A quiet Halloween

I fixed fried eggs and toast for breakfast. We had honey from my coworker's beehives (click here) on the toast and that was a special treat! After breakfast we did a hot tub soak for about 30 minutes. The hot water (99F) seems to really help Mary's back muscles which get really tight and tense.

Mary came along to run errands today, mostly to enjoy our last day of October near 80 degrees and perfect blue sky with the warm sun. Oh, you don't live here? You have snow? Sleet? Rain? Cold? Gee, I feel bad for you...

On our way to lunch we dropped in on Ken Gerkins (click here), our jeweler. After a nice chat while Mary's wedding ring was cleaned, we went to the Purple Onion for lunch and Mary had the Tomato soup. She didn't go in to the dry cleaners but she did go into the grocery store. As soon as everything was in the shopping cart, she headed to the car to sit and relax while I did the checkout. When we got home, she headed straight for her chaise lounge to relax her back muscles.

We did do a pumpkin. Mary drew the face and I did the scraping and cutting. He is a rather handsome fellow, I think. Click here.

We did an iChat video with Mary's granddaughters late in the afternoon. The Pasadena bunch traveled to Tuscon to have a cousins' Halloween and we did the video chat so we could see the girls' costumes. Tim and Lara got into it too, Tim was dressed as a ghostbuster and the girls made Lara put curlers in her hair with a cape but I have forgotten the character she was supposed to be.

The three granddaughters in Tucson on their way out the door for Trick or Treat!

The trick and treaters got started about 6:30 during our video chat. Grandma and the granddaughters were comparing the rate of trick and treat callers. By the time we hung up, we were way behind at 2 while they were at 6. Shortly after 7PM I made a take out run to our Chinese restaurant. Pork pot stickers, Orange Beef and Kung Pao Chicken. All very nice. Mary said we didn't have any callers after I drove off.

And, you are thinking, "How is Mary?" Doing pretty good but not as high energy as Thursday. The medical situation is that the transfused blood (red cells, for example) can live for up to 100 days or so. That means that Mary should be in pretty good shape for a while. The next blood test on Nov 9th will have more to tell. They will evaluate her Complete Blood Count (CBC) and one of the tests, the hematocrit, gives an indication of new red blood cells compared to the older cells. We are looking for a healthy number of new red blood cells because that means the bone marrow is back in the saddle and doing its thing. If there are no or not enough new red blood cells, they may decide to not restart the reduced dose chemo on that day. We just don't know until they see the results of the blood test on the 9th.

What a difference a day makes...

Our girl is stormin', Norman!

Thursday when Mary got up, she told me she felt pretty good. I was glad to hear that. She also talked about baking cookies and freezing them for the holidays. I registered cookie baking in the same category as our plan to visit the International Space Station. Nice to talk about, ain't gonna happen.

Well, she did bake 4 dozen cookies and froze them yesterday. She didn't even keep one out for the official household tester to check her work so I am going to have to wait. Mary did report that one of the pleasures of baking cookies is tasting the dough but she had to forgo that yesterday--there is raw egg in the cookie dough.

You could have knocked me over with a feather. I couldn't believe she was able to cook 4 dozen cookies!

For dinner, she said her back was hurting and asked me to help. OK, I dove in prepping the string beans followed by feeding the dogs. When I finished that, already she was cooking the meat, warming up the rice, had set the table and was pouring water in the glasses.

Hello, is this the same lady who couldn't even think about getting out of the house on Sunday and barely moved from her lounge chair all day?

Wow, what a difference.

The Oncology Nurse (ON) called yesterday as expected. We have a diagnosis and a plan. The diagnosis is that the Gemzar did what it was supposed to do, kill fast growing cells. Unfortunately, in Mary's body it really likes to kill bone marrow--the producer of red and white blood cells--which is the epitome of fast growing cells. Unfortunately, Gemzar is indiscriminate and doesn't ask, "Are you a good guy or a bad guy." This aggressive behavior to marrow is not unexpected but certainly not desired--and our girl's body reacted outside of the norm for her body weight and age. Generally speaking, a lower dose of Gemzar will stop the heavy duty marrow destruction. The plan is to go back to the plan at a lower dose. Skip next week for additional healing time and then start chemo the following Monday (9th).

The 9th will be a long day with a blood draw first, followed by a visit with the Oncologist and then followed by the adjusted chemo treatment. There are no scheduled visits until then but we can always call.

Do we have questions? You bet, lots of them. And we'll have them written out for the visit with the doc.

PS: For those wondering why my last post was censored, my beloved spouse asked me to take down the references to the very h--, c--- surgeon. This isn't the first time I reported on the surgeon using that description which you can check out here and here. Now, Mary doesn't read the blog regularly so one of you ratted me out!

As Advertised...

