfinder into the aisle. This parking spot was also close to the building doors although that was not much of a consideration for us.

All in all, I was very pleased with finding the parking spots. If I had not found the second spot on Thursday, I would have had to spend an extra few hours at the hospital on Friday and who wants time at a hospital on a Friday afternoon when it is sunny and warm in Southern California.

Besides, I had a lesson plan to prepare for my Saturday class.

Thursday was an MRI day for me.

The oncologists [cancer doctors] wanted the MRI to develop some more detailed images of the spots that were first found when I had my emergency operation last October. The doctors were unsure if the spots were cancerous or not. If the spots have gotten smaller, then it is likely they are cancerous and will probably be removed in an operation.

The operation on my liver is not too bad of a prospect for me. The new surgeon will cut along my October scar and cut part of my liver out. Losing part of my liver is only partially serious since the liver will naturally grow back.

My October surgeon, Dr. Aileen Takahashi, said that scars are fine on men. They look good. I am guessing the scar will probably end up a bit wider. I can live with that; I’m used to seeing the scar by now.

Thursday was the first time that I had an MRI.

MRIs are different from an x-ray or a CT scan. You get placed in a narrow, really narrow tube. The machine blows a steady stream of cold air through the tube to help you avoid claustrophobia. Cold air was the not best possible solution for me since I am still a little sensitive to the cold from the chemotherapy medicine. But, the nurse did give me a blanket so I stayed sort of warmish.

The MRI machine is extremely noisy. The nurse issued me some ear plugs to help prevent any damage to my hearing.

The MRI process is also much longer than a regular x-ray or a CT scan. That makes your stay in the narrow metal tube a real challenge. I managed; I figured this was all going to help me recover from the cancer so I am willing to do a lot.

After the MRI, I had my weekly dressing. I’m going to talk about that separately because of the Baby Blues.

Friday was the regularly scheduled visit with the oncologists. I had a man doctor for only the second time. This doctor was less enthusiastic with his vocabulary; no excellents, no greats in his conversation.

The radiologist had not reviewed the MRI results so that left a big void in the conversation. I had planned that the next visit would be the one that discussed the MRI results.

Overall, things are going well for me. I am tolerating the chemotherapy well and the doctors are pleased with my modest weight gain. Most cancer patients tend to lose weight because of their therapies.

We talked about the liver surgery some more this week. I don’t think any decision will be made until I finish the eight cycles of the therapy. That should be in June. I figured the doctors will review file and then decide. I will probably find out what they plan to do next in July.

The only area of concern so far is my blood platelet cell count which is still in the safe zone, just on the lower side of the desired range. I have not had any trouble with blood clotting so far; this would be an indication that the level of platelets is falling off more than desired and my condition requires more attention. I am fairly certain the doctors will want my platelet count higher before they operate.

I guess the only positive outcome of the low blood platelet cell count is that it is likely caused by the chemotherapy regimen. Once I stop with the therapy, my platelet count should rise back into the normal range.

I still have all of my hair and that is good.

I have had only two instances of nausea since I started the therapy. I think the two instances had nothing to do with a reaction to the therapy and much more to do with the food not agreeing with my stomach and the other contents that were there when I consumed the food.

I am still happy and positive and looking forward to a full recovery later this year.

The Baby Blues
Thursday was another dressing change day with the Baby Blues.

I have to go to the hospital to have the dressing for my catheter changed. This requires two hands and a lot of skill, two things that I have in very short supply. Besides going to the hospital gives a reason to get out of the house on a regular basis.

I had a new nurse, Lin, put on the new dressing. Lin was not much on talking on Thursday; that could have been because she had a mask over her mouth and the dressing change room was noisy.

My favorite Baby Blue, Glenda, came by to say hello to me again.

Glenda always makes my day much better when she shows up at dressing changes or during an infusion session. She always had a big smile for me. Glenda looked especially nice on Thursday; she was wearing white pants instead of the usual blue pants with her baby blue colored oversized jacket.

Perfectomundo.

If I was really as organized as I like to think I am, I should have taken a photo of Glenda and Jennifer long before now. Maybe I will get my act together this week.

Why I didn’t Post on Thursday
I went to a fraternity event. It was at the Orange County Alumni Club of the Phi Delta Theta Fraternity. We celebrated the founding of the Fraternity 140 years ago.

Normally, I would not have made the trip for the dinner meeting. I will be going to a Founders Day celebration in May at my own chapter of the fraternity. I went to the dinner because my good friend Scott was going to be the featured speaker and he was going to talk about how the fraternity was doing.

In sum, Phi Delta Theta is doing very well. The Fraternity got invited by a leading Korean business school to come to Korea and explain how to develop an American style fraternity. That is a real honor for the Fraternity.

Scott and I plan to get together when I am in Salt Lake City. We didn’t have too much time to talk when he was in the OC, as Doug would say.

Visitors
We had another good week for general visitor traffic. We had visitors from Australia [14], Texas [9], Japan [5], Canada [12], Chile, Netherlands [2], France [10], Poland [4], Korea [3], Romania [2], Malaysia [4], Switzerland [2], United Kingdom [9], Italy [3], United Arab Emirates, Spain [3], Hungary, Brazil [2], Sweden [3], Germany [5], Mexico [3], Belgium, Taiwan, South Africa [2], Puerto Rico, India, Philippines, Hong Kong, Lithuania, Portugal, Ireland, Slovenia, Slovakia, and Croatia.

We had an off week in terms of visitors who came and stayed around for a while. There were only three visitors who stayed for more than ten minutes; one who stayed for 31 minutes, one who stayed for 23 minutes, and one show stayed for 17 minutes.

I do appreciate all of you who took time to stop and visit the blog. I know that you may have other more important things to do than to come here.

Woman of the Moment Encore
It is time for a new Woman of the Moment Encore feature today. I will be featuring Aiko Tanaka for the next few weeks. Most of her photos were downloaded from the now dead Speed Options.com web site. The others came from her older web site that can be found at http://aikotanaka.com. The website is undergoing an upgrade so the photo gallery is still under construction.

