My Final Blog Post

If you're reading this post, then I've moved onto my next adventure. (C'mon zoo polar bear!!!) This will be my last chance to say

========================================================================

Hi, again. Tom here. She started this about a month ago and didn't get too far. If we were Hindu I'd believe this would be a step up from being a human, I think. As we are Atheists, we're accepting that we are going to take whatever we get and be glad and thankful for it. This doesn't mean that we won't grumble about it a bit and make snide and snarky remarks about it. That is the perogative of a non-believer when they're wrong. However, this time, I don't think so. So, inspite of our non-beliefs, I'm hoping zoo polar bear too. I can always visit her and talk to her and tell her about what's going on in the outside world and how terribly boring and empty it is without her. Thank you all for the many years and many posts that you've all read, followed and commented on. She really, really appreciated it. As she told me, this will be her legacy. But we all will be the couriers to carry her memory ever onward.

Sandra J Smith
2/5/1966 - 6/28/2015
Rest in Peace, My Sweet Sister.

A New (and Sadly Final) Road Trip to Massachusetts Cut Way Too Short

If you remember correctly, my last posting indicated that now that my pain is in a controllable state that I'd start hitting the road again. I had planned a long weekend in Massachusetts and was looking forward to this trip for weeks. But as the old Biblical adage says: "The spirit is willing but the body is weak" (Matthew 26:41).  It's not often you find me quoting this work of fiction but it seemed relevant.

I started out for Massachusetts on Thursday for a 5 day long weekend. The most important part of this visit was seeing my rock star students. I've been getting messages for months about when I would be back for a promised visit and I knew I just couldn't disappoint my cherubs, so in discussions with my former principal, we decided the last day of school would be the optimal day. This way there wouldn't be any disruption to their studies. But how do you make sure that students show up on that last day -- my kiddos are notorious about blowing off the final day of school.  Simply enough, a few days before you spread the rumor that Ms. Smith will be coming to visit on that day. Instead of 4 or 5 students showing, we had a dozens. It warmed my heart.

--------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
Hello all. This is Sandi's brother Tom. The above was the last blog she completed. She came home Saturday extremely ill and yet she managed to start this blog. I believe she may have had more to say, but I believe you get the gist. She loved her kids and was ecstatic to see the turnout. However, I believe the trip and the excitement in her frail condition may have took a toll on her. But deep down, I think she knew. She piloted this cancer from the start. She was not going to let this cancer dictate or control her life. I'm proud of her. She was one of a kind and I'll miss her til the end of my days. There will be one more post after this one. I'll polish that one up and post soon.

The Much Ado About Nothing Cancer Update...

This morning, I had a message from a friend stating that she hadn't seen any updates from me in awhile and asking how I was fairing. It occurred to me that I should probably update people even when there is not much to update on the cancer front. 

Here's the latest:

Mostly my life is about pain management. My doctor has put me on a pain patch (Fentanyl) which slowly releases opiates into my system. The patch gets changed out every 3 days and for the most part is keeping my pain at a reasonable level. In no way am I pain free, but most days it's at a level that I can manage. For the days when the pain exceeds manageable levels, I have Tylenol or Aleve for when the pain becomes a nuisance and Percocet for when the pain is off the charts, which fortunately doesn't happen that often.

My biggest issues these days are motivation and exhaustion. Because my pain is fairly well managed, I could be spending my time traveling and sightseeing, but I'm having issues with motivation. Getting my butt up and out of the house is proving to be a difficulty that I hadn't counted on. Additionally, I get tired very easily. My days go something like this: wake up, watch The Today Show, read, nap, read some more, nap, watch Judge Judy. Or perhaps: wake up, watch The Today Show, watch a movie, nap, watch another movie, nap, watch Judge Judy, etc. It's quite tedious and boring, but it's what my life has become. I hope that eventually I'll get my energy and motivation back.

I have a planned trip to Massachusetts for a long weekend which will happen in a little more than a week, where I will visit with my students and see some friends. I'm hoping that perhaps that will be the kickstart that will get my motivation revved up and get me back on the road again.

That's it for the Much Ado update.

What's a Foodie to Do?!

I've admitted to this before: I am a foodie. A foodie is "a gourmet, or a person who has an ardent or refined interest in food and alcoholic beverages. A foodie seeks new food experiences as a hobby rather than simply eating out of convenience or hunger" (Wikipedia). I love food. I love eating food. I love discovering different foods. I'm less interested in alcoholic beverages, but I've been known to imbibe a beverage or two in the past.

When I learned that my life span was being cut severely and that I had approximately a year to live, I decided to hell with "healthy" eating habits. I was going to eat what I want, when I want. It was a decision that played out well over the first few months. Traveling through Europe was a gastronomic delight! I experimented eating all the local foods: haggis, black and white pudding, a redonkulous amount of roasted pork (thank you, Germany, Czech Republic and Austria), and such. Did I care that the apfelstrudel I had in Austria was 500 calories a serving? Nope! Did I scarf down an entire plates of pasta in Italy? You betcha! I did skip the escargot in Paris because...well...yuck!! I even designed My Last Supper. I figured if I had to go, I'd go out with a gastronomic bang!

And then came the abdominal pain -- a foodie's worst nightmare! You see, I had developed a growth in my upper abdomen which is apparently sitting on a nerve which causes me to have unrelenting stomach pain. As a consequence, eating has become less fun. I now "eat to live" instead of "living to eat." I'm finding this turn of events truly saddening. After all, I don't have many things that I can enjoy about life right now. Food, books, movies, and friends and family are the extent of my world and now I've lost the joy of one. I now have to eat several small meals throughout the day and most of these meals are either of the liquid variety (protein shakes) or bland and boring. Anything more than that and I've got tummy troubles. In addition, my taste buds are all messed up right now so everything (even water) tastes terrible.

