Knock me over with a feather

Mary called me about noon today to let me know she had confirmed Monday's visit with the Oncologist and the subsequent visit with the Surgeon on Friday. We are locking down all our drivers and the surgeon is adding to the blood tests on Monday to double check some items in Mary's ongoing status.

The feather part? As she told me about the confirmed appointments and tests, she said, "I'm going to make the rest of the cookies today." Just her ability to commit to do that was astounding, but was not the knock me over with a feather part.

I figured if she was successful in doing the cookies, I'd be on deck for full chef duties for tonight's wild caught salmon we bought at market yesterday. She'd be so tired, I expected to find her totally wiped out in her lounge chair--her best day last Thursday was like that. I called to let her know I was on my way home.

When I walked in the door, the potatoes had been baked and put in the warming drawer. She had seasoned the salmon and was putting it in the oven. The beans were all prepped and waiting to start cooking in the microwave. The table was set. As impressive as that was, and it was impressive, even more impressive was that all the cookie baking utensils, bowls, pans, trays, etc., had been hand washed and were in the drying rack waiting to be put away.

I was stunned. Mary hasn't been this strong for several weeks. And, hopefully, this means her body is producing the needed red blood cells. Go marrow, go!

I must admit I had a moment of fear for as Mary came over to give me a welcome home hug, I saw this rather large skin defect on her cheek. My fear was some sort of a lesion or weird thing appearing out of the blue. After careful inspection and even more careful attempts to remove it, it turned out to be the remnants of a chocolate chip! She gave me a big grin and said, "Chef's prerogative, got to check my own work!"

Oh, and I mislead you. We topped out today at 79F, not 80F, and the forecast is still 82F tomorrow.