By dinner time, Mary was saying she felt much better and, in fact, prepared dinner without my help. This wasn't a huge task because Ingrid had dropped off her "famous chicken noodle soup" which we are sure was originally developed by ancient gnomes living deep in the Black Forest just outside of Munich. Ingrid makes the soup at home, packages it up and delivers--what more could one ask? Preparation involves cooking the noodles and then mixing in the good stuff. Thank you, Ingrid!

Mary didn't tell me until late last night that she had talked to the Surgeon's Nurse (SN). The SN has standing orders from the surgeon to monitor Mary's chart and system issued emails weekly and report to him regularly about Mary's progress. In other words, SN reports that it appears the surgeon has adopted Mary which make Mary particularly happy. [Original text and image censored.]

The SN hadn't looked at this weeks blood tests, transfusion info, etc. as of the phone call yesterday so she did while Mary was on the line. The most notable comment is that Mary's blood test numbers on Monday were very close to the point where they slap a patient into the hospital and put them in infectious isolation i.e., "The Boy in the Bubble" treatment.

Avoiding infection is the primary goal while her system in compromised by the chemo. Mary cannot eat any fresh fruit or veggie unless it is either peeled or cooked. No lettuce or tomato in sandwiches or hamburgers, no grapes, apples or pears unless they have been peeled or cooked. Cooked grapes? I don't think so. Peeled grapes? I love that woman very much but no way. No crowds in enclosed places--one of the reasons she did not go into the drug stores with me last Saturday, the other being she just didn't have the strength.

Are they going to put her on a breath mask? Heck, we don't know. As I write this, we don't even know what the plan is going forward. Hopefully today we'll get some answers to the questions and set new plans.

I do want to thank Mary's taxi team. We have drivers for every chemo trip under the old plan. We'll do a re-plan as soon as we know what it is!

Quick Note

Mary is feeling much better now. She has been getting better all day.

Mary did call Stanford today to learn what the new plan is but was only able to leave voicemail with the key people. I am sure we will learn more tomorrow.

A Loonnggg Day

The first problem was simply leaving Los Gatos. We have three north-south routes out of town and one of them is closed this week while they rework a railroad crossing. What is normally a few minute drive to get on the freeway to Stanford was over 30 minutes today.

When we got to Stanford, about 15 min late at 9:15AM, I went with Mary to the infusion department. She checked in and waited. Mary got in the chair before 10 when the nurse admitted the orders had not come through yet. After a bit, the order arrived and the nurse gave us the time line which added up to about 5 hours from almost 11. Mary did get two units of whole blood. And, she called me about 4:30 and said she was wrapping up so I headed to Stanford. I arrived about 30 min later and she was still in the exit process.

The bottom line was that we left the house about 8:20AM and got home about 5:30PM. A long day.

Mary was told she'd be feeling better tomorrow. As for the next step in chemo, that is to be determined. I'll keep you posted.

No Chemo Today

Mary's blood count was too low to do chemo today. In fact, it was so low she is returning tomorrow morning for a transfusion of whole blood. I'll drop her off at the appointed hour (about 9AM) and Terry has agreed to pick her up after the 5 hour transfusion. However, this IS hospital time so what will really happen is that I will be picking her up at the end of my day...

Mary's hemoglobin scored an 8 versus normal of 11.7 to 13.8 for senior women so she really needs the transfusion. Mary reported the chemo nurse chewed out the Oncologist's nurse for even authorizing her treatment a week ago. The Oncologist's nurse said, "Wait a second" and handed the phone to the Oncologist so he could hear the chewing...

They told us at the beginning that chemo is not necessarily going to behave such that we can trust the schedule. And, we now know that is correct. Mary will find out tomorrow the schedule for her next chemo treatment.

80 degrees in Los Gatos today

Mary didn't make it to Farmer's Market today. Frankly, she has not really bounced back from chemo #2 on Monday. Today is pretty good, but not good enough to make the treck to market this morning.

Yesterday, Mary rode with me to Walgreens, Pet People, dry cleaners, and King's Court to hit the beauty supply store, another drug store and Lunardi's. She didn't go into all the stores, just some of them. We used the convertible and had the top down so Mary had some nice "air time" yesterday even if she didn't go in the stores.

I am helping our non-Silicon Valley followers vicariously live our horrible weather this weekend with the photo(s). :-))

Soso's booth at Farmers' Market today, a wonderfully warm day in late October.

Nothing like a late October day in Silicon Valley enjoying the fall weather.

Thursday Afternoon Report

Mary was better yesterday than a week ago on Wednesday, but still not at the 80% level. In spite of that, she managed to get the dirty clothes run through the washer and dryer and that was a major accomplishment. Wednesday night she asked me to heat up the hot tub so she could soak. That soaking did wonders for her sleep on Sunday evening. However, it didn't have the same impact last night because she experienced a bunch of tossing and turning and lack of comfort as she tried to sleep--it didn't help all that much.

