My Next PET Scan

My next PET scan is scheduled for Wednesday June 9th. I'll get the results on June 15th. I'll keep you posted...

Something to Brighten Your Day

Here's a little something I found in the backyard today. I wanted to share it with you to brighten your day. And to let you know that I'm still here. :-)

This rose is called "Legends". It's a Ruby red Hybrid Tea rose with "massive, full, & ruffled blooms". Also, the tag reads, "Monstrous buds & humongous blossoms of rich ruby red hold their durable brilliance from beginning to end. Immense petals (just one can cover a child's palm) lend a classical Hybrid Tea bud shape, slowly spiraling open to a ruffled whopper of a show-stopper. Large lettuce-like leaves of an unusual red-green color gracefully enrobe the long cutting stems - in perfect proportion to the flower. Who needs a bouquet? It only takes one prodigious posy to fill a vase."

Also the tag says that Oprah Winfrey was involved in the multi-year evaluation & final selection of the Legends rose. Woohoo!!

The Garden Today

Well we have had a rainy season. And I have to take time for my knitting boot camp. I'm not kidding about that. Anyway, I haven't finished sifting all the soil but I'm still working on it. I should be finished shortly so that I can get the other 2 boxes filled and planted.

So, here's the latest on my little garden space. Today I finished putting in the drip lines for the boxes that are up and running. I think the rain has stopped completely until November or so... so I had to get the water in because the hot weather is just around the corner.

Here's an overview of the garden today. I tried to take the best picture I could:
In this photo you can see my 2 baby blueberry plants.
This next photo is of my 2 "stone" boxes. The first one has two kinds of carrots. The 2nd one has lacinato kale (just about ready to use), celery (looking good!) and a nasturtum. The lettuce is done. If I can find a shady spot then I can start some more.
This photo is of my first raised wooden box. It has tomatoes, basil, a parsley plant (I also have a separate herb bed outside the garden), some French marigolds, some borage volunteers. Also there's a small beet patch on the far end. I also added a row of carrots in between each tomato plant. They are just now coming up.I won't be leaving all of those solar lights in the box. I put them in there to keep some plastic sheeting off of the lower plants. It got cold here for a couple of nights last week. Each box will have 4 of the lights for a nice effect.

I just got some 8-manifold bubbler heads today. I really like them because each outlet has an individual control valve. You can shut any one of them off or adjust any of them individually from 0-30 GPH. Very nice.

So, now I either have to go sift some soil or do some knitting homework.

The Most Important Thing An Overnight Guest Can Do For Me

If you are ever an overnight guest at my house, the single most important thing you can do for me is to strip the bed linens off of the bed, including the pillowcases. I will never understand why guests make the bed. I mean, am I to leave them on there for the next guest? If you do one thing, let this be it. Just toss them on the floor. This will make me smile.

Cleaning the House

When I met David he had housekeepers who came into his house every two weeks (at that time) to clean it. When I joined him and we got Theo we changed that to every week. And until a few weeks ago we continued to have someone come clean the house. Our latest housekeeper was Lupe. And she did a fabulous job and never complained. While I was working or going through chemo it made sense to keep her on. But I haven't gone back to work yet and haven't been on treatments since August so I decided to try to clean the house myself. This saves us $95.00 per week. That's a good amount of pocket change.

So far so good. For several weeks now I've been doing the dusting, mopping, wiping, scrubbing. I generally set aside a day for it so it just gets done and I can dedicate the rest of the week to everything else. I think I'm doing a pretty good job. Before I met David I always cleaned my own place. Granted they were much smaller but a bathroom is a bathroom... a floor is a floor... it's all the same. Just more of them. So, I take longer. But it's really no big deal. Now I don't have to do the mad rush every Wednesday night to de-clutter the house for Lupe. I know where everything is at every moment. (I don't like for things to get moved.) Overall I don't mind cleaning my own house. If I return to work or if I return to treatments then we will see if Lupe's still available (I hope she is - she did a great job) but for now I'll keep doing it myself. In a way, I'm bonding with my house.