These images are some of my personal favorites. I hope that you can share my views.

Firefox
I downloaded a new version of Firefox on Friday after I downloaded the massive Vista SP1 bloatware. I though the version was a final version; my bad luck, it was only a beta version so it has problems left in. My experience using the new beta version was a disappointment, it was more unstable than the version it is replacing. That was really frustrating because it would intermittently not respond to command and then quickly respond.

Note to self, never download beta versions of any program.



Be well and stay happy.

Tuesday, March 25, 2008

Fixing the Grade Books

Fixing the Grade Books
I was able to unsnarl my school grade books today. The task was relatively simple but it took a longer time than I thought would be necessary. I finished and update three of my four classes. I will finish the fourth class on Thursday afternoon.

I made a simple error and all it took to correct was a click on a button and then save click.

Windows Vista Service Pack 1
Holy bloat Batman!

The Service Pack 1 that I downloaded and installed today was over 430 MB fat. I think that was close to twice the size of the Windows XP program. If the SP1 was supposed to fix all of the known bugs, problems, conflicts, and plug the sieve called security by Microsoft, then there must have been one ginormous hole somewhere.

Frankly, this bothers me in some degree.

Microsoft has been babbling like a baby about improved security and more stable platforms for years now. I am beginning to wonder if this talk is all just smoke and mirrors and wishful thinking on the part of Microsoft.

Yes, I know the program is huge and that is partly to blame. There has to be a simple and yet elegant solution to program bloat.

Here’s my two cents worth of an idea, instead of having us download as the normal download, why not offer a slimmed down version without all of the bloat that the vast majority of users will not be able to use or even care to use.

If we wanted the section with all of the kazoos, we could download it at our option and be very happy.

I doubt anyone from Redmond, besides the Princess and the Golfer, will care what I have to say.

So far, I haven’t seen any speed improvements after downloading SP1. I have experienced more hang ups and not responding programs.

I have been using Outlook as my email and calendar program for about two weeks now because I got feed up with Windows Live Mail. Live Mail was or is an unstable program that was prone to freeze up. I also hated that I could not delete an old email. I did appreciate being able to view video clips sent to me by my friends.

For some unknown reason, Outlook is not allowing me to open some video clips now. I know the sender and I trust the sender. I am a big boy after all and should be able to make my own decisions on what files to open. I am willing to assume full responsibility for my actions.

But, paternalistic and singularly uncooperative Outlook has apparently unilaterally decided that it knows what is best for me.

Doug
Doug seems to be gaining some traction with his new Internet writing job. He is getting good view volume. On Monday, two of his posts were among the top three most viewed posts of the day. This morning, one of his posts had almost a 1,000 views in less than an hour.

Sweet.

Being a good parent, I read his posts and I think I understand most of them. I noticed that his name is now on the masthead of the site as a Contributor which I suppose is better than being just an anonymous free lancer.

Good work Doug.

Predator Pilots
I was reading my local newspaper over the weekend and I ran across an article that the United States Air Force was having trouble training pilots or controllers for the Predator reconnaissance aircraft. The article said that there were not enough qualified controllers available to meet the demands.

I use the term controller and not pilot because you sit in an air conditioned trailer in a hopefully comfortable chair while you run your flight. You take off and land on a 7,000 foot – 2,100 kilometer long concrete runway.

What could be so hard about that?

The flight missions seem to be extended versions of the Microsoft Flight Simulator program. You aim the drone in the proper direction, make mid-course corrections, conduct your observations, and maybe drop some ordinance on a bad guy.

Let’s see, I think it takes a couple of hours to learn Flight Simulator so we should allow the Air Force a full week of training. Oh yes, you don’t need commissioned officers as controllers; just find some gamer nerds and they will be fine.

So, what’s the supply problem?

Like many overly myopic military services, the Air Force can only think about pilots and planes and the undying need to preserve the role of manned air craft in combat. Hardly a logical argument, a bomb dropped from a drone will kill just as well as a bomb dropped from a manned aircraft.

I do speak with some authority on this matter. In my misspent youth, I served in the United States Navy as the Gunnery Office on the good ship USS Leonard F. Mason. One of my side jobs was to be the ship’s primary controller of a drone anti-submarine helicopter. I had all of six weeks training on the drone and the equipment. Then, it was off to the war in Vietnam again and time to try out our new drone with the television camera mounted on it.

It was a live video feed so you could see whatever was in the field of vision. One day, I had the drone track a North Vietnamese infiltrator. The ship radioed the Marines and they caught him as soon as he crossed the DMZ.

I didn’t have a nice long concrete runway to land the drone on. I had a patch of deck that was about the size of a half volleyball court. Of course, the deck was always moving out from under the drone as the ship sailed forward; the ship was also rolling; and the ship was also pitching. Then, there was the turbulent wind that swept around the deck house and blew out of after stack to contend with.

We stood on steel decks for the entire mission but we did have good air conditioning; we turned our bodies into the wind.

The drones were never designed to do this type of mission. They were heavily modified for the task. They were notoriously unstable and had an annoying tendency to blow up with the controller was near bye. One of my shipmates on our sister ship lost an eye when his drone blew up on him.

We called out drones Ulcers 26C and Hemorrhoids 26C. Those were very appropriate names.

Woman of the Moment Encore
I am going to have Eiko Koike act as the Woman of the Moment Encore person tonight. She reminds me of my days when I was young and in the Navy and when the Mason was based in Yokosuka, Japan.





Be well and stay happy.

Sunday, March 23, 2008

Happy Easter

Happy Easter
Happy Easter to all of you who are Christian. I join with you in sharing this day of joy when our Savior rose from the dead.

I would also wish the Jews among the readers a joyful Purim festival. This weekend,
Friday to Sunday, happens only once a millennium. There are five major religious observances over the weekend.

Amber the Stylist & Natalie the Receptionist
Amber was at the salon before I got there on Friday. I arrived early because the traffic was lighter than I thought it would be. Sometimes, traffic flows with you in Los Angeles.

I really enjoyed the shampoo and short neck massage Amber gave me. She even used warm water in her spray bottle so I would not be bothered by the cold water. That was very thoughtful of her.