I just talked to her and today was full of aches and pains and discomfort. In other words, just what the doctors described for someone on Gemzar--mild chemo. I was hoping Thursday would be the day starting on the up slope like last Thursday but it didn't happen. Hopefully tomorrow will be in the upward direction.

Mary talked to Lara and her granddaughters who were back from their recent one week trip to New Zealand. It sounded like the spring weather was much better than the winter storms they experienced in July and August. They got to do more outdoor things including visiting a castle (they have castles in New Zealand?).

Mary is not allowed to eat fresh fruit or veggies unless they are peeled. She is very susceptible to infection right now so we need to minimize her exposure. Last night for dinner I asked her what I could do with the tomatoes in the kitchen she cannot eat. "Stewed Tomatoes" was her answer so I prepped the tomatoes, pepper, onion and ham and she came out to cook that. She also supervised the grilled chicken and earlier she had put yams in the oven so all that took care of our dinner. We had plenty of leftovers for tonight as I have a late meeting and Mary will eat before I get home.

Tuesday Day's End

Mary had to roust herself out of bed this AM, I left at 6AM for a 7AM meeting. She told me she got up about 8AM, fixed herself breakfast, fed the dogs, read the paper, did the crossword puzzle, showered, did email and facebook, and watched a bit of TV. At noon, she fixed herself lunch of some frozen thingy she bought at Lunardi's last weekend. She then curled up for an after lunch nap and that took her to almost 6PM--much to her surprise. My meeting ended just before 8PM so she fixed herself dinner from some of our left overs before I got home--our girl was hungry.

She just put herself to bed at 10:30PM. This chemo doesn't seem to cause nausea and her appetite is good. It just fatigues her and makes her want to sleep. As I noted last week, I expect Wednesday won't be a good day but then Thursday she'll start to climb out of it again. I hope.

I managed to spend my morning in the jurors' waiting room. Finally, the judge came down and thanked us all for participating. The case settled so we had fulfilled our jury duty requirement just by hanging around for hours and hours and hours. I am off the hook for at least another year. Not bad, not bad.

I was well equipped with laptop, iPhone, Blackberry, and iPod. And, I managed to score a seat next to a wall outlet so I knew I could recharge if I drained any of them. The courthouse runs a guest WiFi network so that was really beneficial. Email (work and personal) was handled in a timely fashion and I got to listen to some of my podcasts: Click and Clack, the Tappet Brothers; Wait, Wait Don't Tell Me; and my absolute personal favorite, Lake Wobegon by Garrison Keillor. In the last case, Garrison keeps telling stories about Minnesota Lutherans' thought processes, behaviors and culture. I must admit, I don't find many differences between what he describes and my Minnesota Roman Catholic upbringing...I think its less about religion and more a Minnesota thing. Mary is of the same opinion.

For example, yesterday Mary told me this story of her relatives attempting to learn how to drink wine. At some family event with her parents, aunts and uncles, a bottle was purchased and wine glasses were recovered from some dusty cabinet and carefully washed so that all the adults could enjoy this bottle of wine during the meal. Mary reported there were long discussions on how to hold wine glasses, and how to taste wine and how to take a sip of wine between each bite of food to savor the flavors. Wine was not to be 'drunk' but gently sipped. And they all taught each other the meaning of wine words like nose and bouquet and legs. Mary, who has a great memory, distinctly remembers this meal because they were discussing and tasting and commenting about the wonderfulness of a two dollar bottle of Tawny Port.

This experiment with wine did not end there! Oh, no, there was a 2nd meal sometime later that Mary recalled. Her aunt poured the wine in the kitchen and served the wine in glasses to the adults. They continued their cultural learning and refinement with this second bottle of the fruit of the grape. Tasting, commenting and all in all enjoying their moment being sophisticated adults because their meal benefited from the glorious wine selection. Mary's aunt then took the empty glasses back to the kitchen for refills (having not fully mastered the refinement of pouring wine at the table) and made a wondrous discovery! The wine bottle sitting on the counter was still full! This bottle that she had just served to her family was still full. Clearly a miracle, a true miracle! The energy among the relatives was electric with this possibility of a true miracle right in her aunt's kitchen in Minnesota. The energy caused by the miracle stayed with them for a while until someone noticed the brand new bottle of scotch sitting on the counter next to the full wine bottle was empty.

Apparently, Mary's aunt had done a bit of tasting before serving the spirits and managed to get herself a little confused. She had served the scotch in the wine glasses which explained a lot of things. And, as Mary noted, no one at the table, no one drinking the odd colored, strong tasting wine said a word...

And the women are strong, the men are good looking and the children are all above average!