Garden Prep Detours

I haven't been sifting soil this past week at all. The weather was absolutely perfect for it but I had other obligations. I am in the middle of an 8-month long knitting boot camp which meets once a month. Since the last class I had been working pretty non-stop in the garden, pausing only to clean the house, do laundry, or go to doctors appointments. So I didn't work on my homework until last week (we meet again tomorrow, Tuesday the 13th.) I spent many hours doing the knitting homework and will go upstairs to dedicate the final 30 minutes needed to prepare for tomorrow's class. After tomorrow's class you can again find me in the garden (the rain will be gone - yay!) and I should finally get the remaining soil finished this week. Then I will know how much to purchase and then I can finally get the garden going in earnest.

I will also try to do the knitting homework throughout the next month.

So, that's my boring update (excuse) on why I haven't been posting much lately. Soon I will tell you about Justin, our San Jose Giants baseball player who is living with us for the season.

Still Sifting Soil...

Not done yet! And it's been raining. This week should be beautiful but I have to work on my knitting homework for my class next week. I'm WAY behind.

Also I will have to tell you about the San Jose Giants baseball player we will have in our home for a few months. Don't let me forget!

Sifting Dirt

Wow. I wish I had time to sit here and compose something witty. But I'm outside in the garden sifting the rocks out of the dirt in the raised beds. All day. I'll see you in a week or so with pictures.

So, I'm Officially NED for One Year!

Hi all,

I just want to share my good news. Long story short (to update any new readers)... February 2008 I was diagnosed with colon cancer (at the ripe old age of 37.) I had surgery and 6 months of chemo. Then it was also found in my liver in December 2008. January 2009 (just over a year ago) I had surgery to remove the new tumors and did another 6 months of chemo, which was completed last August. I have had alternating MRIs and PET scans every 2 months since then, the latest being yesterday. The MRI that was done yesterday confirmed that there are no tumors at the moment.

Do you know what a milestone it is to be confirmed disease-free after an entire year? It is something to shout from the rooftops!

(Oh, by the way, NED = "No Evidence of Disease")

Not Much to Update...

...which is a good thing!

Well, I do have an MRI next week so I'll post those results when I get them.

I have been keeping very busy not getting much done. At least it seems that way, but I know I'm busy every day because my feet tell me so, and I haven't been doing anything leisurely during the days. My foot still hasn't healed from my November 6th surgery so the doctor prescribed a bone growth stimulator machine, for which insurance is paying 90%. Thankfully. It's an ultrasound machine that I use every day for 20 minutes and it's supposed to stimulate the bone to heal using voodoo magic. At least that's what the doctor said.

I never did get the greenhouse, so I have found ways to accomplish what I want inside the house, in my kitchen. Luckily I have a large expanse of counter space behind our sink in a bay window. And I have learned that maybe it's a good thing to start the seedlings in the kitchen where I see them every day. They are coming along wonderfully and I haven't lost any of them. Out in the garden, "out of sight, out of mind" perhaps could have played a role in the demise of some seedlings so it's probably for the best that I can see them every day and tend to them. That window does not let in enough light so I had to put in a grow light to keep things moving along. It looks kind of funny but will be taken out when seed starting is completed.

Here it is:

That's actually a garment hanger that the lights are hanging from. You know, the kind you'd put in your closet or laundry room to hang clothes on. I looked all over for one of those stands that you hang grow lights on. Even the place that sold me the grow light did not sell stands. And anyway they probably would have been pricier than this garment rack. It was only $20.00 or so. I have it on its shortest setting and it works. As the plants grow taller I can raise the lights bit by bit by moving the s-hooks up the chain. We had an extra shelf in the shed that is the exact stain and color of our kitchen cabinetry, and it actually happened to be the right size, so we added it to make a nice little platform for the plants. Otherwise I would have had to deal with the 2 cross bars on the bottom. It looks nice with the cherry shelf.

My knitting is coming along too. At the moment I'm not working on any project, so to speak. I am attending a knitting boot camp and the assignments are to make little swatches using different techniques, and the goal is to expose me to the experience of doing all of the techniques so that when I do make something more complicated than a stockinette scarf I'll have experienced pretty much everything at least a little bit and I won't be intimidated by it.