I did like the haircut she gave me. I liked it more than I liked the photos she took of me. I was planning to update my photos that I have scattered around the Internet; like in my Blogger.com profile section, for example. I was unable to pose properly for the image I want to post. I suppose that I am being overly picky about how I look.

I did have a chance to see Natalie the Receptionist as well on Friday. She had just returned from a business trip and I think was a little jet lagged for the early morning hour that I was there.

Natalie also got her hair cut much shorter than I have ever seen it since the last time I was at the salon. I think she has been growing it longer ever since I first met her. It is now about eight or nine inches shorter. I am beginning to like and enjoy the new Natalie look. I think it fits her well now.

Obviously, this is an older photo of Natalie.

School
My Saturday class went well for me. I had more students in class on Saturday than on the previous week. This is always good with the administration. I do think I am going to lose two or three students from the roster for non-attendance. I can’t force students to come to class; it is there money after all and they can choose to spend it or waste it as they wish.

I spent a perfectly wonderful Spring Sunday afternoon grading papers. I think I may run out of red ink in my pen before the term is over. Some of the students have not learned how to write in common English yet.

It seems as if some of my students may have lifted some of their homework assignment directly from someone else’s writing. One of the common clues is the language used is very proper and the vocabulary is uncommon. The papers are not how the students speak in class when we are talking about a discussion. For example, I do not know many twenty years who would use the word “antagonist” in a sentence.

Most of my writing students failed to follow my suggestion about having their papers proof read prior to submission. The lack of proof reading showed in the poorer papers.

I did manage to make a mess on my online grade books when I tried to correct some incorrect entries. I will be spending some time with the Associate Dean on Monday. I am hopeful that he can solve my problems relatively quickly and without too much trouble.

Full and Fair Disclosure
I obviously like my friend Renee’s painting style. I should point out that I own two large oil or acrylic on canvas and five small water color paintings. I think I have wall space or I can make wall space for some more of her works.

I did feel guilty, to a certain extent, about Amber the Stylist having to get up early two days in a row.

Merit the Server
I went to El Gringo on Thursday for my dinner as usual. No surprises there for any regular reader of the blog. Unfortunately, Merit was working at the Hermosa Beach El Gringo that night. Alana the Busser was there and she was very friendly with me. By that, I mean she spent some time talking to me, more so than she usually does.

Merit’s working in Hermosa Beach presented me with a quandary. I had stopped by Giuliano’s Delicatessen to pick up a chocolate éclair for Merit because Merit loves chocolates. I know the éclair wouldn’t keep that long in the refrigerator at home, especially with Doug, who loves the Giuliano’s éclairs, around. I could see him inhaling in a matter of minutes.

I thought of the shark in JAWS at that moment.

In the end, I think I did the right thing. I drove to the Hermosa Beach El Gringo and surprised Merit with the éclair. I suppose that I will find out how she liked it in two weeks when I am back to my regular Thursday evening meal pattern.

Visitors
We had another good week for visitors. We had visitors from Canada [16], Spain [2], Singapore [2], France [3], Malaysia [2], Japan [11], Texas [5], Mexico [4], United Kingdom [7], Australia [6], Czech Republic, Italy, Philippines, Belgium [2], Iran [3], Hong Kong, Greece, United Arab Emirates [3], Germany [7], Netherlands, Brazil, South Africa, Sweden [2], Portugal, Thailand, Korea, Ireland, Bulgaria, Uzbekistan, and Kuwait.

This week was the first time that the blog has had a visitor from Uzbekistan. I hope you return to the blog when you have time.

We had an off week for visitors who stayed around for a longer period of time. We had one visitor who stayed for 18 minutes, one who stayed for 14 minutes and two who stayed for 11 eleven minutes.

I do appreciate all of you who took time to cycle through the Internet to visit my blog. If you enjoy the blog, be sure to mention it to your friends.

Woman of the Moment Encore
I am thinking about changing the Woman of the Moment Encore section sometime this week. I will be shifting from Eiko Koike to Sunisa Kim. This should be an easy change for everyone to make. In the meantime, we will make do with Eiko Koike.





Programming Note
I may not have a blog posting tomorrow. I think I will be spending a lot of time with the school’s online grade book system and getting my courses set up properly.

Life happens and we all make adjustments.


Be well and stay happy.

Thursday, March 20, 2008

My Favorite Baby Blue

My Favorite Baby Blue
I saw my favorite Baby Blue today when I went in for my weekly dressing change. This would be Glenda.

Glenda didn’t change my dressing today but she did stop by to say hello and give me the biggest smile that I have observed from her. I guess she was in a good mood today. Glenda said she read the blog and my comments about her giggling all of the time. She was giggling when she told me she was a reader.

[Note to self: Glenda is a reader; take more care with what you say about her.]

My day started off great for a change.

School

My classes went well yesterday. I had a full class for my Microeconomics course. I gave them their first quiz. I am wondering if I want to grade before the weekend or just wait until Sunday evening to grade the quiz.

I don’t want to have my weekend spoiled by having to grade a quiz where everyone did poorly.

The Wednesday night writing class went very well. The lesson plan called for a discussion on the issue of truth and which theory, evolution or intelligent design, is the answer to the question of how we got here today. It was a fascinating discussion.

We also discussed their course projects. Some of the groups are in good shape and some others concern me because I fear that the weaker groups will fail badly at the end of the course. I have tried to schedule the course project so that they all start early on the final project that is a moderately long paper.

Phi Delta Theta Fraternity
My good friend Scott called me yesterday. He wanted to invite me to a fraternity dinner out in Orange County for next Thursday night. Scott is going to be the featured speaker. I think Scott and I go back for maybe twenty years to when he was an undergraduate at the University of Utah.

We also talked about our old chapter at Utah. It was closed by Fraternity and University for hazing. It was the right decision to make. The original plans to restart the chapter called for an initiation of new members in May. That has been postponed until Fall. I think everything will turn out fine in the end; so we take a little longer to restart.