Chemo Injection #2

Ingrid dropped Mary off at Stanford at noontime today. This in itself was a minor miracle because Ingrid stayed at a friends house near Truckee last night. She made it to the bay area in plenty of time.

Mary had her blood drawn right after arriving and then went up to the chemo area. They made her wait until 2:30 and called her in for her treatment where she gets to sit in the recliner and relax until the needles come out--or go in, depending on your perspective. At 3PM, they came to apologize for being late and to explain that her blood count wasn't absolutely good enough to allow the Gemzar. Apparently the reading was borderline so she wasn't sent home but rather the nurses contacted the doctor for permission to continue. At 4PM, they started the injection. This nurse was a bit more hurry up than last week and Mary said it stung a bit during the injection and she was done shortly after 5PM. When she was done, she called her pickup driver, Jean, and all in all, Mary was home by 6PM. You might wonder what Mary does during all this waiting. She has loaded up an iPod with audiobooks and listens to them while waiting. She finds that more relaxing than trying to read or watching TV provided at each injection reclining chair.

Thank you Jean! Thank you Ingrid!

Mary didn't want anything fancy for dinner and shortly afterwards she went to bed at 9PM, same time as last Monday. This wasn't all that early because I didn't get home from work until almost 8PM. This chemo really knocks her down. I imaging Tues and Wed will be very bad for our girl. Hopefully, she'll start to gain her strength by Thursday.

In other news...

Mary has been complaining about upper back pain. Sunday, I cleaned out our hot tub and filled it, treated the water, warmed it up and we had a great soak last night. She really enjoyed it and it took a lot of the pressure off her back. Our tub is a teak wood tub, semi-custom design. It's 4' 6" (1.4m) deep which means Mary has to stand on tippy toes to keep her mouth out of the water when it is full to the brim. We haven't used the tub since last winter, before Mary's symptoms appeared. Why did we install this deep tub? So Mary can do stand up exercises for the arthritis in her lower back. Works great, too! Check it out! Click on the picture.

From 2008-04-12 Sister's Gardens

The plastic sheeting on the unsecured patio doors worked in the storm on Tues and Wed last week. The service guy showed up on Thursday as promised and fixed that door plus adjusted several others that had become difficult over the 8 years since they were installed. Its really nice when you don't have to fight the door and window hardware! Saturday, I removed the sheeting and the residue from the duck tape. I was careful to only put it on the glass to minimize any paint damage. And yes, it was duck tape. Out here, ACE Hardware sells duct tape by 3M and duck tape by some knockoff company. The role I used was duck tape.

I did see my cardiologist last week. No problems, issues or concerns. She is continuing the blood pressure medicine my internist prescribed because she likes the BP numbers. Otherwise, see you in six months. Oh, yeah, something about exercise, diet, you know, the usual.

I also saw my dermatologist. She removed some additional superficial basel cell carcinoma and nitrogen zapped some cosmetic stuff. No serious concern about the BCC. This is my fifth or sixth instance of BCC. Apparently, my light, Irish skin is very susceptible to sun damage and I didn't really start understanding and using sun block until ~20 years ago. For those who have never seen it, I have a picture somewhere of me at the age of 25 with my black, black hair and red beard! The red beard is a genetic clue to my skin's sensitivity to the sun. As for the cosmetic items, she called them "age spots" to which I protested--I am only 62!

Last but not least, I am reporting to the courthouse for jury duty at 8AM sharp tomorrow. Mary mentioned that an espionage case was starting jury selection tomorrow. That could be very interesting but its gonna be long so I am not raising my hand. Check it out here.

RE: All Good News!

Mary and Pat,

The chemo "routine" you are going through sounds familiar. So I
guess it is "normal". If hurting is normal, and the sky rains pigs, and
the ground moves at the slightest touch. "Getting through" is only a
goal if you are in cancer treatment or on the four-and-a-half-mile hill
trail at Marine Officer Candidate School. Oh yeah, also if you've been
shot. Bravery is getting up everyday and telling life that you are
enjoying yourself. So go to hell, cancer cells!

At least, you know what it's like to feel better, and that
condition will return.

As for the barking member of your family, y'all are definitely
trained.

> Love,
> Milt

Demandit Dawg Clips

Three clips in total. The first one is here on the blog. The other two require you click on the links below and you will go to youtube to view the videos.

Here are two links, Clip 2 and Clip 3, for your viewing pleasure.

Loma Prieta to Los Gatos

My third post today is about the anniversary of the Loma Prieta earthquake. You can zoom in and out and choose between map and satellite view using the buttons on the map. The B in the balloon is Loma Prieta.


View Larger Map

Demandit Dawg, the Pigeon and the Professor

(This is my 2nd post today, news about Mary is below.)