So I return to my original question: what's a foodie to do? Will I ever be able to have my dream Last Supper?? If I do decide to have my Last Supper, it'll have to be spread out over several days. Anyone have any suggestions? I'm open for any type of advice.

If I haven't said it lately, having cancer sucks! I wouldn't wish this disease on my worst enemy...well, maybe my worst enemy I would but certainly no one else.

Beef Wellington...yum!

Never Speak Ill of the Dead???

It's been three weeks since I last posted. Wow. Probably my longest dry spell. But it's hard to feel motivated while lying on your brother's couch feeling like shite! Hopefully, now that I'm feeling a wee bit better these days, I'll have more motivation and can get back on track with my observations.

Here's today observation:

Everyone's heard that old aphorism "never speak ill of the dead" (De mortuis nil nisi bonum) and I've always wondered why that is. I get that it's socially inappropriate to speak ill of the dead, but what if the person who dies is an asshole??

What brought this thought on was a posting on Facebook. A friend and one-time colleague had posted about the passing of a colleague from one of the law firms for which I once worked. As I said to another friend/colleague, I wasn't terribly torn up over this person's death because quite frankly, I didn't like the man. He and I often butted heads and I thought he was an arrogant prick. So now that he's dead, I'm suddenly suppose to feel like he was a great guy for whom this is a tragic loss. Ummmm, no. Sorry, I cannot do it. It goes against my basic belief about honesty in all things.

I'm quite certain that when I finally shuffle off this mortal coil in a few months, there were be plenty of people who will speak ill of me - that I was a bitch or they disliked me or whatever. Trust me, I do not expect to be canonized for sainthood. And I certainly do not want someone for whom I dislike to suddenly espouse my greatness.  That's being disingenuous.

Now, I'm not saying everyone should go around bashing those who have passed on before us, but neither do we need to root around in our heads and hearts to find something nice to say about people about whom we didn't care.

I will put this on record right here and now. For all those people who dislike me, feel free to say whatever you wish upon my demise. I promise that neither I nor my family will hold it against you. After all, I'll be dead and won't care. I won't even haunt you. Okay?

It's all about keeping it real, people!

Weirdest National Anthems...

Last night, while waiting for the Yankees-Mets game to start, I watched the pre-game activities, which included a beautifully rendered version of our national anthem, sung by Glee star and Broadway performer Matthew Morrison. I'm always impressed whenever performers nail our national anthem, because let's face it, it's not an easy song to sing. Of course, there are the notoriously bad versions of the Star Spangled Banner (i.e., Roseanne Barr, Christina Aguilera, and others). Due to the difficulty of our national anthem, I'm all for the proposal of changing our national anthem. Why? Well, other than the Star Speckled Banana being difficult to sing, the lyrics are all about bombs and war and bloodshed -- and not in a good way. I'd recommend "America, the Beautiful".

Every country has their own national anthem and, for the most part, none of us know any of their songs. I know the British national anthem - "God Save the King/Queen", but that's about it. During the Olympics, we often hear other nations' anthems, but we only hear the instrumental version. Of course, even if we heard the lyrics, as only a handful of songs are in English, we still would have no idea what they say because the songs are sung in the native language of the country.

So, I wondered - are there national anthem that are worse than our? I suspected there might be.

Algeria: "Qassaman"/"We Pledge"

Though it pre-dates both heavy metal and rap by several decades, the Algerian national anthem's lyrics expertly incorporate the prominent cornerstones of both genres' most violent moments. Destructive lightning? Check. Gratuitous bloodshed? Check. Machine guns? Check. Being held down by the man? Word up, son.

The lyrics, written in 1956 by Moufdi Zakaria, are about two "hos" shy of being a Lil' Wayne single. At the time of the writing, Zakaria was being held captive in Algiers by French colonial forces. Realizing that it was, in fact, France that was holding him and his country down, he spent his downtime penning a tune about the ass whooping his fellow countrymen would surely be dishing out sometime in the near future.

Disturbing Lyrics:
"We swear by the lightning that destroys, By the streams of generous blood being shed."

"When we spoke, none listened to us, So we have taken the noise of gunpowder as our rhythm, And the sound of machine guns as our melody."

Italy: "Il Canto degli Italiani"/"The Song of the Italians"

Throughout the majority of the Italian national anthem, things sound pretty bleak. Heck, the main line in the chorus is "we are ready to die!" But Goffredo Mameli, the 20 year old poet who wrote the lyrics, clearly understood that one can only be down for so long.

Like most good national anthems, this one was written in the shadow of a looming war for independence, this time with Austria. Listening to the first few verses, you would think Mameli thought independence was a lost cause. But then, the final verse rolls around and Mameli goes from defeated poet to a Nostradamus-like teller of fortunes.

On an unrelated note, can you imagine what state our collective national anthems would be in if written by the 20-year olds of today? Booty booty booty booty bursting everywhere!

Disturbing Lyrics:
"Mercenary swords, they're feeble reeds. The Austrian eagle has already lost its plumes. The blood of Italy and the Polish blood it drank, along with the Cossack. But it burned its heart."

Hungary: "Himnusz"/"Hymn"

Unlike most of the other anthems on this list, Hungary's really has no cause to be as violent as it is. There was no war for independence on the horizon. No foreign invader was occupying their homeland. Basically, a whole bunch of nothing was going on. It would appear that overall, Hungary is just such a shitty place to live that some dude decided to ask God to help him out.