Amber the Stylist
Amber sent me an email reminder last night about my hair cutting appointment. Usually, I send her a reminder but since she has been on time for the last couple of appointments, I let it ride. Amber said that she was looking forward to seeing me today at 11:00 AM for a hair cut. Amber also said that Natalie was going to be out of the salon today and be unable to remind me about the appointment as she usually does.

I replied that the appointment was for Friday at 10:00 AM.

I had another email from her when I got home from seeing the Baby Blues at the clinic. She laughed at her mistake and observed that being on time two days in a row would not be a bad thing.

Woman of the Moment Encore
I might as well conclude a very nice day for me with some Eiko Koike images. These images, like the others I have posted, have come from her web site. For those of you who missed the web site’s URL, it is http://www.eikokoikeonline.com.






All in all, I had a good day.

Be well and stay happy.

Tuesday, March 18, 2008

Some Days Are Better Than Others

Some Days Are Better Than Others
I’m a cancer patient and I am going through chemotherapy. Friday was the half way spot on my first round of chemotherapy. I had my fourth infusion and I have four more infusions to go.

I think I will be having at least one more round of chemotherapy. That ought to take up the beginning of the New Year.

The Baby Blues, Glenda and Jennifer, came bye to say hello. That was a nice pickup for me.

This is my off-week for treatment. I only have a dressing change scheduled for the week.

My Saturday class was fairly good. About half of the class did not show up; I guess getting up was too hard for them. I do have one older student who likes to hear her voice in class. She has a tendency to speak up and comment, regardless of whether the comment is related to the course discussion.

I was going to put a posting up on Sunday but it was a bit cool for me and my fingers were rather sensitive to the keyboard. I tried to take a nap on Sunday. That was a failure. I live across the street from a church so it is a quiet neighborhood for the most part. Sunday, the church decided to have a festival with live and well amplified music; obviously, a nap was out of the question.

The Princess phoned me on Monday after her trip to Salt Lake City in conjunction with her birthday. She seems to have had a very good time with her girl friends from college. We talked about my trip to Seattle in June. The Princess thought that June might be an excellent time to visit since the weather is likely to be optimal.

Perfectomundo.

My friend Sharon phoned me this morning. She wanted to reschedule our lunch plans. We talked for a while; it was nice to hear her talk without too much tension and drama in her voice. Her assistant just gave his notice so she will be on her own in about two weeks, all of which makes scheduling somewhat problematic.

I didn’t celebrate St. Patrick’s Day because I am neither Irish nor Catholic. Doug did celebrate because he is a quarter Irish; we did the math before he headed out to join his friends at an Irish pub – bar in Hollywood. From all accounts, he had some fun.

The best part of my day came when my friend Renee called. I have known Renee since maybe 1993. She is an abstract impressionist artist. Doug used to call her painting finger painting until I told him how valuable her paintings were. He has changed his mind about her painting style and has one of her paintings of his own now.

Renee says I am special for her because I helped get her career off of the ground. She says I gave her the first solo art show in her career.

I was president of a credit union at the time. I wanted to have original art on the office walls. I went to a large show with hundreds of young struggling artists, all trying to get noticed. I saw and liked her work and invited her to hang some of her work in the office. The credit union paid her a modest sum. She sold some of the paintings. I bought two that I really enjoy.

Renee wanted to talk to me because she needed to hear my voice. She felt the impersonal email was just not the right way to communicate. We talked for about an hour and covered a wide rage of topics; it had been a long time since we had our prior conversation. Renee gave me some suggestions about health food and supplements to help keep me healthy. I will give them a try if the oncologist agrees and gives me her approval to try the supplements.

We did agree that Doug and I have to visit her at her new house in Ventura that is only three houses away from the beach. That will be perfect for Doug and me to watch the young ladies in bikinis. June is going to be a busy month for me; I have the trip to see the Princess and the shorter trip to see Renee.

Visitors
Last week was a good week for visitors to the blog. We had visitors from Canada [16], Texas [7], Netherlands [2], Spain [5], Germany [11], Iran [7], Peru, France [7], United Kingdom [12], Japan [7], Singapore, United Arab Emirates [2], Italy [4], Israel [2], Switzerland [2], Australia [4], Austria [2], Taiwan, Colombia, Poland [2], Brazil, Uruguay, Russia, Slovenia, Sweden, Latvia, Korea, Ireland [2], Belgium, Malaysia, Denmark, Indonesia, and India [2].

We did have some visitors who stopped by for a longer stay. These visitors stayed for 35 minutes, another for 30 minutes, one for 22 minutes, one for 21 minutes, and one for 19 minutes.

I do appreciate all of you stopped by the visit the blog. I know that you are busy and probably have other more important tasks at hand rather then stopping here.

Woman of the Moment Encore
I know that some of you have been visiting here because of the Woman of the Moment Encore program. I track the most popular entrance and exit pages.






Be well and stay happy.

Thursday, March 13, 2008

Back Scratching

Back Scratching
I used to scratch my back by rubbing up against a convenient door jam; a simple but elegant solution for an itch that was difficult to reach for me.

My friend Lisa thought I was acting silly and not like a Vice President; this was when we worked together. She bought me two back scratchers; one for home and one for work. Now I am able to address itching back whenever I need to.

Doug thinks I am a bit obsessive about scratching my back. Maybe he is correct. I will still use the back scratchers so I can address the inconvenient itch in the middle of my back, between my shoulders.

I do feel so good after using the scratcher.

School
I have had three of my classes so far, my last class in on Saturday morning. I think my Saturday class will be the one that is the most fun for me. I don’t have any former students in my Monday morning Composition II course and only one in my Wednesday afternoon Microeconomics course.

I think I have a dozen or so former students in my Wednesday evening Written Analysis. All of these students were in one of my first courses at the school when I came into the classroom in the middle of the term. The prior five weeks had been the substitute de jure who was more like a baby sitter than a teacher.

I got all of my instructor evaluations from the last term. I did well with the evaluations but I am not certain if I will qualify for any incentive payment for being a good instructor.

El Gringo
I went to El Gringo for dinner tonight. I took along a slice of chocolate truffle cake from Giuliano’s for Merit the server because she said she would bring me some cookies for a local bakery that enjoys going to.