Some of you may be aware of the behavioral studies regarding a pigeon and a professor. The experiment was straightforward and went something like this. Each day, the Professor would take the pigeon and put it in a special cage for the experiment. The special cage had a wire floor and two buttons, one square and the other round each with seed glued on the face. The Professor would observe the pigeon and when it pecked on the square button, the Professor would push a button to electrify the wire floor and give the pigeon a mild jolt. When the pigeon pecked on the round button, the Professor would drop some seed down a little chute to a waiting dish for the bird to eat.

The Professor reported that it didn't take very many jolts of electricity for the pigeon to stop pecking on the square button and only peck on the round button, thus changing the pigeon's behavior.

The cynics observed that the pigeon had perfectly trained the Professor to stop torturing the poor bird and to provide food anytime the bird was hungry.

As for Demandit Dawg, she has learned a new behavior--or, perhaps, she has perfectly trained us. As I write this, we have finished eating breakfast, Mary is reading the paper, I am typing this blog entry and Demandit Dawg has started to bark. Mary stated exactly what I was thinking--Demandit Dawg wants her post-breakfast chew stick. Demandit Dawg barks at the breakfast area, backs up two steps, barks again, backs up, barks again and eventually backs her way into the utility room where we store the chew sticks. If we don't respond, she comes back to the breakfast area and starts all over. This can go on until our ears stop working.

Later today, she will start barking again, back up, bark, back up and repeat until she is at the door leading to the garage--not the utility room. Demandit Dawg will repeat this over and over. It can drive you crazy--until we open the door to the garage, affix the leashes and take her for a walk or a ride in the car.

Shawna quietly observes all this fussing about until its payout time and then she is right there too. Old dogs can be incredibly efficient when there is a young Demandit Dawg around to do the heavy lifting.

For the dog owners out there, the chew sticks are called KiloTreats and are rawhide twisted into 1/4 inch round, 4 inch long (6mm x 100mm) sticks which a Cavalier King Charles can actually chew because they are small enough.

So, has Demanit Dawg trained us? Or have we trained Demandit Dawg?

Saturday Morning

Mary continues to gain strength and feel better. Last night she ordered Chinese takeout from Yong Lo Garden in Saratoga--we had dinner there last Saturday. We ate the entire Orange Beef dish and did a lot of damage to the Broccoli Chicken too. YLG is a very nice restaurant and I wrote a couple reviews about the place after our dinner. You can check them out here and here.

We really don't know how this chemo stuff is going to affect Mary day to day but it appears that after the injection on Monday, she goes downhill for two days pretty quickly. Then, she starts to gain back some of her strength and general good healthy feeling each day after Wednesday. She isn't anywhere near her level of overall health she was experiencing the weeks before chemo started but is isn't down so low that she is simply bedridden waiting for the next Monday. This morning as I read this she is quite perky and is engaged reading the paper.

In fact, she called her sister as I was preparing breakfast because of an email. Reenie reported that today was the 20th anniversary of the Loma Prieta earthquake. Mary, in a show of spirit, called her sister and asked when was the last time they had 80 degree weather in Duluth in October. Seems like 80 degrees in Duluth during October and a 7.0 earthquake in Los Gatos occur more than 20 years apart. It did show Mary is feeling feisty this AM. And yes, it was 80 degrees in LG this week.

We have drivers set up for this Monday (Ingrid and Jean) and next Monday (Terry in both directions). Thank you, thank you!

We'll see how strong our girl is over the weekend. Right now, its looking pretty good.

Was Wednesday the bottom?

Mary is clearly feeling better today--no headache--but not as good as pre-chemo by a long shot. My indicator is her interest in preparing dinner. Up through Sunday she was in the kitchen with me or on her own fixing meals and adding Mary flavors to the meal. Tonight she joined me as the food hit the table--same as last night.

So we are hoping she gets stronger each day now and Wednesday was the worst. We realize the expectation is that she will get weaker each week of the three weeks and then the week off will allow her to gain a bit more strength.

Chemo, is by design, attacking fast growing cells but it also impacts normally growing cells too. The idea is that the fast growing cells are the cancer cells and that those cells are killed off before the normal cells are wiped out. In other words, Mary is experiencing the equivalent of being hit by a truck during each chemo session. And, remember, this was classified as mild chemo.

Mild chemo is a bit of an understatement

Mary made it to her hairdresser on Tuesday morning, and then slept for three hours afterwards. She helped with dinner but clearly was not as strong as she had been last week.

Today at lunchtime, she took the dogs to the park because the Maids were cleaning the house. Mary said that she was exhausted about half the way around her normal walking path. When she got home, she said she felt kind of like she had a flu which they told us is a typical side effect. She laid down for most of the afternoon for a long rest. About 6pm, she asked me to fix dinner and she remained in bed. I cooked the chicken and microwaved the broccoli and rice and she emerged from the bedroom when she heard the alarm on the microwave.

