Scott

Time In A Gigabytle

I loved that song Jim Croce sang in 1972 about saving time in a bottle. I’m saving time in a virtual Gigabytle.

I finally finished shooting – copying – digitizing and archiving about 30 years of large, desk pad calendars. I first mentioned the project in an earlier post. They were referred to as desk pads, but mine was always on my home-office wall.

Some of them shouted the month and year in LARGE FONT, like breaking news headlines, while a couple series appear to have had little interest in going public with the current month or year.

My personal, historical notations are the most significant inscriptions, but an extra treat was finding several ticket stubs. They were tickets to events, now they’re tickets to the past. They are, along with name tags, sticky notes, and other souvenirs, fastened to appropriate days or nearby margins.

When I put all the months in order, I found that some were missing. January 1990 is missing, as is August 1995. The entire years of 1998 and 1999 are missing. Maybe we tried an alternative calendar then, but two random, single months? My perfect alibi is shot.

Maybe in those missing months, I urgently needed some crushed paper packing materials, or something to quickly protect the floor under the cat-food dish.

I’m solid from September 1976 through 2007, except for those missing pages – those missing memories. It’s not that they aren’t filed away in the database of my mind, it’s that the physical calendar pages turned out to be the “product code” that unlocks them.

If anyone has been waiting for the opportunity to rewrite a little history, I’m accepting bids on a full set of like new, never marked, but naturally aged 1980 (20″ X 25″) calendar pages.

Seven Weeks

My Urologist and my Radiation Oncologist agree the prostate cancer has returned. My options appear to be:

Do nothing – and probably enjoy 10 years before quality of life issues become apparent.
Wait, watch, and maybe do something later. PSA will sometimes increase and hover around 0.2 for a long time with no real problems.
I can have targeted radiation treatments now.

Improving my likelihood of long-term survival, and the fact that I am currently employed and have fairly good insurance are good reasons to act now (although the Multiple Myeloma – or the unexpected – could change my circumstances at any time).

The only negative my Radiation Oncologist listed (other than the ever-lurking unexpected or unlikely) is before the treatments are finished, I should expect to experience some inconvenient bathroom related issues. These symptoms usually subside after the treatments have ended.

The Radiation Oncologist explained that when prostate cancer returns, it’s usually found in one of three places: the old prostate neighborhood, the lymph nodes, or the bones. Since they know historically it’s in the prostate area 75% of the time, that is where I will receive daily radiation treatments for seven weeks.

I returned to the Radiation Oncology Center in Beaverton where seven years ago, I had 24 daily treatments, not realizing it was a rehearsal. I was mapped, scanned, and tattooed (again). The treatments and commuting will begin on April 18th.

On the positive side – I signed up a couple weeks ago for the second annual Chubby Bunny Challenge, a weight loss competition at work. I joined it to be involved and supportive, and for the $20 sign-up fee, you get a nice T-shirt and Pizza.

With my previous radiation treatments, I lost 30 pounds. This year, with the help of radiation, I may have a pretty good chance of winning first prize!

STOP IT!

I saw a Gastroenterologist. The result of our visit was a prescription to treat symptoms caused by excess stomach acid. I’ll take it twice a day until further notice.

He also made an appointment in May for a camera down my throat. If my symptoms go away or are notably reduced before May, I may not need to swallow the camera.

I also saw a Speech Pathologist on what may be the last stop (win or lose) on my way to solving this throat clearing issue. About my constant throat clearing, she basically said, “STOP IT!”

It reminded me of this Bob Newhart skit. It turns out there is a little more to the STOP IT theory than you might first imagine.

It’s true that something is causing this to happen, but it turns out that throat clearing causes irritation, and irritation causes throat clearing. If the cycle continues long enough, it becomes part of you.

If you can STOP or REDUCE it, you might break (or damage) the cycle.

She offered a list of suggestions of how one might STOP IT, most of which I am already doing. The bottom line is, if I can stifle the throat clearing, at least to some degree, the instances and/or severity may be reduced, at least to some degree, regardless of the primary cause.

I had the follow-up PSA test last week. I haven’t talked with my Urologist yet, but, the test results were automatically posted to my (Medical Stuff) web site.

Test data often appears to be in Greek (Latin?), but these numbers were quite clear: 0.19. Now that’s a cliff-hanger. More than 0.2 indicates a recurrence of the cancer.

I’ve given up trying to predict what a doctor will say or do, I’ve been wrong so many times. I’m sure it will be interesting when we talk next.

St Patrick’s Day

I’ve been working on a theory about time; specifically, the passing of time and the perceived passing of time. I know I have the same number of hours in a day as everyone else, and the same number of hours in a day as when I was younger.

I think the hours were somehow fatter when I was younger. I could accomplish a lot more in those fat hours. My hours seem much thinner these days. They stack tighter and can be passed quicker. It’s hard to get things done in a thin hour.

Everyone is busy. We all have things to do on weekends, and things we’ll try to get done after work. There are things that need to be done before you go, and things to finish before they arrive.

I have indoor projects best suited for dark, rainy winter days, and projects postponed until the longer, warmer summer days are here. Lately I find myself considering a vast, new scheduling option: “Soon After Retiring.” It appears to be wide open time slot.

*Taken recently on the way to visit my brother, Mark, in Salem*

Today is St Patrick’s Day. On St Patrick’s Day 2011, I had prostate surgery. I’ve never been zealous about the holiday, but the night before, I asked my wife to find a green ribbon I could tie in a bow attached to myself where my surgeon would lift the blanket and be surprised to see I was celebrating St Patrick’s Day.

That might have been fun, but I had just recently met my surgeon, and that could have made me appear to be irresponsible, or a weird-O. So I didn’t. Looking back over our seven year relationship, the doctor and I have shared a few laughs, and I’ll bet the green St Patrick’s Day ribbon likely would have made for a unique and memorable surgery.