Merit was working tonight so we had a nice long chat. There was only one other customer; I went to dinner early because I only had a salad for lunch. Merit liked the chocolate truffle cake from Giuliano’s and said she was looking forward to indulging herself after work.

I told Merit that I was not responsible for any unplanned weight gain from eating the cake. She laughed.

One of Merit’s girl friends came in as I was working my way through the large and spicy chicken burrito. I ended up drinking two large Arnold Palmers tonight so I am likely to be up more than once in the middle of the night. Her friend told me, while Merit was working, that she helped pick out the cookies Merit got for me.

I should have taken a photo of it before I ate it. It was like a shortbread cookie that my grandmother used to make. It was very tasty.

Woman of the Moment Encore
I have some more images from Eiko Koike’s web site. I did notice that the Encore pages this week were among the most popular pages to visit. I think they have either been first or second place measured by the entry and exit page data from Sitemeter.com.






Be well and stay happy.

Tuesday, March 11, 2008

Confusion Reigns

Confusion Reigns
I went into the Nissan dealership to have the Pathfinder fixed. I was expecting a fairly simple and routine procedure today; they only had to replace one part. The dealership’s parts department called me on last Thursday to say the part had arrived.

I said that was great and that I scheduled a repair session for Tuesday with my service advisor.

The dealership’s service department called me yesterday morning to remind of the appointment. That was great follow-up in my mind.

Things started to fall apart as soon as I got to the dealership.

I arrived two minutes before my schedule appointment time. I am really time sensitive and it bugs the crap out of me when people are late. My service advisor was not there. I explained to the replacement service advisor the status of my contemplated work and that the replacement part was in the parts department.

She took all of the information down and entered into the dealership’s computer system.

After waiting for three hours, I tracked the replacement service advisor down to see when the Pathfinder would be down. She fumbled around and finally had to page the service department to get an answer.

The service department manager came to the service office and said they were waiting for the part to arrive.

I exploded and told him the part had been in their parts department since last Thursday. I asked him how they could be that incompetent.

I was frustrated and mad at wasting more than two hours at the dealership will they played around. I said, “Fine; put everything back together and I’ll take my truck someplace else where I could believe in the quality of the repair work.”

I relented when they said it was only twenty minutes more to complete the task; now that they knew where to find the part.

Forty minutes later the job was done.

Right now, I am hoping and praying that I get one of those post dealership service survey questionnaires to complete. I will be brutally honest with the survey.

For the record and in the interest of fair and balanced blogging, the dealership in question was Power Nissan in Torrance, California.

Can anyone guess when I will be going back there?

Pigs will fly first and the Los Angeles Dodgers and Los Angeles Angels will play in the World Series first.

Recovery Part 17B – Cancel the Big Chocolate Brownie Part 2
I went to the hospital after spending all morning at the Nissan dealership to pick up my pills. The confusion clouds preceded me to the hospital.

I was able to find a parking spot almost immediately. Parking is a real challenge at the hospital. I had no trouble when it came to paying for the prescription except that the clerk who took my check was surprised at the cost of the pills.

I was the third person in line to pick up my prescription. I was beginning to feel that my luck had changed for the better.

The pharmacy clerk went to find my prescription. I could see her look through the alphabetically labeled boxes of prescriptions. She kept looking back at me and smiling.

I began to become nervous and concerned when the clerk started ducking into closed office and cubicles. This was not a good sign for me.

Eventually, after waiting for about fifteen minutes, the pharmacy clerk returned with my prescription. I think that she either found it or they very quickly created a new one for me.

In any event, I was happy to have the prescription in my hands and I drove home, happy for the balance of the day that promised to be warm and sunny.

Woman of the Moment Encore
At least this part of my day ought to go smoothly. I have all of the images on the CD in the disk drive. All I have to do is select which ones to post today. That is a good challenge for me.





Be well and stay happy.

Monday, March 10, 2008

Cancel the Big Chocolate Brownie

Cancel the Big Chocolate Brownie
I went to the hospital pharmacy to pick up my prescription for Xeloda this afternoon. You will recall the clerk had said she would waive the charge for the prescription which I thought was very generous and unnecessary on her part.

But, anyway and back to the story.

You can imagine my surprise when a different clerk said I needed to pay for the prescription. That would be USD$462.95. I did not have my check book with and I was not going to make two trips to the hospital in one day. I have to out and about tomorrow morning so I will swing past the hospital then.

The clerk who said she would not charge was working the counter. I thought for a moment that I should say that she said she was not going to charge and ask for an explanation. Then, I decided to not raise the question. There was no reason to get her in trouble with the powers that be; that should never be; or could never be.

Life, after all, is way too short for warm beer and cheap cigars and mindless civil servant functionaries.

15th Annual Douglas Reinhardt Birthday Dinner at Morton’s
This event would have been known as Douguary 2008 until Doug decided he wanted to use a different description so we settled on this one.

One of the really great parts about this birthday dinner was that we were in a private room that was so quiet. We could talk at a normal conversation level and be heard clearly by the person on the other side of the table. We also had a personalized menu for the dinner.



Doug does not like to have his photo taken. You’ll just have to accept the idea that these are photos of Doug with his dinner, a Chicago style rib eye steak with a lobster tail along with some mashed potatos and steamed green beans. Morton’s gave Doug a candle on his Morton’s Cake dessert and sang “Happy Birthday.”



I had a small steak and part of a salad for my dinner. I was not that hungry so I took the steak and salad home for my dinner on Sunday night. It was very good on the next night. I had another type of chocolate cake that was mostly all chocolate. I managed to eat that on Monday. It was wonderful and probably an excellent reason why I gained another kilo.


Woman of the Moment Encore
We will start the formal Woman of the Moment Encore, as voted on by the readers, with Eiko Koike. I have about 70 images of Eiko; but, I do not plan to post all of them. I am planning on posting about 15 to 20 images over the next two weeks.

You can see more of Eiko at her web site, http://www.eikokoikeonline.com.






Be well and stay happy.