After dinner, she changed into her comfort clothes and has stayed up watching TV so I guess the afternoon nap/rest has helped substantially. Its clear, however, her energy level is already way down from last weekend.

The other aspect of this chemo is that she must avoid bacteria sources so only fruit/veggies that can be peeled meaning no strawberries or uncooked tomatoes. That will last for this entire cycle and probably for a few weeks after that.

We'll keep plugging along but its clear this mild chemo is a real heavy hit for our girl.

Why 30 minutes isn't 30 minutes...

and why Mary cannot drive herself to chemo.

The chemo she is taking gives a burning sensation to the veins as it enters, similar to a potassium IV. They use two techniques to minimize the pain. First is to dilute the chemo with saline. This adds 50% to the 30 minutes. And, another technique is applying a heat pack to her arm while the IV is running and they recommend extending the IV duration by (you guessed it) 50%. That explains why Mary's 30 minute chemo IV took 90 minutes from 5:30 to 7:00PM. And, that should be the duration for all the rest of the chemo treatments.

We also know that the proper blood tests take a minimum of 90 minutes to process. Add an hour for processing orders and the pharmacy and you've got a four hour visit minimum. But, its only one day a week and three weeks in a row followed by a one week break.

The nurse also injected a nausea med given her propensity for nausea. The side effect is that she is a bit loopy and clearly should not drive. Hence our need for re-instituting our taxi team.

The only side effect from yesterday's treatment is sleepiness. Mary fell sound asleep at the lunch table and laid down for a 3 hour nap after lunch. She is awake now at 9PM but I expect she'll proclaim she is going to bed soon.

Mary drove herself to her hairdresser today for a cut before lunch so she was feeling fine but tiredness took over after lunch.

We were hit by a pretty good storm with strong winds that is supposed to last 24 hours or so. It is much like a winter storm (Jan or Feb) and not the typical seasonal fall rain we get leading to winter. Of course, now that the fires have stripped the mountainsides, they are worried about mudslides from all the rain in the fire areas. We lost our cable for a few hours today. The only connectivity we had was our iPhones. Amazing little devices!

This is a shutdown week for me so I am attending critical meetings only and staying home as much as I can to make sure Mary is ok until we know how the chemo affects her. So far, so good.

All in all, good signs from the first round of chemo.

The dashboard clock read 7:07...

...as we turned from the hospital complex. Mary was feeling a little tired but no other noticeable side effects. As we approached Los Gatos, she suggested hamburgers and onion rings from our favorite joint. I asked her if she was serious and she was! OK, so we called in a takeout order and when we arrived she suggested we eat at the joint because the food was hot. Frankly, I was stunned!

So we ate there and headed home. The dogs greeted us with great enthusiasm for the simple reason we were an hour late for their feeding time. Mary changed into her nightclothes and I went out to cover a patio door set with plastic sheeting. The weatherstripping is damaged and the repair man will show up after the storm--we learned this afternoon--so I covered it with plastic sheeting. Hopefully it will withstand the incoming storm. When I came back into the house, she was watching TV--well, not exactly. She was actually sound asleep. I think the fatigue and tiredness side effect from chemo has hit her full on--but no nausea. I put her to bed about 9:00 PM and we'll see how the evening goes.

We did learn that she will be given a nausea drug at each chemo session that prevents her from driving for the balance of the day. That means I'll need to call on the taxi team again. As I wrote earlier, we may do a daily drop off and pick up team, especially if today's snafu happens again. Even if things go smoothly, we now know her blood tests take 90 minutes to process. Add an easy hour for the pharmacist plus a full hour for her Gemzar infusion (instead of the 30 we were told) and we are approaching a four hour cycle. If anyone wants to hang out, the system is set up so that a visitor can be present--you have to wear a face mask in the infusion area--and because this is on the 2nd floor with great windows the cell phones work fine as does Stanford's guest wifi system.

I am watching PBS show, Audrey Hepburn Remembered. If it runs on your PBS station, be sure to watch or record it. A very nicely done history of Miss Audrey.

6:45 and the nurse is getting anxious too!

She just sat down and is waiting for the very last drop of Gemzar to leave the IV bag and trickle its way into Mary's arm. We should be out of here in 15 min or so...don't laugh.

Started!

They just started the IV of Gemzar at 5:30PM and it should be done in about 30 min. Not bad for a 1:30 appointment, eh?

Still at the hospital

We have progress, the blood tests are done--oh, is it only 5:10PM? And, the nurse has given Mary her injection for nausea but the pharmacy has not delivered the Gemzar dose yet. It should arrive soon.

The Stanford Concierge service has stopped by and apologized for today's snafu. We got free parking and a free drink in the cafe downstairs. Well, its better than not acknowledging the problem at all!

Soon, they'll start the real work and we'll go from there.