That's right, this anthem is written as a direct address to God. Most national anthems implore the citizens of their grand country to take up arms and fight against oppression, transgression, whatever. "Himnusz" is having no part of that. Really, it's a bit unclear what the problem was at all. But whatever was up their ass, it apparently required divine intervention. It's basically the national anthem equivalent of what an unemployed, alcoholic friend might call and moan to you at 2:30 in the morning.

Disturbing Lyrics:
"No freedom's flowers return, from the spilt blood of the dead, and the tears of slavery burn, which the eyes of orphans shed."

Turkey: "İstiklal Marşı"/"Independence March"

Another anthem, another fight for independence. Noting that Turkish fighters were having a fair amount of success defending themselves against European invaders, it was decided that a motivational song to spur them onto victory and celebrate their inevitable success was in order. Basically, Independence March was the Super Bowl Shuffle of its day.

The lyrics focus mainly on how unbelievably awesome it would be to die for your country. We would prefer to, you know, defend our country while at the same time remaining alive. Silly us!

Disturbing Lyrics:
"I'm like the roaring flood; powerful and independent, I'll tear apart mountains, exceed the heavens and still gush out!"

"Render your chest as armor and your body as trench!"

"For only then, shall my fatigued tombstone, if there is one, prostrate a thousand times in ecstasy, and tears of fiery blood shall flow out of my every wound, and my lifeless body shall gush out from the earth like an eternal spirit."

France: "Le Marseillaise"/"The Song of Marseille"

"La Marseillaise" was written in April of 1792 by Claude-Joseph Rouget de Lisle in the midst of the French Revolution. It was originally called "Chant de guerre de l'armee du Rhin" ("War Song of the Army of the Rhine") but the name was later changed due to the song's popularity with volunteers on the streets of Marseilles. And, presumably, because "Chant de guerre de l'armee du Rhin" is a pretty goddamned long name for a song.

Depending on where you're reading it, the translation of the lyrics varies. But hey, you say a tainted blood irrigates your furrow, we say their impure blood should water our fields. To-mae-to, to-mah-to. Whichever you prefer, somebody's getting fucked up.

Disturbing Lyrics:
"The bloody flag is raised, the bloody flag is raised."

"Do you hear in the countryside, the roar of these savage soldiers, they come right into our arms, to cut the throats of your sons!"

"May a tainted blood irrigate our furrows!"

Vietnam: "Tien Quan Ca"/"Army March"

Anyone who didn't see trouble coming when we went to war with Vietnam had clearly never taken a gander at their national anthem. If they had, they would have seen that this is a country that does not take war lightly. Most of the other anthems on this list mix in a little bit of talk about peace, national pride or whatever else. The blood and guts talk just finds its way into a verse or two at random. Vietnam's anthem, on the other hand, is all war, all the time.

The lyrics start with the line "armies of Vietnam, forward!" And guess what? They mean it! There's blood on the flag! Guns are rumbling! Bases are being built! There are chains to be broken!

Vietnam's national anthem kicks more ass in two short verses than most countries do in a lifetime.

Disturbing Lyrics:
"Our flag, red with the blood of victory, bears the spirit of the country."

"The distant rumbling of the guns mingles with our marching song."

"The path to glory is built by the bodies of our foes."

"For too long have we swallowed our hatred. Be ready for all sacrifices."

-----------

After checking out some other national anthems, I suppose I can't complain too much about our national anthem. What do you think about our national anthem?

Not the Life I Imagined...

I need to get something off my chest. When I was growing up, I had a certain mindset of what my adult life might be. It was a fairly simple dream. The dream life was: I'd have a career I loved, a spouse who adored me, a kid or two on whom I could dote, I'd live to a ripe old age surrounded by family and friends, and (hopefully) die peacefully in my sleep. How did my life go horribly wrong?

I don't usually give into self pity and sadness about my circumstances, but there are times that the direction my life has taken sends me down a negative path and I'm overwhelmed by the misery of it all. Of my imagined life, I was lucky to have a career that I adored - two in fact. My performing career was a failure, but hugely fun. My teaching career was moderately successful and I loved being a teacher, but my time teaching was cut painfully short. I've only known persistent heartache when it comes to love. No children, which in hindsight is probably for the best. No ripe old age for me, but I do have family and friends who love and support me. Definitely no dying peacefully in my sleep.

I didn't quite get my dream life, but added to not quite getting everything - I got a whole boat load of crap. Last night, as I lay in bed in excruciating pain - waiting for the meds to kick in, I was struck by how truly fucked up my life is. All I kept thinking is "why is everything so difficult? Life should not be this hard." It seems like I've had more than my fair share of problems in life. And yet, jackasses like Mel Gibson seem to just cruise through life.

Many of my friends, relatives, and students have crowned me with roses and think that I'm some sort of heroine with how I've been dealing with my cancer. But all I can think about is: how the hell am I going to get through the next few months of my life with grace and dignity? How do I avoid sinking further into a hole and not spend my time wallowing in self misery? Why can't life just be easier and not such a shit show?

Okay, time to get off the pity pot. This life is the only one I have and I must take what's dealt to me.

The Worst Board Games EVER!

Today, I was looking through some of my past blog posts and came across my posting of "Strange Board Game Origins" which looked at the background of some of our most beloved board games. This walk down memory lane got me thinking about what board games have been produced which were probably best left in the imagination of its creator and not actually produced. 

Some of the resulting games are a little terrifying and many are really offensive.

Sinking of the Titanic

This game from Milton Bradley sends players across around the board, rescuing passengers from the Titanic‘s staterooms. You have to escort all the passengers to lifeboats before the ship goes down, at which point the game shifts gears, and you must now hunt for food and fresh water -- by drawing cards. A rescue ship eventually shows up, and players must race to it. The first one there wins the game. Everyone else dies. 