Sunday, March 09, 2008

Recovery - Part 17 & Weekend Update - March 9th

Recovery - Part 17
Doug went with me when I went to see the oncologist on Friday.

As visits have gone so far, this was another good one for me. All of the tests came back with positive results for me. Positive results means there were no adverse changes in my blood condition and other body functions. I gained another kilogram of weight from the last appointment and the doctor was pleased with that.

I guess that I am somewhat unusual in that I do not complain and moan and groan a lot when I am at the oncology clinic. I heard some patients berating the doctors about some minor things like not being to see them when they wanted to see them. I am a happy and smiling patient.

Friday was the first time that I have been seen by a male oncology resident. I think the doctor needs to tone down his vocabulary somewhat. I don’t think that using terms like “fantastic” and “great” are necessarily the best choices when commenting on patient reactions to the medication.

I also think the young residents need to get a better grip on the time – space continuum concept. The resident said he would step for five minutes while he reviewed my file with the attending physician. Most of the other residents have had a poor concept of how much time would be necessary for a consultation with their supervising physician.

The resident returned twenty five minutes later.

Then, we talked about their treatment plans for plans for me.

I take a drug called Oxaliplatin, once every three weeks. It is the main cancer drug in the treatment plan. Normally, patients only last for six sessions or cycles with the drug because of the drug’s main side affect of creating a sever sensitivity to cold with the patient.

In my case, this means no cold drinks [like cold Heineken’s] or cold food [like ice cream] for me for about two weeks after each infusion. Cold weather also bothers me but that is not too much of a concern since Summer is coming to Southern California and I will not be cold until October or November.

This is not a major burden for me.

The doctor would like me to take eight cycles of the Oxaliplatin because it will be give better results. I said I would be happy to do that since doing so clearly benefits me greatly. Besides, I get to see the infusion nurses more and that is a lot of fun for me.

We finished up with the doctor and went to get my prescription for Xeloda, the other drug that I take with the chemotherapy, filled at the hospital pharmacy. This is not an inexpensive pill. A two week supply of 98 pills costs USD$463 and change. I priced the drug at Wal-Mart and it was USD$1,037 there. I took a number and waited for my number to be called so I could turn in the prescription.

I didn’t get upset when someone cut in front of me. I just smiled and said, “Good morning” to the clerk. She apologized. I said, “People happen; it’s not your fault.”

The clerk entered my prescription and gasped at the price. I said, “I know its high but I don’t mind. It is, after all, much better than going without the medicine.”

I guess I made her feel good because she waived the charged for the prescription. I told Doug and he said she deserved a big chocolate brownie. I agree but I don’t know how I would give it to her without causing trouble.

Doug and I went to Fatburger for lunch. Doug went off his “no red meat” eating for the day. I had a Fatburger with cheese, fat fries, and medium Coke. Doug had a Kingburger with cheese, fat fries, and a medium Coke.

Doug said, “Coke always tastes better if it comes from a fountain or a glass bottle.” I think he is right on that count. Then, we went back to my flat to let our meals digest.

An hour later, we were on our way to Glacier Gelato for ice cream [for Doug] and gelato [for me]. I had two types of chocolate flavored gelato and one scoop of coffee flavored gelato. Doug had a scoop of Junior Mints ice cream and a scoop of Oreos ice cream. I think it tastes better than it looked.

After dessert, Doug headed south, behind the Orange Curtain for the weekend and a couple of days next week.

Weekend Update
I go to the clinic on a weekly basis to have my dressing changed. Changing is something that requires a skilled person and access to specific tools and supplies. You can not change your dressing successfully by yourself.

I have gone to the clinic after school. I wear a suit to school because that is the school’s dress policy for instructors. So wearing a suit is no burden for me. I have continued to wear a suit because it makes the nurses happy and a happy nurse is more likely to take better care of me.

I also noticed that I seem to get better treatment from people in general when I wear a suit. Thursday, I was wearing one of Michael Clayton suits, dark grey suit, white shirt, dark blue tie, and highly polished black shoes. Nurses smiled at me as walked through the hospital.

I think I must have looked very serious to them. I learned how to march when I was in Navy Reserve Office Training Corps in college. We were taught by a Marine Corps drill instructor. I picked up the habit of digging my heels in when I walked. I have yet to be able to break myself of that habit.

I was in an elevator with two doctors who were talking about medical stuff. I literally had no idea what they were talking about. When I got out, one of them wished me a good day. I thanked him and wished him the same.

Amazing how impressions can change one’s perspective.

My Thursday dressing change went off fairly well. There was one minor problem. The nurse will flush out the PICC line as one of the last steps in the process; this is but one of many examples why I can not change the dressing. It also takes two hands and I can only use one hand. The nurse also wants to get a partial blood backflow into the syringe as part of the process. On Thursday, the nurse was unable to get a blood backflow. It was not a failure per se but something that concerned me.

I plan to go in on Thursday and have my dressing changed so that they can get a blood backflow and so I will not have any troubles when it comes time for my next infusion on Friday. I have a few hours to spend on Thursday. I would rather make sure everything works right when I need it to work right.

The Princess called me on Saturday and we talked for about half an hour. She and the Golfer are in the lengthy process of unpacking and putting things away in Seattle. That will take some time. She said it wasn’t so bad since they had their furniture and the cats and dogs were getting used to the new setting.

I told the Princess that I will not be able to visit her in March for her birthday as we had planned because of my Monday morning class. Monday morning was when I had planned to fly back to Los Angeles. The Princess said that was fine with her; she understood completely and she pointed out that the weather was more likely to be much better in June than in March. If things go well for me, I plan to see her during my quarter break which should come in late May or early June.

Doug suggested that I take a walk along the beach this weekend. I took him up on his suggestion. I went for a walk along the Esplanade this morning. I think the walk was about a mile long. I am looking forward for more walks along the beach as the weather turns warmer and young women start wearing their bikinis when they play beach volleyball or roller skate.

Perfect way to spend a morning for me.

Seriously Guilty Pleasures
I went to the market Saturday because I was out of much of the food that I like to eat. It is hard to live without food.