Waiting is so boring

After the blood test, we went to the chemo area. They put Mary in a recliner and did the introductions. They said the blood test results would be available in about an hour, add a bit for the pharmacy to prepare the dose and Mary would get the Gemzar in about 90 minutes.

Hospital time...

Turns out the blood test folks didn't draw enough blood for the required tests. We don't know if the technicians didn't read the order correctly or if the order wasn't placed correctly. It doesn't really matter. They didn't figure this out until the nurse started her preparation for Mary and she discovered the blood test was incomplete. Its about 2:45 and they just took more blood samples from Mary and the lab turn around is 60 to 90 minutes. So I guess she won't be starting the Gemzar until 4:15 at the earliest.

There are six reclining chairs in this area and we are in room B. It appears there are rooms A, B, C, D and E so about 30 patients at a time. Patients are easy to tell from visitors because they make the visitors put masks on to protect the patients. I've been wearing this darn thing since 12:45 and I'd like to say I am getting used to it but I'd be lying.

Mary is listening to an audio book on her iPod to keep her mind busy. I am trying to get my iPhone working again...I did something wrong! I am just about to dive into the forums. If I was home, I'd head for the Apple store and the Genius bar.

I'll keep you posted.

At Stanford

We arrived at 12:30 and Mary is now standing in line for her blood test. They'll take the information, she'll sit down until they call her into the lab area. When that is done, we'll go upstairs to check in with the chemo folks.

It was a quiet morning. I finished putting lawn furniture away and buttoning up all the the external openings in the house. We are expecting a really rough first winter storm--winds up to 70mph (125kph) and lots of rain. Hopefully, we won't lose power but we can survive that. Mary had the fireplace insert installed a couple of years ago so we can stay warm. And, we have two LP cooking devices so we can heat up food if we need to.

Mary is tense about the chemo--because we really don't know how it will affect her. "Mild" chemo may be aggressive for her and she is concerned that will be the outcome.

More soon.

Sunday Evening

Farmers' Market, Lunardi's, Trader Joe's, cleaning the back deck, shampooing the dogs, run to the dry cleaner, wild Alaskan salmon Sunday dinner and Saturday dinner at a Chinese restaurant made up the weekend. In other words, very close to a "normal" weekend.

That is the good news.

The bad news is that Mary starts Gemzar chemo tomorrow. Supposedly, this is to be "mild" chemo but until it starts, we don't know how "mild" it is--or not. I'll be with her tomorrow for the first treatment. This chemo is once a week and Mary's day is Monday.

As she arrives, she has a blood draw for a blood test. It takes about an hour for the blood test results and if the results are favorable (red cells, white cells and platelets), the order is placed with the pharmacy. It takes another hour for the pharmacist to make up the IV dose. Plan a quarter hour to put her in a chair and half an hour for the IV to finish, its a 3 hour event.

Friday night and all is well...

Mary took herself to Stanford to meet the surgeon about her recent quick weight gain. The outcome is that he was very calm about the weight gain--it is not unexpected after radiation, even this long after radiation, 8 weeks or so.

Mary is to stay on diuretics for a while longer and it should not affect the planned Gemzar chemo to start on Monday. The weight gain is fluid retention and it is not unexpected. More than that, the doc was pleased with Mary reporting her appetite has increased as has her desire for more varied foods. He took that as a very good sign.

Her blood test results today were A-OK. That lifted her spirits and the doctor's too.

All in all, it was a very good visit and it helped assure us that the fluid retention was not a great concern.

Otherwise, Mary fixed us a nice dinner of chicken & sun dried tomato ravioli with a nice tomato sauce. I picked up fresh Acme bread from Lunardi's and Mary made a great oil and balsamic dipping sauce for the bread.

All in all, just a nice Friday.

PS: I understand that they required a nurse in the room--can't leave Mary alone with the "very hot/cute surgeon!"

Just another good day

Mary had a good day yesterday. She took idjit dawg for a walk (ol' dawg was sleeping), did ironing, talked to a bunch of folks, did a little facebook and even prepped most of dinner.

I got home after the Twins had already lost to the Yankees so we didn't watch that game. I read that the Twins arrived in New York at their hotel at 4AM ET and then played a game at 6PM ET. Given the liquid refreshment I saw in the locker room celebration on Tuesday when they won the Central Division, I was not surprised they lost game one.

She is scheduled to see the doctor tomorrow about some recent tenderness in her abdomen and a bit of water retention. They put her back on diuretics and asked her to come in just to check up on things. She will take herself tomorrow, do the blood test routine and then wait to see Dr. Visser. Reenie is accusing Mary of simply wanting to see the "Very Hot/Cute" surgeon. Hmm, I hadn't thought of it in those terms.

Monday is still on track for the beginning of chemo and a visit with Dr. Fisher. I will be in attendance for that one.

Clip of another idjit dawg...

