Mukilteo Musings

A Little Bit of This and a Little bit of That

1. Last Days. Oh NO. My last days are here. At least according to Best Western they are. They send me e-mails and the shortened title I see is "Janet, Enjoy your Last Days...." Ah SCREAM! How do they know I have cancer? Please do no send e-mails like this to cancer patients even if all you are saying is enjoy the last days of nice weather somewhere.

2. Chemo Room Gossip. I had my eighth chemo yesterday and I have another CT scan scheduled for next Monday to track how we are doing. I ask for your prayers and positive thoughts. Tests are always a bit nerve wracking. Anyway, my nurse, Eileen was taken away from me yesterday for a two hour period out of my 5 hour chemo session. She was doing a stem cell transplant in the room next to me. I asked another nurse about it. When my friend, Patti, had a stem cell transplant 12 years ago, she had to be in the hospital several days and now it is outpatient. Wow! They do it right in the same place I get chemo these days. Advances are being made every day in this business.

3. Husbands, you can't win. This discussion was brought up last night by some entertainment TV show which had Heather Locklear's mug shot. She was picked up for DUI not involving alcohol but probably for one of the pills I take. Stupid. Even I know not to drive some parts of my day. They listed her weight as 105 lbs. and her height as 5'5". I remarked that was skinny skinny--skinnier than me and how awful she must look. Dave then responded to me that I look good.

"What do you mean I look good? I am a bag of bones---a cancery sick skinny bag of bones!"

"No, you look good, people say how wonderful you look," Dave emphasized.

"Well, of course. People are not going to tell me I look terrible, now are they?"

"You do not look starved and emaciated. Yes, you obviously have lost weight but your butt looks great and with the new pants I bought you at Costco, you look really good--hot even!" Dave kept going on.

"So....are you saying I was fat at 135 lbs. and now at 120 I'm not and I look better? I really would prefer another 5 to 8 lbs. The wooden pews at church are not good for this rear end, believe me." I continued.

"No...No. You looked good then, too, but you always said your butt was too big and now it's not."

"You thought I had a fat butt? You thought I was fat? You like my skeletal remains better?" Oh this was fun.

"No, you do not understand. You really do look great. I'll stop now." Yep, just like that cereal commercial where the husband screws up by asking his wife if she is watching her weight. You cannot win, husbands, on fat issues with your wives so do not even try.

4. The Soup Commercial. Speaking of commercials, have you seen the ad where the guy is pulled off his chair and down the stairs to face yet another boring bowl of soup. Oh man. That captures how I feel about every dinner time. Only I do not get taste--wish I did then I wouldn't be so SKINNY.

5. Hair Math. Yep, my hair keeps on falling out. I am glad I had twice as much hair as most people and now I have half as much hair as I used to. At the store I found some shampoo that said it would give me 50% fuller hair. The numbers should put me back to normal if the equation worked. Nah, it didn't work. Helped but not the full 100%. But my finger nails have never been better and my scientist husband cannot explain it to me. I wouldn't mind softer ickier toe and finger nails, if I could get my curly thickish hair back. Oh well. The chemo is working.

6. Paul Newman. His death made me sad. And of cancer. He was two years younger than my Dad and he looked like my Dad--blue eyes and all. My Dad died at age 57 and he looked so much like Paul Newman then. As the years have passed, I would see an aging Paul Newman and think about how my Dad would look--always movie star handsome.

7. Ah! I Saw the Light. Last night as I was getting ready for bed, I wondered if I was experiencing my last day like Best Western predicted. My magnified make-up mirror was tipped up and it was reflecting the light fixtures above my sink. The image refected behind me into Dave's mirror above his sink and back again into my big mirror and scared the bejeebers out of me. Yikes, I'm still not used to our new light fixtures. Nope, not dead yet. Not me. And I have no intention of going any time soon.