It was also the start of the Girl Scout Cookie Drive. The Cookie Drive is a major fund raiser for the Girl Scouts and I almost always purchase a box or two of cookies, thin mints usually.

One of the Girl Scouts asked me if I want to buy some cookies. I said that I would see her on the way out and that I would be buying a box. She smiled.

True to my promise, I stopped on my way out and purchased three boxes of thin mints. That made her happy.

You have no idea how happy I was.

I nearly ate a half box of thin mints while I was finishing off the last of a book that I had ordered. I don’t know what I enjoyed more; the book or the cookies.

As it turned out, I left two things off of my food shopping list so I need to go back to the market this afternoon. I know I will buy the cream cheese for my onion bagels and paper towels.

Of course, I will also buy more thin mints. The nice thing about thin mints is they keep for a long time if you freeze.

I am very lucky to have a large freezer compartment in my refrigerator.

I went to the market today. I picked up the forgotten items and some more thin mints. I bought five more boxes of thin mints. I think my freezer shrunk in size over night. It seemed much smaller when I put the new thin mint boxes in the freezer.

The Girl Scouts were surprised at my order. One of them wished me a good day. As I left, I turned and smiled at her and said, “I certainly will now.”

I didn’t feel guilty at all.

School
I received a call from the Associate Dean late on Thursday afternoon. It was a good call for me. He wanted to know if I was interested in teaching a fourth class in the coming term which starts tomorrow morning.

I said I was and asked what the class was.

He said it was Composition II again for me with seventeen schedules students. I took the class. I will not have to prepare any new lesson plans since I just taught the course. I will be teaching on Monday morning, Wednesday afternoon and evening, and Saturday morning now.

Doug
Doug joined the ranks of the proletariat last week. He has a job writing for an Internet web site. He is getting paid so that is excellent; he can say he is a working writer. Hopefully, this writing job will lead to other and more profitable writing engagements.

Woman of the Moment Encore
This is the last of the Hankook Tires Girls. I will be starting with Eiko Koike as the next Woman of the Moment Encore presentation on Monday.





Visitors

We had another good week for visitors. We had visitors from Canada [14], Germany [5], Finland, Texas [11], Indonesia [3], United Kingdom [11], Switzerland [2], Singapore [2], Australia [6], Netherlands [3], Italy [4], Japan [5], France [4], Malaysia [2], Belgium, Spain [2], India, Philippines, Taiwan, Portugal [3], Greece, Poland [2], Ireland, Iran [2], Saudi Arabia, United Arab Emirates, Turkey, South Africa, and Korea.

We also had some visitors who came to the blog and stayed around for a while. We had two visitors who stayed for 26 minutes, three who stayed for 17 minutes, and three who stayed for 14 minutes.

There was one visitor who came and stayed for 72 minutes while looking at 163 pages.

I do appreciate all of you who took some time or a lot of your time to come and visit the blog.

Programming Note
Going forward into the new term, I don’t think I will be posting on Wednesdays because I will in school for most of the day and will not be home until after 10:00 PM, way past my usual bedtime.


Be well and stay happy.

Thursday, March 06, 2008

Early Weekend Bonus Feature - March 6th

Early Weekend Bonus Feature
I decided to post the Weekend Bonus Feature early because I will be spending a bunch of time at the oncology clinic. By the time that I get home from the clinic and have lunch and make a post-lunch run to the Ice Pan or Coldstone Creamery or Glacier Gelato, I probably will not feel much like tossing out another posting to the blog.





Be well and stay happy.

Wednesday, March 05, 2008

Vacation Update

Vacation Update
Well, here it is March 5th already. Where did Winter go?

For once, the weather here in Southern California has been Spring like. Doug has been making a regular long walk along the beach in the afternoon. I would probably join him except he walks too fast for me and the chemotherapy does take away some of my energy.

I was supposed to have lunch with my friend Sharon this week. We were originally going to go today but she had to make a major presentation at work. Next, I suggested Tuesday, yesterday. Sharon never got back to me until late in the afternoon. She was on her way home from work early because she was still suffering from a cold. Sharon said it would not be good for me to meet her because of my weakened immune system. I am going to call Sharon on Monday when she is at her desk and with her schedule so we can reschedule our lunch.

I have been enjoying my vacation from the blog this week. I have been indulging myself by sleeping in past my usual 5:21 AM alarm clock ring. It goes off then because one tap on the snooze feature gives me eight more minutes and then I think seriously about getting up sometime between 5:30 and 5:45 AM.

Friday is my day to visit with the oncologists to discuss my progress and see what they have in mind for me. I am optimistic that they will be able to tell me when I will have my MRI examination. Thursday is my usual dressing change day; hopefully Glenda or Jennifer will be able to change my dressing. I do like them.

I am prepared to wait to see the oncologists on Friday. I have a new book about how the United States tried to use economic power against Japan in the years leading up to the Pearl Harbor attack. This is anything but a fast read so I am in good shape to kill time. In addition, I will also have the Friday Sudoku puzzle that is rated as diabolical to help me kill some more time.

I went to the market today; I had to run some errands and the market was one of the stops. It is not my main market but one of the alternative markets that have really interesting food. I wanted to pick up some frozen salmon steaks stuffed with feta cheese for Doug’s and my dinner tonight. There were all out so I bought some swordfish steaks instead; we were both happy with the second choice.

I also treated myself to some dark chocolate covered dehydrated blueberries. Dark chocolate and blueberries are supposed to have some health benefits. Health benefits plus chocolate, what’s not to like about that food combination.

School and Grades and Next Term’s Classes
I got my grades in on time for the last term. I only had one student who failed one of my three classes. He failed the writing class because he didn’t do the weekly writing assignments. It is difficult to pass a writing course without writing.

After turning in my grades, I stopped by the Associate Dean’s office to see how many students were scheduled for my classes. I have seventeen schedule for Wednesday afternoon Microeconomics; thirty two in my Written Analysis on Wednesday evening; and ten in my Saturday Professional Presentations class. The nice thing about school is that not everyone shows up for the courses so I am hopeful that my Written Analysis course will not be as large as the schedule program is forecasting.