Our friend Rudi sent this clip of another idjit dawg. Enjoy!

Reenie reports that the internet in Duluth does not like the autoload feature of this clip. Therefore, if you don't see the video, click here to open it in a new browser window.

Mary also commented that the dog appears to be a Border Collie, a well known breed of working dog. The dog is probably trying to do herding (programmed genetically) given the limitation of a lack of animals to herd and being constrained on a lead!

80% and counting

Mary said last night that she feels like she is at 80% of normal now. That is very good! And, it also is one of the checkpoints the Oncologist wanted before starting the chemo next week. We don't know how Gemzar will affect Mary. Each patient is different so all we can do is get started and observe the impact. Given Mary starts on Oct 12 as planned, and that she does three weeks on and one week off, the earliest she would finish is just before Christmas. But, they warned us to NOT make any plans based on a fast sequence. Each week of chemo, Mary has to take and pass a blood test before the injection. If her red count, white count and platelets are below requirements, the chemo is skipped for that week and continues the next week. Also, they said they'd accommodate holidays so that could add some weeks too. We are thinking mid to late January to wrap up the 9 injections. And, finally, they may find the impact of three weeks in a row too much so they'd switch to two weeks of injection and then skip a week.

In other words, ultimate flexibility.

As for the routine stuff, Mary is doing great. Sunday was Farmers' Market and Mary managed to buy some late season corn. We had near 100 degrees the prior weekend, if you recall, so some of the local fruits and veggies had a wonderful end of season spurt. We also bought fresh wild caught Alaskan salmon and locally caught black cod and they became Sunday and Monday dinner along with the corn on the cob and fresh veggies.

Mary went to lunch at Santana Row with Marge on Monday. That was her first meal out without me around and she did very well Mary reported. And, she drover herself as well. For my readers who don't know Silicon Valley, Santana Row is basically an outdoor mall located across the street from our large indoor mall anchored by Nordstroms and Macy's. The difference is that the Row has good restaurants (no food court) and more high end shops--Burberry, Gucci, Ferragamo and even Orvis have shops in the Row.

In addition to her luncheon outing, Mary did the laundry and managed to put it all away--except the king size sheets but think about that for someone her size. We made dinner together and afterwards, she announced she wanted a cookie. So, off to Lunardi's at 8PM to acquire the proper dessert.

And, yes, that means we walked away from the Vikings-Packers game but no fear, we have TiVo! Football goes so much faster when you can speed through 'between the plays time' and the ads. If Farve can stay healthy, the Vikings may have a good shot at it this year--finally! And, actually, we started TiVo recording when we began preparing dinner because we really don't like the TV to control us, we love our TiVo because we control TV.

Mary is currently dabbling on Facebook. If you don't have an account, you'll have to sign up (its free) and click here for her home page. She just posted that she will attend her Book Club tonight for the first time since March. Yippee!!

While Mary is at book club, I will be watching the next event in the dome in Minnesota. Last night in the dome was Vikings-Packers and tonight is Twins-Tigers for the AL Central Championship. They played 162 games and ended in a dead heat so they decide the outcome of the 162 games by playing one game. Everything else in baseball is best-of-three or best-of-five or best-of-seven but not this one. And besides, if its down to one game, why not skip the 162 games in the first place? Anyway, last year was the same situation only it was the Twins and White Sox playing in Chicago. The Twins lost. This year will be better!

Habitat for Humanity Dedication

We had a great time at the Habitat Dedication of new homes in Santa Clara yesterday. I have picked a few pictures to tell the story. Mary was the Habitat Family Selection Chairperson when these families were selected. The good wishes and smiling faces from the new homeowners, other Habitat volunteers and existing homeowners who attended made the almost three hours in the sun very worthwhile!

You can click on the images and it will take you to our Picasa on-line album where the pictures are larger.

Today we had our regular Sunday brunch at the Purple Onion. Ingrid joined us and MaryR was in Petaluma at a rowing regatta--again.

Mary is getting better. She has made the last two dinners with virtually no help from me--even if I offer. That is a sign, in my mind, of how strong she is feeling. And it is very good.

Chemo starts a week from Monday. She knows she has to do it and she hopes it is truly mild on her system.

Just a quick note

Mary continues to get stronger. Last night she had dinner all fixed before I arrived from work--it was baking in the oven--and that is a first! For whatever reason, she went for comfort food so it was Tuna Noodle Casserole. Hey, the important part is that she fixed dinner without me for the first time since the surgery!

She also went grocery shopping. In other words, it was a pretty 'normal' day and that is a major accomplishment!

This morning we are heading to a Silicon Valley Habitat For Humanity home dedication. Six families are getting new homes in this ceremony. Mary was the chairperson of the family selection process when they were selected a year ago, the families have contributed 500 hours of labor to build the homes and, most importantly, Mary really wants to attend the event.