Prep Work

Before my surgeries, I madly attempt to make my house a more hospitable destination for healing. Since Brandon will not be home with me during the day, I need to know that food and entertainment will be easily accessible. Yesterday, we went to Trader Joe's, where I stocked up on cheese, hummus, crackers, chips, and fruit. After five surgeries, I know what I like to eat when I'm at home and don't feel well. Today has been whirlwind of activity around the house. And now I am exhausted, and drinking my last glass of wine for a few weeks.

Today's To Do List included the following tasks

• Multiple loads of laundry, folded and put away. Now I do laundry often, but usually I let the clean clothes pile up on the guest bed until it is time to do laundry again (meaning that the pile is gone).
  
• Found old VHS tapes to watch. I plan to spend time on guest bed since it is in the "coolest" room in the house. The VCR is in the same room, so I plan to watch some of my old VHS tapes. So glad the movies weren't purchased at the yard sale nor did I give them to Goodwill.
  
• Prepared and/or cooked the following items for consumption during the upcoming week: chopped cantaloupe, chopped and blended gazpacho, zucchini cake with chocolate chips, and cleaned sweet cherries. Also put ginger ale and sparkling water cans in fridge. And then cooked fresh peaches in grapeseed oil with leftover pulled pork, and corn fritters for dinner.
  
• Tore out recipes, decorating tips, and party ideas from old issues of the Martha Stewart magazine before tossing the magazines in the recycling bin. Not really a necessary pre-surgical task but something I'd been meaning to do for about a year. What would be a better time than when I've got a billion other things to do? I certainly can't think of one.
  

I keep thinking that I have forgotten something. And even if I have, it is not the end of the world. But I hate being entirely reliant on someone to do basic tasks for me. I won't be able to drive for a few weeks. I may not be able to sit up by myself. I won't know the full level of my limitations until Tuesday when I wake up from surgery. So I plan and prepare for the worst.

Thank goodness someone out there is less lazy than I am

Sometimes I don't read my magazines on delivery day. Sometimes, I let the publications pile up in the corner by the couch until they are about to collapse. Once the pile reaches a potentially harmful height, I kick off a mass reading spree infusing my brain with entertainment news, desirable travel destinations, and more recipes than I have the time or energy to cook.

Today I read my Cleveland Clinic newsletter, Catalyst, volume 8, issue 2, Summer 2010. Turns out an immunology researcher at the Clinic has found a way to prevent the development and halt the growth of breast cancer tumors in mice, and may figure out the way to do the same in human women. The key word in the prior sentence is may. But nonetheless, a pretty awesome development in the world of medicine. Maybe I should read my magazines sooner.

For more information, check out this online article, "Cleveland Clinic Researchers Develop Prototype Vaccine To Prevent Breast Cancer" (5/31/10).

Numbers.. It is all about the numbers

According to the blogging software, I am now writing my 100th post. Wow! Who would have thought that I could write even ten posts? Certainly not me.

Yesterday was my 36th birthday. Next month will be the two-year anniversary of me finding that sneaky, evil lump of cells in my boob. And guess what cancer cells, I'm still alive. Screw you!

Next week, I will undergo my sixth surgery (surgeries are as follows: mastectomy, port installation, tissue expander installation, DIEP procedure, and DIEP follow-up #1). Hopefully this procedure will be the last one. My body would like to rest.

Howdy!

Just wanted to say hello. I'm still here, and have plenty to say. My summer of livin' has been pretty busy with lots of travel and keeping on the now very soon to explode vegetable garden (photos are on FB if you are a friend of mine). Plus all of my free time has been spent madly knitting what seems to be the world's largest baby blanket for my new nephew, baby Graham. He was born on Wednesday, which is Brandon's birthday, so Brandon now has a new birthday buddy.

As for the blog, I do need to get better about posting. I have tons to say, new photos of inappropriate pink items, and rants. The blog is one of my forms of therapy. My therapist is great at helping me work out issues, but the blog gives a necessary release. I would write more but I need to get working on the "guest" room. Nanette and her husband are coming to visit (yea!) and they need a clean bed and space for their stuff. Right now neither of those requirements exist.

Livin'

I can't remember the exact phrase but in one of my favorite movies, Dazed and Confused, the character Wooderson, talks about how he is just living, "livin." While this movie is almost 20 years old (ack!!), I still enjoy quoting it from time to time. Actually, truth be told, I probably quote it on a semi-daily basis.

Today is the Saturday of Memorial Day Weekend - the official kick-off weekend of the summer season. My plan is for this summer to be my official summer of livin'. I just want to have fun and enjoy myself. For the past two years I have been bogged down with cancer, my treatments, my recovery, my surgeries, the side effects, the emotional breakdowns, and I'm done. I just want to move on and what better way than to focus on having fun. Brandon and I even started our summer a little early. First by going to Belgium and the Netherlands for a week at the end of April/early May. And then by taking a random vacation day earlier this week to visit Cedar Point (the best roller coaster amusement park in the country!).

So what do I have planned for my summer of fun? Let's see...

• When in town for a full week, I will work longer days Monday-Thursday so I can schedule Friday afternoons off.
  
• On these Friday afternoons, I will do something fun including kayaking, going to the movies, drinking sparkling wine in the back yard, or going for a long bike ride.
  
• Maintain a kickass vegetable garden. Try to get the rest of the yard under control and be relatively attractive.
  
• Travel to Hilton Head for Brandon's cousin's wedding, and spend a couple of extra days in Savannah.
  
• Leave a few days early for my annual library conference to spend time with my mother and grandmother. My mother and I are planning to spend one of those days at Rehoboth Beach, one of my favorite places in the world and I haven't been since before all the cancer stuff started.
  
• Spend a weekend on a pontoon boat and camping with friends in southern Indiana.
  
• Try new and different restaurants in Columbus (so maybe I'll stop complaining about how boring I think this city can be).
  

That is my list so far, and I'm sure that I am forgetting something. Please let me know if you have any suggestions for activities I can add to this list. We still haven't decided what to do for Birthday week (Brandon's birthday is 7/14 and mine is 7/19). A few years ago we went to Albuquerque, and last year we went to Toronto. Some years, we stay home and try to do something different each night (mini golf, go out for ice cream, watch a movie,...). And Nanette and Chris are planning a visit out here for a couple of days during the week after my birthday. So more activities are sure to be scheduled for this awesome summer of livin'.

P.S. I still need to have one more surgery this summer which will put a slight damper on all the fun to be had. Hopefully the date for this surgery will be chosen on Tuesday.

P.P.S. And I'm going to try to be better about writing the blog. It helps with my emotional and mental healing, but sometimes I'm just not in the mood to write.