Speaking of the knitting assignments, I'd better work on some of that today. Our next class is next Tuesday and I have some things to complete. It's a rainy day today so I should be able to get some of it done.

Off I go...!

The Beginning of the 2010 Garden Season

Well, it has begun. For the rest of the year I will have dirt under my fingernails. Here's what I've done so far: I pulled up all of the irrigation from last year and re-laid out the garden beds. Some of them were OK but some were just too wide. I can comfortably reach 1 1/2' into a bed, so I laid out all of the beds to be 3' wide, leaving 1 1/2' - 2' paths in between. We did set aside some space for a nice 6' x 8' greenhouse but I'm not sure I'll be able to get it. Last year Costco offered a coupon for $300.00 off and I was expecting the same this year, but so far I haven't seen the discount. But I have a plan B, and it may work out even better. What I have done is started my seedlings in my AeroGarden. I was hoping that by the time they were ready to transplant into little pots that I'd have a greenhouse. However, since that didn't work out, I have decided to get a 4' long grow light to put them under, and they will sit in my kitchen behind the sink where there is just enough room for that. What makes this potentially better is that I'll be able to keep an eye on the seedlings every day. In the greenhouse they might dry out but in my kitchen that won't happen. So, the space where the greenhouse was going to go can now become the home of one of those cheap plastic storage shed things that you get from a home improvement store. I just need someplace to keep my bags of soil, gloves, gardening tools, etc. I think this will work out very well.

Here's what my AeroGarden looks like:

So, here's where I am now: A month ago I started some kale, lettuce, mustard greens, spinach, and celery in the AeroGarden. Yesterday I transferred all of the seedlings except for the celery and the smallest 2 kale into little 6-pack seedling pots. Here are the seedlings:For now they are sitting in front of the sunniest window that we have but the truth is they won't get enough sunlight. And they will all grow sideways to reach the light. The grow light has been ordered and hopefully it will arrive soon.

Today I started some more seeds in the AeroGarden: 3 kinds of tomatoes and some beets. For the 3rd year I'm going to try beets. Hopefully this will be my successful year. The last 2 years they have been direct seeded and just never did well. So this year I will grow seedlings and transplant them when they are stronger. I'll see if that makes a difference.

Very soon, hopefully later this week or next week, I need to go and direct seed the carrots into the garden. I have decided to plant some normal orange ones as well as some "Atomic Red" carrots. Plus I'll see if I have any yellow carrot seeds left over from last year but I think I planted them all.

Open Letter to Everyone Who Forwards Viral Email

Dear Family/Friend/Loved One/Acquaintance,

When you forward an email to me that was forwarded to you, and you include, say, 24 other people, now 24 other people have my email address. And while you may trust those other 24, you don’t know the 25 people they may forward it to, and each of those 25 people may forward to 25 more. At the end of the day, hundreds or thousands of people could have my email address that I don’t know. And perhaps one of those people works for a company that collects emails for spam. Or maybe one has a virus or Trojan horse on their computer that scans emails such as this looking for email addresses to add to a spam database. So, anytime you are sending an email that may get forwarded, you should always use “Blind Carbon Copy” (or BCC). Don’t use the regular “CC” or "To". You have to use the BCC because then all of the email addresses will be hidden from the other people.

That said, I never, ever read emails like these. You never know when one might contain an attached virus. And frankly, I just don’t find them interesting. So, they get deleted right away. My request to you is: no matter what you choose to do in the future regarding forwarding emails that you didn’t write, please don’t include me.

Anytime you want to write a personal note to me, feel free! Those I welcome.

Love,
Laurie

MasterChef Tryouts

So, last Thursday I was shopping at Sur la Table in Los Gatos for some soufflé cups for Friday night's dessert (a yummy Meyer Lemon Soufflé). So, while I was there, I looked down on the counter and uttered, "you've got to be kidding me." What did I see? A stack of little cards advertising open casting calls for Chef Gordon Ramsay's new TV show called MasterChef. If you want to see the details, follow this link: MasterChef auditions. Well, I immediately thought that I could try out to be on the show, seeing as how I love to cook and am always trying to improve my skills. Also, I have been considering going to culinary school to learn some professional skills and I thought being on the show might be like a crash course in culinary school. I picked up the card and checked out the details when I got home. The requirements were a bit daunting: Bring a dish to plate and serve to one taster, bring a photo of your dish, bring a photo of yourself, and bring the completed application (about 10 pages long). And the casting call was on Sunday in San Francisco.