“The Sinking of the Titanic” received a ton of criticism when it was released in 1975. So the company released a sister version in the UK the following year, changing the title to “Abandon Ship.” This version is set in the Pacific Ocean, and the ship collides with a coral reef instead of an iceberg. The name change cost the company the all important name recognition of the doomed Titanic. But since people weren’t exactly eager for a game that made light of a famous tragedy, the switch was probably for the best.

Life as a Blackman

This Underground Games release from 1999 offered a simple yet heavy message: Life as a black man is hard. Delivering this message pretty much involved trotting out a parade of stereotypes, blurring the lines between satire and genuine racism. 

Players all start as 18 year old black males either in Glamourwood, Black University, the Military, or in the Ghetto. Through die rolls, players work their way through the randomly selected starting areas and into Downtown, an approximation of life in the real world. Players may find themselves going to Church to right past wrongs, or spend time in Prison for making bad decisions. The first person to reach the Freedom space at the top of the board wins.

Unlike many games on this list, “Life as a Blackman” isn’t forgotten. An app of the game is coming soon for your iPhone.

Blacks & Whites

Here’s another example of a game that tries to illustrate racism, with pretty shocking results.

Produced in the 1970s, “Blacks & Whites,” according to publisher Dynamic Design Industries, depicts housing discrimination through “the absurdities of living in different worlds while playing on the same board.” At the beginning of the game, players choose to either be a “Black” or a “White,” and the choice handily determines who wins the game.

The Whites comprise the majority of players, start with $1 million, and can buy property anywhere on the board. Their black counterparts are the minority, start the game with only $10,000, and can’t buy many properties. These properties that the players fight over range from the “inner ghetto” and “outer ghetto” to “lower integrated” and “upper integrated” neighborhoods to, lastly, “newer estates” and “older estates.”

“Blacks” and “Whites” each draw from their own set of “opportunity cards.” A typical White opportunity card: “Stock dividend from a company that makes tear gas. Collect $40,000.” A typical Black one: “Government begins urban-renewal project. You lose both Harlem and Watts. Collect full price less 10% from Treasury.”

Project Pornstar

Produced in 2004, “Project Pornstar” casts players as directors of their own porn flicks. If you’ve ever played a trading card game, you have a rough idea of how this works -- the various cards in the game represent components for your film, and the best combinations win you the most points. Since you’re making a porno, one set of cards represents your actors (men, women, amenable livestock), and another represents objects (handcuffs, for instance, or a cucumber). 

Another set, the “action cards,” further change the course of your film. If a performer’s face doesn’t quite meet expectations, you can play a card to throw a paper bag over it. There’s an “AIDS” card, too, of course.

Fun for the whole family!

Juden Raus! (Jews Out!)

Nazi Germany featured quite a few horrifically offensive anti-Semitic games, from shooting games to games tracking the triumphant rise of the swastika. But the most notorious of these games is probably “Juden Raus,” published in Dresden in 1938 approximately one month after “Kristallnacht” (the Night of Broken Glass). 

It’s a simple game. You roll dice and move your token to Jewish homes, where you collect Jews. You must then escort your Jews to a “collection point” so they can be banished from the city. “If you are the first to expel six Jews,” reads the game’s original rules, “you are the undoubted winner.”

Still, the Nazis were the most evil people in history, so it’s unsurprising that they produced such a game, right?

Not exactly. “Juden Raus” was manufactured by some private German company, and surprisingly, a major Nazi journal, the SS paper "Das Schwarze Korps", heavily criticized the game (issue No. 52, December 29, 1938, p. 7): An (unknown) author claimed that the game trivialized the anti-Semitic Nazi policies and that the international press would use the game’s existence to make the policies look completely ridiculous. The author’s main objection was that the game manufacturer was trying to profit from the Nazi slogan “Juden raus” (Jews out) to promote the sale of the game; and not that it's an offensive game. 

Dishonorable mentions: Gay Monopoly, What Shall I Be? The Exciting Game of Career Girls, and Busen Memo (Bosom Memory).

Random Acts of Kindness...

I don't know about the rest of you, but I am tired of the cruelty of people toward others. News reports are filled with horror stories of death and destruction. It becomes very exhausting and disheartening to watch the news anymore. There has to be some heartwarming stories out there and today I was on the hunt to find some.

Here's what I found:

1. Pizza Delivery With Heart: This story could have gone horribly wrong for either of the people in it, but it turned out to be an amazing story of kindness. Sometimes pizza joints get special requests with their online pizza delivery ordering system (one woman asked them to write "I want a divorce" on her pie - they didn't), so they're used to getting requests. One pizza delivery guy showed his commitment to customer satisfaction. Pizza My Heart in Menlo Park, CA took an order that came with a special request: “Send us your cutest delivery boy. Tell me I'm pret.” Clearly, the customer ran out of characters to finish the instructions, but it's a no-brainer than they wanted to be told they were pretty.

Expecting to be greeted by a bunch of college girls when he delivered the insanely overpriced pizza, he instead encountered a room decorated for a birthday party, with only one woman in the room. The delivery boy reportedly wished the customer a happy birthday, and the girl told him how she had planned a party but nobody came. After a short conversation, she invited him in for some cake and the delivery guy ended up staying for an hour.

“We laughed and talked the whole time, as I was leaving I gave her a hug and told her she was pretty,” he said.

The only negative aspect of this story was that upon the delivery guy's return to the restaurant, he received a written warning for taking so long. But he says it didn’t matter as long as he made someone happy on their birthday. If only everyone was as nice as this guy.

