Chondrosarcoma – ah shit, bob's sick

Today I went for the major eye exam. It took the better part of two hours to thoroughly, and I mean thoroughly check my eyes out. All reports came back fine, as a matter of fact, even my glasses prescription hasn’t changed in the past seven years.

I had the exam done right in town (Springfield, VT) by Lane Eye Associates, and they were totally professional. I was really impressed to find a place of such high integrity right in town. I’ll definitely use them again if and when necessary.

No sign of broken pieces of plague, broken blood vessels, detached or torn retina, no nothing. Both eyes were declared in absolute perfect health … and honestly, they always have been. That’s one of the reasons this eye problem is so troubling.

The results didn’t really surprise me. I felt my eyes were in good shape before going … but I also wanted to eliminate them as a possible cause for the current situation. I solidly feel that I accomplished that today … that’s a good thing.

So where does that leave me? Well, I’m kind of back to square one in a sense.

Current plan is to redo the carotid artery scans to find out which set was actually correct and if that come back good, then there are several heart echo-grams to do, and last but not least a head/brain scan, although that seems to be a pretty remote concept at the moment.

There appears to also be the possibility of my being overly radiated, remote possibility again .. but certainly possible. Radiation exposure can cause optic nerve damage and I have had a lot of exposure in the past two years.

So, we’ll see … I may be heading back to Boston for some of these tests … only time will tell, and I don’t expect to hear a thing until Monday.

Seems like one of those ‘hurry up and wait deals’.

Remember Gomer Pyle USMC? Well … I had my own surprise today. The story really begins a few days ago … well, maybe last Thursday or Friday when I started having some issues with my right eye. The issue was that I seemed to occasional loss vision in it … and I mean loss of vision. Either total blackness or total white light in my right eye.

Well, to make a long story short … I went off to see my primary care doctor Monday to ask about it. Once again my doc ordered the right tests for me and by the end of the day I knew I was in for a big one. Yep, tomorrow morning (Feb. 23, 2011) I go in for at least carotid artery surgery and who’s knows … could be a major bypass situation.

Gee whiz … and I thought things were just beginning to calm down a bit from the chondrosarcoma. Here we go again… nothing like a little excitement in life.

Hey, over the next few days … you can call or email Sher and help calm her down .

If all goes well …. I’ll see you all in a few days.

To learn more, Google carotid artery surgery … you’ll get the drift!

BTW … I ordering a whole new body from Amazon as soon as I get back from Dartmouth. This stuff is starting to get old .

Quick note about the trip to Boston:

This past trip to Boston was in one sense a tough one, and in another sense one of the better trips I’ve had. Driving was absolutely awful, mainly caused by the amount of snow still in the roadways. I was surprised to see so much snow still on the roads. Getting out to Chelsea/Harvard Imaging was truly a trip through narrow, snow bound roads, and impatient morning drivers.

The good news is, that after the tests, scans, needles and everything else, there appears to be no change in the cancer. This is good news. Nothing is happening. Good enough to declare that I don’t have to go again until September … that alone is awesome.

These tests were different then what I’ve had in the past, different chemistry and different scanning machines. At the time, the mix of concoctions put through my IV made me fell rather ill and I thought it would be a lousy trip home, and was planning on feeling poorly for a few days, but to my surprise, they seemed to dissipate quicker then whatever they used in the past and by the time I had spoken with Doc Delaney, I was already beginning to recover.

This made the trip home much easier. Although I was really tired from driving and the long day, I wasn’t feeling nearly as poor, as in the past.

To put this trip in short form … it wasn’t bad. They did take some photographs for documentation and as always lot’s of questions, and it is one of the few times I’ve seen Doc smile and seem satisfied with what’s going on. I couldn’t call this trip, and Doc’s work, any less then satisfying.

So while this Chondrosarcoma saga is far from over, I do feel that stabilization may be on the way. Yeah, I have my crappy days, but life is beginning to get “peppered” with a few good ones again now and then. And that my friend, feels awful good.

Now back to work!

What’s been going on in life? Well, a lot has, in fact so much that I haven’t had time to keep up with it all. What else is new?

Keeping up with things in life, not only requires a constant level of energy, but a high level of concentration and both of those items have become as valuable a commodity, as just about anything could be. Oh, what I wouldn’t do for more energy.

You know those five hour energy drinks? … little tiny bottles of nasty tasting stuff that’s supposed to give you a boost through the afternoon, or give you “jump start” in the mornings? I could drink a dozen of those things right after waking up from a twelve hour sleep and go right back to bed.

My average day is actually rather simple … I’ve desperately tried to redesign my life’s days to intentionally reflect simplicity because of this energy problem, but unfortunately, I haven’t found that right combination that provides the increased desire to sleep and rest more often, and still accomplish the things in life that I need to do, in order to survive both financially and mentally.

In fact, the other day I said to Sher, that I thought maybe, at one time, long, long, time ago, that people might have hibernated like some animals do during winter. For the first time, I can honestly relate to this mode of living. Really! I mean, if I could pack myself away for the winter months, I’d do it.

There are several things that just seem to ‘use up’, absorb or require lot’s of energy that I just can’t (or maybe not willing to) do without. I mean, like working. None of us can get by without working. How could you? Work not only has financial reward, which helps a lot, but also the sense of accomplishment that we all need. That’s something I’m not willing to lose or reduce.

Another thing is art (for a lack of a better word), I consider art to be a major part of a balanced life. This includes everything from keeping sharp on my guitar playing, to writing, to creating 3-D computer art, and everything in between. If you think about it, your art time, is often the only time you get to “work” for yourself, sort of speak. The Labors of Love.

Click Image For a Larger View

Yet another thing is children, children require lots of time and energy to grow. Ha! sounds like I’m talking about growing a plant or something … but it’s true. It’s a never ending thing. Often I blend several of these things together, in an effort to try and accomplish two things at once … like the old saying ‘killing two birds, with one stone’. Hence to the idea of teaching Al to play guitar. While getting it out of my system, it’s also teaching him. Last week I did it again with my computer. I showed him how a computer language can render a beautiful piece of art, simply by writing a file and sending it to a rendering engine to interpret it. We designed a Star Ship for fun.

For those that understand computer art, we used the POV-Ray engine (Persistence Of Vision, Point Of View), and a simple text file to create the ship below. While it’s not finished by any means, we do have a good start to it. For those interested you can read about the scientists that designed the render engine and language, why and what it’s all about, at POVRAY.org.

Read more…

Wow! It’s just hard to believe that another year has gone by, and it’s been a crazy one too. Last year around this time I was just finishing up my treatments and travels to Boston and getting resettled at home. I wasn’t back to work yet, and feeling quite weak and tired from all the radiation and proton therapy … but I was also very happy to be seeing another New Years Eve.

But here we are now, a year later, healed and in decent shape, considering all that went down last year, and hoping this year will be better than ever! It’s certainly starting off that way! We had a great holiday season and for the first time in my life not only did we have fun …. we also got the house cleaned up and most of the decorations put away! Now that’s a first for me … usually my holiday decorations remain in place until at least mid February … but not this year.

So in the spirit of keeping this short and sweet, I wish everyone a Happy New Year and let’s hope we all have a better year.

Peace, Love and Happiness to all.