I mulled it over and decided on Spring Rolls because I felt they would hold and transport well in a cooler for several hours. I was more stressed about the answers to the questions. The hardest ones for me were how my friends would describe my personality, and what would they say are my best and worst qualities. I got some feedback that I'm a bit shy and reserved and sometimes don't know what to say. And this is true. Also, I guess one of my flaws is honesty because I think this is why I was passed up.

Sunday morning I got up and decided to do this for real, so while I went to the store to get the ingredients I needed, David went to Fry's to pick up a printer. Our photo printer had died a few weeks earlier. I rushed home and assembled the Spring Rolls (which, by the way, I had never made before.) :-O

David and I then rushed up to San Francisco in order to stand in line for a few hours in the cold. Luckily it wasn't raining. I finally made it to the front of the line and went along with my group to the "audition" area where I quickly plated my dish for the taster. He came around and asked me, "So, what do we have here?" "Spring Rolls made with shrimp, carrots, cucumber, and avocado. Served with a sauce made of mayonnaise, sesame oil, rice vinegar, wasabi paste, and chopped cilantro." Taster: "So, where did you get your shrimp?" Me: "I got it at 99 Ranch Market this morning." Taster: "How did you cook your shrimp?" Me: "I boiled the water, added the shrimp, turned it down to a simmer for a couple of minutes then took them out of the water. Then I tasted one to make sure it was done." The taster took a swipe of the sauce with his pinkie and took a bite of the Spring Roll and said, "Very fresh. Very good." Then walked away.

After that, a lady whom I assume is a casting person came to ask me questions. That's where I blew it. She asked me why did I decide to come try out for the show, what are my culinary goals, and how would my friends describe my personality. I said I felt the show was made for me because I love to cook and am always trying to improve my skills and gain enough knowledge and experience to stray away from recipes. I said that I considered going to culinary school but not to be a professional chef. Instead I wanted to have professional chef skills when cooking for my family and friends. And I said my friends probably see me as shy and reserved. Hmmm... I guess they don't want shy and reserved people on TV.

Anyway, the taster liked my dish! I am glad that I was able to see a glimpse of the underbelly of a cooking TV show. If it comes around next year I think I'll be better prepared with my answers and tell them of the energetic, adventurous side of me as well.

Totally Random Stuff

Well, sorry I have been a little silent right now, but to tell you the truth, not much has been going on. I'm still recovering from my foot surgery. That and the rain have been keeping me pretty quiet. I did get to re-arrange the garden before it started raining but now I can't do much until it stops, and it looks like it'll never stop. I have been practicing my knitting. I even enrolled in a knitting boot camp and hope to learn a lot. Cassie is still cute and sweet, and continues to make us happy to have her in our family.

I just passed one milestone: January 21st was my 1-year anniversary since my liver surgery, and that means I'm 1 year into remission. That's actually a big deal. Though they don't really have a "cured" time frame after cancer has spread to your liver, I think most of the return cases are within 2 years. So, I'm halfway there. The last time my remission was for less than a year so it was nice to reach the year mark this time. I'm still living life as if I have lots of it left.

Latest PET Scan

A short post:

As my Facebook friends already know, last week I had a PET scan. The results: ALL CLEAR. In two months I'll get an MRI. For now I am living life in 2-month increments. I'll take what I can get.

Granny and Grandad

This post is dedicated to my wonderful grandparents. My grandmother's name was Rosa Mae Haddox, and my grandfather was always called "J.C. Wells", which is short for Joseph Caron Wells. Grandad and Granny got married on March 1, 1932. Granny used her middle name (sort of a common thing for our family to do, I've discovered) and so she went by the name "Mae Wells".