2. A Good Chick-Fil-A Story: I'll be perfectly honest, I will not patronize Chick-Fil-A restaurants due to the company's religious beliefs and their CEO's antiquated same-sex marriage views. I just cannot abide giving money to bigots, but when I heard a story about a Chick-Fil-A team in Raleigh, NC, it warmed my heart.

Sheree Carter started working at Chick-Fil-A in October. At the time, she was living in shelters and temporary housing with her two young children and working hard to get family back on their feet after the loss of Ms. Carter's parents and her children's father. The family finally got an opportunity to move into their own apartment just before Christmas. Knowing how hard Carter had been struggling, her co-workers banded together and chipped in to fully furnish the apartment (including a dishwasher) as a surprise gift to the family.

Carter was overwhelmed by their generosity, as she didn't even think they knew that she was homeless because she never showed it. While I still will not step my big toe across the threshold of any Chick-Fil-A, it's nice to know that there are still people out there doing what they can for others.

3. Mystery Man Pulls Driver From SUV: Yesterday, in Idaho, an unidentified man may have saved the life of 23-year-old driver, whose 2000 GMC Yukon was heading south at approximately 8 a.m. when it left the road, drove through a yard and over two terraces before getting snared in a chain-link fence that prevented it from crashing into the canyon.

"As the Yukon's front end hung over the canyon's sheer edge, the man appeared, broke the vehicle's passenger-side window with a rock and removed Sitko [the driver] by dragging him through the opening" (AP story). The rescuer left the scene as the police arrived, stating that he had to go and then left.

Who this man is remains a mystery, but kudos to him for saving the life of a complete stranger!

-------------

These three stories restore a little bit of my faith in humanity, although I still think for the most part people are assholes to each other, but it's nice to know that there is still some kindness out there. Here's one of the songs that I find inspiring for promoting kindness:

Brain Droppings...

Today's blog is just some general brain droppings that I wanted to get off my chest. I haven't been posting as much lately because I haven't been anywhere or done anything interesting or significant. While I had indicated that I was going to continue to travel by completing day trips from Philadelphia, I haven't been able to go anywhere for a couple of reasons.

First, the weather has only now just begun to be conducive to outdoor activities, like sightseeing. But that's not the real reason I haven't been traveling.

My old friend, Pain, has refused to leave me alone since arriving back in Philadelphia. You see, I go to bed with the idea that I'll get up the next day and go do something interesting/fun/entertaining/informative, etc. What I end up doing is spending most of the night being woken up by Pain every couple of hours. The pain medication that my doctor has put me on doesn't really work very well. It'll dull it for a couple of hours but then Pain comes roaring back, stronger than ever -- and a good couple of hours before I can take the next dose. I then spend the next hour or so trying to ignore Pain before giving in a taking the next dosage before I should. After a night of restless sleep and weeping due to this annoying little bugger, I get up, vomit from lingering Pain, take another dosage of meds and finally lay on my brother's couch and nap the morning away. By the time the afternoon rolls around I have zero energy to go and do anything. Plus Pain is still being a pain in the arse. I'm not loving my current situation.

But I have discovered something about myself: I am not a masochist. So, you know, that's something. Whenever I think about masochists, I always remember a scene from the musical film, Little Shop of Horrors. In the scene, masochist Arthur Denton (played brilliantly by Bill Murray) visits dentist Orin Scrivello (Steve Martin) and gets a painful thrill of a lifetime (see video below). The scene, of course, is fictional but there are people in this world who find pain to be a turn on. As I'm not one to cast aspersions on other people's interests, all you masochists out there I say "enjoy", but don't look for me at your parties.

Personally, I would give everything I own to rid myself of Pain. I remember my mother once saying when my dad was dealing with leukemia was that "at least he wasn't in pain." Sadly, this genetic marker is one that skipped me by.

Additionally, I have concluded that the likelihood of my traveling to the west coast is probably slim to none. The odds that I can withstand a five and a half hour flight to Los Angeles are pretty low; let alone getting my oncologist to agree to the trip. New York City is another questionable visit simply because I'm not certain I have the stamina for New York, but I'll have to think upon that one. I still would like to make a final trip to Massachusetts to see my students and friends up there. Even though it's a six hour drive, I can make stops along the way and take my time getting there.

All in all these past couple of months have been (and the upcoming months promise to be) physically exhausting and painful; and I'm over it. I would like for someone else to take on this burden please. Anyone, anyone? <sigh> I suppose there won't be any takers for that request and I don't blame you. Cancer is not very glamorous. Therefore, I will continue to muddle through.

More Weird, Yet Funny Facts...

Another case of boredom caused me to find some more strange facts for your entertainment. Some of these are really crazy:

1. "Fart Battles" were popular art scrolls created in Japan during the Edo Period (1603-1868).

2. In Spanish, the "esposas" means both "wives" and "handcuffs". [Sounds about right.]

3. 2.6 million Kenyans practice the "sport" of naked night-running. [That's gotta be painful.]

4. In 2011, a woman bought a "non-visible" piece of art for $10,000. [Someone with way too much money.]

5. You can change your language of Facebook to "Pirate". [Try it - it's fun!]

6. Brazilian footballer Ronaldinho's deal with Coca-Cola ended after he was caught sipping a Pepsi in a news conference.

7. There is an official Rock Paper Scissors league in the United States. [What about Rock Paper Scissors Lizard Spock?]

8. If you search for "askew" in Google, the content will tilt slightly to the right.
9. Paris Syndrome is a psychological disorder, mainly suffered by Japanese people, caused after realizing Paris isn't what they expected. [Seriously? WTF!]