I think Saturday will be the most fun and easiest course for me to teach. It is mostly public speaking and how to make PowerPoint presentations or as I like to call it, Magic Lantern Shows and Smoke and Mirrors. I have taught Microeconomics twice so I don’t have any preparation work to do beyond inserting the lecture notes in a new syllabus and putting it in the course notebook. I do have to create lesson plans for the other classes but that should not be a major challenge when one text book has just over 300 pages with lots of pictures and graphs. The other new course has one text book that is about 250 pages in one book and around 350 pages in another text book.

Anti-virus Programs
I subscribe to an email based, weekly newsletter on Windows Vista. I subscribed to the earlier Windows XP newsletter. I read it and have, over the last three years, downloaded some useful applets and programs. I also read it because it lets me know of problems that I ought to avoid.

I was reading it last week. I was really interested in an article that talked about program that were incompatible or had other issues and troubles Windows Vista. I am really glad that I read the article because I learned that the Trend Micro Anti-Virus program would not work on the program and I was just about to renew my Trend Micro Anti-Virus program. I ordered McAfee instead.

Pathfinder
I took the Pathfinder into the Nissan dealership because it was making an abnormal noise that indicated a problem with the fan belts or one of the devices that are attached to them. I did not want to have the water pump or alternator go out when I am forty miles from home.

I spent two hours at the dealership while they figured out what the problem was. It turns out the idler bearing assembly is failing. I can accept this; the Pathfinder is thirteen years old now and this is original equipment. The bearing is a sealed bearing so there was no oil or grease to add to it over the years. The new bearing will cost about USD$40.00 plus labor to install. I may have to replace the belts but that is not unreasonable to me.

I am going back to the dealership on Monday to have the new idler bearing assembly put in. hopefully, I can get out with only a couple of hours waiting time.

Speed Options web site
The Speed Options web site is no more.

I will miss it; it was the source of most of the images that I had used for the Woman of the Moment feature over the years. I think it had images of over 200 models. I only used the ones that were featured as the Model of the Month.

Doug introduced me to the web site when he wrote about Mercedes Terrell in his old blog on Blogger.com.

Ironic Commercials
I was watching one of the news programs on television yesterday when I saw a parody of the Jack Nicholson commercial for Hillary Clinton’s Presidential Campaign. I was struck by the ironic choice of background music for the commercial. The background music was the Battle hymn of the republic, a song that most of my generation [we older people tend to vote a lot] and a lot of other Americans associates almost exclusively with the 16th President of the United States of America, Abraham Lincoln, the first Republic Party President.

Woman of the Moment Encore
Here are some images of the Hankook Tire Girls. I think I will re-start the Woman of the Moment Encore program with the Weekend Update posting on Sunday.




Be well and stay happy.

Sunday, March 02, 2008

Weekend Update - March 2nd

Weekend Update
I had a comment from a visitor who appreciated some K T So images from a November 2, 2006 posting. He thought the posting was “nice.” It is always heartening to learn your readers appreciate your work.

The Princess and the Golfer arrived in Seattle on Thursday. The Princess said the moving van will arrive on Wednesday, hopefully. The van went by the direct route, across the snow covered Northern states; it took two days to cross North Dakota.

Visitors
February was the second best month for the blog. We had a total of 1,041 visitors to the blog.

We had visitors from Germany [9], Canada [15], Texas [5], Argentina, United Arab Emirates, Australia [4], United Kingdom [6], Belgium [3], Singapore [6], France [10], Austria, Saudi Arabia, Taiwan, Japan, Brazil, Finland [4], Israel, Ireland [2], Poland [2], South Africa, Turkey, Portugal, Slovakia, Czech Republic, Netherlands [2], Mexico [2], Iran [2], Hungary, Spain, and India.

We also had a number of blog readers who stopped and lingered a while. We had one reader who stayed for 29 minutes, one for 21 minutes, one for 17 minutes, two for 14 minutes, two for 12 minutes, and three for 10 minutes.

We had one incredible visitor who stayed for 81 minutes and visited a stunning 198 pages.

That is fantastic.

I do appreciate all of you who take time out of your days to visit the blog; whether it is for two minutes or eighty minutes.

School
Sometimes, I think some of my students are barely awake when they are in class. One student in my Saturday morning writing class is a classic example.

Saturday was the last day of class. I told him that he was in danger of failing because he hadn’t turned some of the weekly assignments. He said he was supposed to graduate this month and that my class was his last course.

I gave him and several other students until Sunday night to turn in their missing assignments. They could email their assignments to me. My email address was the only thing on the white board.

Then, the student asked me what he needed to do because he had lost his assignment sheet in his car somewhere. I gave him a new assignment sheet and marked the ones he needed to complete. Then, he asked if they were all essay assignments.

I said yes; this is, after all, a writing class.

The student called me this morning to get my email address. He had lost my phone number and was calling all Charles F. Reinhardt’s. He had called seven before he found me.

After I gave him my email address again and stayed on the phone while he sent me a test email, I hung up and wondered how he managed to get so far with so little attention to detail. How will he survive in the business world out there if he loses important information? I hope he has an understanding and tolerant boss.

El Gringo
Doug and I went to El Gringo on Thursday night for dinner, as I usually do. Doug had just come up to my house from behind the Orange Curtain so he was ready for dinner. I had hoped that Merit would be working so she could meet the other part of my local family. Unfortunately for me, Merit wasn’t working.

Oh well, her loss I guess.

Doug had a chicken burrito that filled him up. I ordered a Number 2 combination of two chicken tacos, rice, and refried beans. I only managed to eat one taco and some rice and beans. I have been suffering from a low appetite all week long. I think I dropped a pound or two during the week. Maybe next week, I will have a better appetite and can enjoy eating a bit more.

This is one of those consequences of going through chemotherapy.

Doug’s Birthday Dinner at Morton’s
I think I’ll post more about this during the week. In sum, we had a great time.

Woman of the Moment Encore
I decided to keep the Hankook Tire Girls around for this week and shift back to the Encore program next week.





Be well and stay happy.