Granny was born on March 22, 1913. She was always very kind, warm, loving. She always, and I mean always, had a smile on her face. You know how most people, when they are relaxed and gazing into the distance, have a neutral look on their face? Granny didn't. Her lips were always curled up in a relaxed smile. This is one thing I remember about her. Granny was also very short, which became worse with her osteoporosis. Her upper back became hunched over, causing her to shrink. She LOVE it when I gave her back massages. Also, she always had a pot of beans on the stove or in the fridge. It's just the way it was done. I also remember that for many, many, many years (since when I was a little girl) she had a sore on her right leg. She scraped it when she was not very old and it never healed. The doctors did many skin grafts on it but could not get it to heal. I always wondered why. She was always cleaning it, changing the dressing, and always had a bandage on it. For the last few years of her life, she suffered from congestive heart failure and was in out of the hospital because of heart problems. She finally passed away, at the age of 96, on April 5, 2009. I am so lucky that she gave me a packet of old photographs a few years ago, which I rediscovered a couple of days ago as I was unpacking one of the final boxes from moving to our current house. In this packet was this photo. She was beautiful, and look at all that hair!

Grandad was born May 5, 1914. To me, he always looked the same, and that's to say: old. When I was a kid I was actually a bit afraid of him. He was gruff, and didn't speak to us kids much. Perhaps he just didn't like kids. I remember that he was ALWAYS working outside in the garden or in his tool shed, planting his garden, building something. He was outside all day, every day from the time he got up to the time he had to come in for dinner. After dinner he'd usually watch TV and relax. He taught me a poem about a wise old owl. I don't remember how it went, but I remember I cherished that poem because he taught it to me. When I grew up into an young adult I noticed something interesting about him: he slowed down, took more time to visit with me, and became very loving. He smiled a lot more, hugged me, and enjoyed conversations with me. When he spent time with me he made me feel like I was his favorite person. I'm very glad that the gruff grandfather I grew up knowing mellowed out and showed me that he loved me. And I loved him very much too. He died at the age of 87 on August 23, 2001. The cause of death was colon cancer which, by the time they discovered it, had spread too far to treat. (Side note: My colon cancer is unrelated to his. I am much younger and I also did a lab test to see if it was genetic. It wasn't.) This is how he looked when he was a young man. Very handsome!

Granny and Grandad were married for 69 years, and loved each other until the end. This is how I remember them:

This is a fun picture of them too, as a young married couple. This was taken in probably 1944. My father is the baby that my grandfather is holding.

Christmas Letter 2009 (penned by David)

Greetings –

Well, this year started off rather inauspiciously when we discovered just before last Christmas that Laurie’s colon cancer had returned as a metastasis on the left lobe of her liver (the small part often used for donation). We knew one of our first challenges of the year would be surgery. The surgery was done at Stanford by one of the world’s leading liver cancer surgeons. They also took her gall bladder out when they saw a second small lesion above it. After several months of recovery and another 6 months of chemo there has been no recurrence. Laurie continues to alternate between PET and MRI scans every two months. They’re continuing to look clean and we look forward to less frequent and equally clear scans as the years roll by.

Laurie also had the first of 2 bunionectomies done in November. The surgery corrects bone growth in the foot so that the bones are now straight and that will remove a lot of pain that she’s been having. There has to be 3 months between surgeries, so Laurie will have her other foot done in late February.

David’s continuing to work at Cisco. The work isn’t quite the same as he originally signed up for, but it is gainful employment and he feels there’s value in what he’s doing. Most importantly, the job and pay are solid along with great benefits. Now if only they’d stop forcing vacation times on him so that there could be some planned time for him to do stuff with Laurie.

We wouldn’t consider our life normal if it didn’t include a little chaos. Laurie finished her last chemo in August and was looking forward to a little relaxation time before considering a possible return to work. With the previous 19 months of her life pretty chaotic and lost with surgeries, chemo and recovery, it was decided that it was time for Laurie to slow down, relax and start to enjoy life for a while. Well, that was the idea at least. Then Laurie made the mistake of mentioning to Theo’s breeder that he seemed bored at times. Well, 3 weeks later Francee contacted Laurie and said she had a long coated female that was 9 weeks old.