10. In Dorset, Minnesota, a 3-year old boy was elected as mayor. A year later, he was re-elected. [Makes sense -- most of our politicians act like toddlers.]

11. One in four Americans thinks the Sun goes around the Earth. [A sad statement of our education system.]

12. One in ten Americans thinks HTML -- the language of web pages -- is a sexually transmitted disease. [Yep, I'm still sad.]

13. In 2007, a Bosnian couple divorced after discovered both had an online affair with each other under fake names.

14. 35% of American workers said they would forgo a pay raise in exchange for having their boss fired. [Back in my corporate days, I would have been part of that 35%.]

15. The word pencil comes from a Latin word meaning "small penis".

16. British spies planned to lace Hitler's food with female hormones to make him less aggressive.

17. In Catalonia, Spain, a smiley-faced piece of wood called "shitting log" poops out the presents on Christmas (photo below).

18. A man named Moondyne Joe escaped prison so many times, that police built a special escape-proof cell for him, from which he escaped as well.

19. Benjamin Franklin wrote "Fart Proudly", a scientific essay about flatulence.

20. Cows moo in accents specific to their region, just like humans.

I'm Beginning to Loathe All Doctors!

In my 40+ years on this fine planet, I've been to my fair share of doctors - all types of doctors. This fact is particularly true when you consider that I have had two cancer diagnoses and a major depressive episode -- you see lots and lots of doctors with all those issues.

Let's begin with the most annoying fact about doctors...wait times! Has anyone ever arrived at a doctor's office and been seen by the physician within a reasonable amount of time...say 5 or 10 minutes? A couple of weeks ago, I went to my first (and most likely final) visit to my new primary care physician. My appointment time was 12:15pm. I arrived at noon and was brought into the exam room at 1:55pm and finally saw the doctor at 2:05pm. An hour and 50 minutes past my appointment time. Does anyone else find that reprehensible? This scenario is typical of all doctor's offices. I've even had the first appointment of the day and still had to wait an hour before being seen by the doctor. <sigh>

After the annoying wait times, I find the "god complex" of doctors to be equally irritating. I know that they had a shit ton of schooling - 4 years undergrad, 4 years med school, and anywhere from 3-8 years of training for their specialty, but that does not make them the omnipotent or infallible. Yet, they expect their patients to follow their directions with no questions asked. Well, I say "screw that!" Question everything that your doctor recommends. For example, my oncologist set me up for a biopsy of one of my tumors to ascertain that my metastases are actually endometrial. The more I thought about it the more I questioned why I was putting myself through this test. I called the doctor to question why he recommended this test. He wanted to make sure that it was endometrial because that would determine the treatment recommendations he would make. That means that he did not listen to my decision which is to seek no further treatment! So, I cancelled the test because I'm not going to waste my time and money on unnecessary tests. Why don't doctors listen? Oh, right - because they're "god" and "know what's best for their patients".  <grrrrrr>

Also, doctors seem to think that patients don't deserve to have all the information required to be fully informed. At least, that's been my experience. My last visit with the oncologist to review my CT scan, I was told that "as expected, everything was slightly worse." What I wasn't told was that I have new tumors in various places and a new complication. The only way I found out about this bit of news is that I asked the office to send me a copy of the report for my records. It made me feel like my doctor didn't want to bother me with the details. F**K THAT! It's my body and I deserve to have all the information so that I can make decisions based on knowledge. Fecking doctors!

Here's the full 411: In the two months since my last CT scan, there has been moderate growth of the existing nodules. In addition, I have "multiple [new] lesions" in the liver and the pelvic region, plus a small pericardial effusion (fluid around the heart). Now I don't know about you, but I believe these were important points that the oncologist should have mentioned to me because there are side effects from these developments of which I should be aware. Consequently, I have to return to my oncologist and have yet another conversation with him that he is to monitor my disease, not treat it. And if he can't deal with that, then I will ask to be assigned to a different doctor. There are several in this office.

FECKING DOCTORS!!!!

Random Weirdness...

I was really bored today, so I dug up some really weird facts for your amusement and bemusement.

1. The Romans used to clean and whiten their teeth with urine. Apparently it works. Please don’t do it, though.
2. The world’s deepest postbox is in Susami Bay in Japan. It’s 10 meters underwater. 

3. In 2007, an American man named Corey Taylor tried to fake his own death in order to get out of his cell phone contract without paying a fee. It didn’t work.
4. The oldest condoms ever found date back to the 1640s (they were found in a cesspit at Dudley Castle), and were made from animal and fish intestines.
5. In 1923, jockey Frank Hayes won a race at Belmont Park in New York despite being dead — he suffered a heart attack mid-race, but his body stayed in the saddle until his horse crossed the line for a 20-1 outsider victory.
6. Everyone has a unique tongue print, just like fingerprints.
7. Most Muppets are left-handed. (Because most Muppeteers are right-handed, so they operate the head with their favored hand.)
8. Female kangaroos have three vaginas.
9. It costs the U.S. Mint almost twice as much to mint each penny and nickel as the coins are actually worth. Taxpayers lost over $100 million in 2013 just through the coins being made.
10. A family of people with blue skin lived in Kentucky for many generations. The Fulgates of Troublesome Creek are thought to have gained their blue skin through combination of inbreeding and a rare genetic condition known as methemoglobinemia.

