Brendan Gates

This morning I went into the cancer center for another of what is becoming my routine blood tests. Numbers aren’t great right now, but from yesterday’s test I am slightly up – so that’s good.

There was a really crotchety old man that was also in the cancer center yesterday. He was quite vocal in his demands of the nurse, mostly for more chocolate milk. At one point he made reference to Jefferson Barracks National Cemetary, in what seemed to be a veiled threat that he might die if not attended to sooner. I don’t know the man’s situation – so I can’t know what he’s going through, or that I wouldn’t be the same way. But I did feel bad for the nurse. She seemed pretty flustered about having to juggle 9 patients by herself, especially with one of them constantly demanding more attention than the others. When I went back in to the center today, that same old man was back again – though we had a different nurse this time and considerably less patients for her to care for. This time, the old man was much more sedate – though he didn’t miss his chance to order the chocolate milk. After I was done, I was waiting by the second floor elevator in a part of the building that looks down over the large first floor entrance/atrium to the center. I saw the old man (who had finished up a few minutes before I had) slowly working his way across the atrium with his walker. Being a Sunday, the building was largely deserted – and he was probably the only person on that floor right then. He was not moving very fast, and I couldn’t help but feel a twinge of empathy for the man – despite his behavior towards the nurses. Then, just before my elevator arrived, I watched him stop at the vacant receptionist desk and empty the candy basket into his pockets.

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I went to Dierberg’s and bought some more orange juice, plus some maple syrup for the waffles I plan heat up and eat very soon. I haven’t had waffles in a long time, so I’m pretty excited. After I left Dierberg’s I used some hand sanitizer that my mom gave me to keep in my car. I hadn’t used it before, and it makes my hands smell like cherry flavored pipe tobacco. I’m pretty excited about that too.

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It would seem that my attempts to pass on the bedside meme have failed – or at the very least are failing at this point (since I’m batting 0/3). Sorry, CK. I tried.

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Do you need a reliable, used 24,000 lb diesel engine soil compactor – but you can’t afford what the local Ingersoll-Rand dealer is charging? Maybe your jobsite is in Chiang Mai, Thailand – and being a good 300 miles north of Bangkok you’re not really able to head on over to your local heavy equipment dealer. Maybe you only need something small, but you don’t have the resources to track it down yourself. You, my friend, need to contact MTM Distribution LLC.

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My grandma just called me to see how I was doing. It was a very brief conversation, as I think she’s always afraid that she might be troubling me or keeping me from something more important. She’s not, of course, but there is no convincing her of that. Despite the record 1 minute 22 second call time, it was nice to hear from her.

And that’s all I’ve got. Enjoy your Sunday.

This has been a frustrating week. My results from Monday’s and Wednesday’s tests were very promising – with one of my numbers actually up and flirting with a normal range. So that’s good. Very good. But side effects from the drugs are “cramping my style” (as I prefer to code) and still keeping me out of the office. Like clockwork, in fact – I have pain for almost exactly the same time period every day. Hopefully a newly lowered dose for one of my prescriptions will make a difference.

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A few notes, mostly resulting from being cooped up and going back and forth between Google News and various cable news networks. I’ll try to be brief . . .

Goodbye, Peter Jennings. Thanks for the news.

Making no judgment on Cindy Sheehan or her Crawford, Texas based anti-war protest – I am disturbed by what I perceive as how she is being exploited by political groups for their own gain. Maybe I’m being too cynical, but initial impressions are not good.

NARAL is running an anti-nomination ad against John Roberts, one that is apparently very misleading. The ad pans over a busted-up clinic, shows one injured woman being wheeled out, and is date stamped 1998. The voice over claims that John Roberts filed briefs supporting violent anti-abortion groups. Then it jumps to present day, with that woman, who was wheeled out in the first footage, speaking about how she is against violence. A court document is flashed on screen as evidence of John Robert’s complicity, in which you can barely see that document was actually dated 1991. Further, Roberts was arguing that the clinic had no standing under an 1871 federal anti-discrimination statute, not that the bombers were cool or violence is gravy. C’mon NARAL. You lose more than you gain when you run an ad like this.
. . . but decide for yourself, dear reader, from my sources:
Anti-NARAL ad info @ FactCheck.Org
Pro-NARAL ad info @ ProChoiceAmerica.Org

President Bush signed a $286.5 billion transportation bill [bill text] into law Wednesday, including thousands of essential programs and improvements for the country – but also apparently riddled with pork barrel spending measures. No joke, there is a $2 billion Alaskan bridge project included that will be named “Don Young’s Way” – for Don Young, the Republican Congressman from Alaska that chairs the House Transportation Committee. Wow.

Did you actually read all of that? I did, but I don’t have much else to do. Congrats either way. As a reward for at least reading this paragraph, you can listen to a free Secret Machines and Kings of Leon concert webcast tonight being sponsored by NPR. Should be good stuff, at least worth tuning to if you’ll be in tonight. Starts at 8:45 pm CST.

That’s all. Have a good day. Really.

Based off of a few responses that I’ve gotten to the previous blog posts, it would seem that I need to make that point clear. I am being treated by an hematologist/oncologist, and my blood work/transfusions are done in the David C. Pratt Cancer Center; but my particular condition is a collection of blood disorders known as Aplastic Anemia. If you’d like to read a fairly simple explanation of it, you can do so here. I will eventually offer up some much more detailed info on my situation and perhaps even dedicate a portion of my website to it – but for now I didn’t want people to draw their own conclusions and paint a much more bleak diagnosis for me than is actual.