The timing was right for everyone, but we also knew this would pretty much trash any chance of the next 10-12 weeks being quiet and relaxing. Less than 3 weeks later we met Francee and Hollie in Petaluma and returned with the most loving 12 week old ball of fur you’ll ever meet. Cassiopeia (aka Cassie) is gorgeous, loving, affectionate and full of life. Theo hoped she’d leave for the first couple days, then put her in her place for a few days. Now he just lets her do whatever she wants. She is constantly goading him into play and has brought the puppy out of him again.

The conclusion is all is right in our life again. Laurie may decide to return to work in the future, but for now she’s just keeping her license up to date so the options are open. Theo and Cassie are definitely our kids. We are very happy that Laurie is healthy and in the clear.

We wish you all a Happy New Year and Joyous Holiday Season.

Laurie, David, Theo, and Cassie

Poor Cassie :-(

Well, it was time. Cassie had to go in to the vet to get spayed. I know that some people think a dog needs to go through one heat but for her future we decided it was best not to allow that. For one thing, she isn't allowed to go to daycare after 6 months of age unless she is spayed. And she could have her first heat from 6-8 months old. We feel the socialization she gets from being around other dogs at daycare is very important and we don't want to deny her that socialization for 1-2 months just to have a heat cycle. Plus we don't want to deal with her having a cycle in the house or for Theo (who is altered but can still respond to hormones) to get weird. So, we took advantage of this Thanksgiving break in her training classes, and of the extended time that Dave's at home for the holiday, to go ahead and get her fixed.

She is a little confused, a little wimpery. I don't blame her. Yesterday she woke up, happy as ever, bouncing around, playing, wanting breakfast (which she could not have) and then we took her to the vet. The doctor said that when he was doing an exam on her she was giving him kisses. Then she was sedated and spayed and later Dave and I picked her up. I wonder what's been going through her head. She woke up, different somehow, and now she has to wear a cone on her head. She's not allowed to run, play, or jump for 7-10 days and so she goes outside on a leash. Gone are the free romps in the back yard. For all she knows, it's forever. But it's only for a few days. In a week or two she will be back to her old self, with free roam of the house and back yard and she and Theo can play again. I know that Dave and I can't wait for that to happen.

Here's a picture of her from today:

Did I Tell You I Had Foot Surgery?

It's not sexy... and it is painful. The bunion. Due to unlucky developmental abnormalities, my feet have always hurt when I wear anything other than tennis shoes. Well, I could wear flip-flops too, but those only get a person so far! Finally a couple of months ago my right foot was hurting after wearing flip-flops all day, prepping for some dinner party or another. So, I scheduled a visit with a foot doctor. He took some x-rays of my feet and declared them to have moderate bunions (coupled with some arthritis) which he could correct with surgery. I've heard of people regretting having had the surgery, and I've heard of people wishing they had done it sooner. I hope I'm one of those people.

So, two weeks ago my right foot was operated on and I have to say, I'm amazed at the "after" x-ray. The foot is still tender and swollen and I have to wear the big black surgical shoe for another week and a half, and then tennis shows only after that for 3 weeks or so. I will go easy on my foot, but when it's ready I can't wait to put on a nice pair of dress shoes and see how it feels!

So far the recovery isn't bad. Not much pain, unless I'm up on my feet too much. I've been keeping it elevated and iced a lot, watching TV, reading, knitting.

In about 3 months I'll do the other foot and go through this whole thing again.

Modern Courtesy

I'd like to bring attention to the decline of modern courtesy, specifically as it relates to invitations. I was taught that if someone invites you to something then you should respond with an acceptance or a declination. Ignoring the invitation is not an option. If I have decided that I'd like to spend time with someone and don't get any response at all, I don't take it as a "no". Instead, I feel snubbed. And after a couple of these I'll stop asking.

If I ask you if you'd like to do something or if you are available, it's OK to not be available. But I would appreciate it if you'd let me know so that I can either ask someone else or make other adjustments without the fear of a last-minute change. It's not polite to put people on hold in case some better offer comes along.

I find this is a very Californian thing, I think. At least I never experienced this in Texas. Does this happen everywhere else?