11. Casu marzu is a Sardinian cheese that contains live maggots. The maggots can jump up to five inches out of cheese while you’re eating it, so it’s a good idea to shield it with your hand to stop them jumping into your eyes.
12. The loneliest creature on Earth is a whale who has been calling out for a mate for over two decades — but whose high-pitched voice is so different to other whales that they never respond.
13. The spikes on the end of a stegosaurus’ tail are known among paleontologists as the “thagomizer” — a term coined by cartoonist Gary Larson in a 1982 Far Side drawing.
14. During World War II, the crew of the British submarine HMS Trident kept a fully grown reindeer called Pollyanna aboard their vessel for six weeks (it was a gift from the Russians).
15. The northern leopard frog swallows its prey using its eyes — it uses them to help push food down its throat by retracting them into its head.
16. The first man to urinate on the moon was Buzz Aldrin, shortly after stepping onto the lunar surface.

17. There is a glacier called "Blood Falls" in Antarctica that regularly pours out red liquid, making it look like the ice is bleeding. (It’s actually oxidized salty water.)
18.  A U.S. park ranger named Roy C. Sullivan held the record for being struck by lightning the most times, having been struck — and surviving — seven times between 1942 and 1977. He died of a self-inflicted gunshot in 1983. Shocking!
19. The katzenklavier ("cat piano") was a musical instrument made out of cats. Designed by 17th-century German scholar Athanasius Kircher, it consisted of a row of caged cats with different voice pitches, who could be “played” by a keyboardist driving nails into their tails. Why?
20. The Dance Fever of 1518 was a month-long plague of inexplicable dancing in Strasbourg, in which hundreds of people danced for about a month for no apparent reason. Several of them danced themselves to death. There are worse ways to go, I suppose.

Blood Falls

Tackling the Practical Tasks of Being Terminally Ill...

There have been a number of tasks that I have ... well ... it's not that I've been avoiding them. I just put them on the back burner because I had better things to do: seeing Europe and the US, but today it was time to start tackling these necessary tasks.

Task 1 - Health Care Power of Attorney/Living Will 

Quite frankly this task is one that everyone over the age of 18 should complete and keep up to date on a regular basis. A health care power of attorney/living will gives directions to your health care proxy about life prolonging medical treatments. I can hear people now: "But Sandi, I'm young" and "I'm not sick." Yes, and tomorrow you could walk out of your house and be hit by a bus. Do you want to be the next Terri Schiavo? I do not. Of course, I have had a living will for years, but it needed some updating. Now, it's all ready to be signed, witnessed, and delivered to my physicians. It's pretty standard. What are my wishes? Unsurprising, no life sustaining treatments are to be given. Done!

Task 2 - Last Will and Testament

Let's start with the knowledge that I did have a will drawn up -- years ago. But times have changed and so has my situation; therefore, I needed to update this document. Fortunately, thanks to online legal websites, this chore was easily accomplished - particularly as my will is pretty basic. Another document ready for signing, witnessing, and storing. Done!

Task 3 - Researching Pennsylvania Cremation

I decided decades ago that when it was my time to go, I did not want to be stuffed in a box and placed in the ground. My plan is to arrange and prepay for the disposal of my remains. I spent some time today looking into crematories in the area and the approximate cost. Next step is to choose one and make an appointment to finalize my plans. 

Task 4 - Dispersal of Ashes

This assignment was more difficult than I expected. How do you decide where your ashes should be dispersed? First off, yes, I want my ashes spread somewhere. I don't want them sitting on someone's mantle. Ugh! Then I narrowed it down to something with water. One of the random facts I once listed about myself is that I love the water - any type (lakes, ponds, oceans, swimming pools, etc.). As I do love the ocean (but hate the beach), I have decided that I would like my ashes to be scattered into the ocean. I think my brother, Tom, needs to fly to Florida and he and my other brother, Tim, should rent a boat (bringing a case of beer with them) and take my ashes out into the ocean in order to scatter them properly.  No throwing them into the ocean from the beach. Uh uh!  I do not want to end up on the sand! With my luck, I'd end up in some jerk's ass crack.

Task 5 - Plan a "Good Death"

I read an article about tasks that the terminally ill need to accomplish and this task was one of them. What they meant by "good death" is: Where do you want your final moments to be -- your home, a hospital, a nursing home, or hospice facility? As with deciding on my ash dispersal, I found this task to be a bit difficult. Ordinarily, I would say I would prefer to die in the comforts of my home, but I don't actually have a home. Yes, my brother has kindly allowed me to live in his home, but it's not exactly my home. If it were, there would be different toilet paper in the bathroom. Plus, it's not fair for my brother to have that burden. A hospital is out. It's how my father died and that sucked! So I suppose I need to start looking for a good inpatient hospice facility. I started with making a list of some area facilities. The next steps would be to go and visit them to see what they're like and if they would fit into my "good death" scenario. Also, as cost is an issue, I have to find out if I can afford great hospice care. I'm sure I can afford crap hospice care, but that's not an option I'd want to consider.

Task 6 - Write my Final Blog

Okay, some people might find this ghoulish but I started to write my final blog which I will ask my brother to post after I croak. As this will be the last words that I will ever post, I want them to be perfect so I will continue to work and re-work this last blog in order to make it perfect. I doubt if it'll ever be perfect but I'll do my best to say goodbye to everyone in a way that will (hopefully) be equal parts of funny, interesting, and poignant.

----------------

I had a few other minor tasks that aren't worth listing but were completed. I feel like I did well today on getting started and, in some cases, completing some necessary tasks. All in all, today was one of my more productive days of late.

And the Pain Goes On, the Pain Goes On (Cancer Update)

(What's the pop culture reference in the title that I co-opted?)

As I mentioned in my last update, this week was almost nothing but annoying medical appointments. After nearly 2 years of dealing with cancer, I'm over it. Can it all just go away? Even for a little bit? Nope, guess not.  And as I'm in too much pain right now to do any sort of sightseeing and traveling, it gives me something to do, I suppose. Here was my week:

On Wednesday, I headed to the hospital in order to have a thoracentesis performed. You may remember that I had fluid building up in the pleura around my lungs and this procedure drains the fluid. I arrived at the hospital at 7:00am and registered. I was told to head up to the Short Procedure Unit. Short Procedure - that sounded promising; perhaps I would be in and out in a short time. Nope! The nurse asked me to wait in the waiting room until they had a bed available. Around 7:45, the nurse (Lee) brought me back, where I had to change into one of those very sexy hospital gowns. After climbing into the bed, I went over my medical history with Lee. She then placed an IV in my hand and told me that they would be up in about 30 minutes to take me down to radiology. An hour later, I was finally carted off to the 1st floor. Both the nurse and the doctor gave me the overview of what the procedure would entail. Here's what happened: I was brought into the room, told to scoot to the side of the bed and lean over the x-ray machine bed. Then the doctor used an ultrasound machine to locate the pleural effusion. After marking the location on my back with a marker and sterilizing the area, he then stuck a rather painful needle into the area in order to numb it. Then a slightly larger needle was placed and the cap removed. The fluid flowed out into a liter glass bottle. I just had to lean and wait for the fluid to flow out. Approximately 10-15 minutes later, I was done and they bandaged the site. While I was waiting for them to roll me out into the hall, the nurse asked me if I wanted to see what had been removed. I said, "sure." I turned and saw 950 milliliters of bloody fluid. Holy crap! If you're like me and are a Metric idiot, 950 milliliters is 1 quart. A normal amount of fluid in the pleura is 20 milliliters. Well, no wonder I was having trouble breathing. Although oddly, it didn't do much to improve how I'm feeling. I'm coughing less, but otherwise, I still feel like hell. After a chest x-ray to make sure there was no pneumothorax (a collapsed lung), I headed back to the Short Procedure Unit and about an hour later (a little before noon), I was released and headed home.

The next day (yesterday), I headed back to the hospital for a CT scan. It was pretty much like every other CT scan I've had over the past 2 years. Arrive, sit, choke down a nasty barium contrast drink, lay on the CT machine, hold breath, get injected with a contrast solution, hold breath, and leave.

Today, I met with my oncologist to discuss everything. While he didn't give me specifics, he did say that the CT results showed that everything has gotten slightly worse since my last CT two months ago. Not surprising. He was disappointed that the draining of the fluid didn't do more, but he suspects that I'm just unlucky enough that even though the lung nodules are still relatively small, they're positioned in places that are causing me pain. Lately, I've been having stomach pains as well, and he suspects that's from the abdominal nodules. Oh joy of joys. He is still advocating chemotherapy and I am still adamant about not wanting to do any more chemo. So we have reached an impasse. The next step: the oncologist wants to be sure that it really is endometrial cancer that we're dealing with and not breast cancer so he is recommending a biopsy of one of the nodules. As there are now abdominal nodules that can be biopsied, the risk is minimal (as opposed to any lung nodule). Sometime in the next couple of weeks, I will have the biopsy to confirm that we are dealing with endometrial. This procedure seems stupid to me. What difference does it make if I'm dying from endometrial or breast cancer? Whatever. I left the office with a prescription for Percocet for pain and an appointment to see him in three weeks.

Real Playgrounds Which are the Stuff of Nightmares!

When I was growing up, playgrounds were places of happy and imaginative entertainment. Slides, see-saws, swings, and other innocent, fun recreational equipment were the mainstay of my youth. I think if I had come across some of the playgrounds shown below, I would not have the fond memories of innocence. 

A picture is worth a 1,000 words. Enjoy!

Parents: I do not recommend you take your children to any of these places!!!

Pain, Pain, Go Away! (Cancer Update)

As I mentioned 2 weeks ago, I made the decision to head back to Philadelphia instead of continuing on my road trip to California. There were many medical reasons why I made that decision but mostly it was an extreme pain issue. If you remember back in January, the test results indicated that I had pleural effusion, which I needed to keep an eye on.

Reminder: pleural effusion is a build up of fluid around the lungs. And it is effing painful. For the past two weeks I've experienced everything from mild to severe pain - with occasional pain so bad that I've either vomited or burst into tears. The pain takes the form of a stabbing pain - like someone jabbing me continually with an ice pick with the occasional axe to my side. Adding to the pain is a chronic cough which developed thanks to the lung irritation. Pretty much the past two weeks have been hell.

Today, I met with a new oncologist. The doctor I saw in January was not covered under my new health plan. Let's not discuss what those visits and tests are going to cost me! Anyway, I met with my new oncologist who seems to be an understanding sort, but also a bit stubborn. So stubborn meets stubborn. Yay! Wanna guess who'll win this contest? Once again, I had to review my cancer history and my thoughts on moving forward. While he completely gets the desire to travel, he is also advocating the use of chemotherapy and Tamoxifen. <sigh> He means well and he did talk me into getting a prescription for Tamoxifen. Even though I have the pills, it doesn't mean that I'll be taking them. He may think the minor chance of a stroke or blood clots is worth trying it, I do not. Right now though, we're both focused on getting rid of my pain

Here's what's on tap for this week: (i) a chest x-ray (which I did after leaving the oncologist's office), (ii) another CAT scan of my chest, abdomen, and pelvis, (iii) a thoracentesis, which is a fancy word for draining the fluid around my lungs (see photo) - hopefully that will help with the pain, and (iv) meeting with the oncologist at the end of all this to see where we go next.

A busy week of medical stuff and I'm already bored with it. Stay tuned for further updates.