Diary of a Network Geek

Doing the 365 thing at Flickr?

Well, this might not be the only thing you use to make some of that happen, but according to this article at ReadWrite, Daily Mugshot might help. The article talks about a site that has a set of free tools that will help you take a daily picture of yourself, to track the continual change in your outward appearance.
I may do this, just to track the changes in my face this year as I try to loose that post-chemotherapy weight that I’ve gained.

The “inside” changes are all on you.

At least, that’s my story and I’m sticking to it!

Tuesday night, I took “before” pictures.
Knowing that the Queen of the Damned will likely read this, I hesitate to mention how heavy I’ve gotten. Let’s just say that I’m the heaviest I remember being, ever, and I’d like to lose forty pounds or so. And, it’s not like I haven’t been meaning to get back in shape after last year’s “little episode”. Chemotherapy takes that weight off great, but it all seems to come back with the hair! And, every pound seemed to bring a buddy!!

In any case, I started planning for this even before treatment ended. I got several books on exercise and I had a new pair of running shoes from before I was diagnosed. Not that I’m allowed to start running at my age, but they’ll give me support for taking the dog on walks.
I’ve had a subscription to Men’s Health for several months now. Believe it or not, in spite of being the male equivalent of Cosmo, there’s really a lot of pretty good health advice in there. Granted, there are lots of articles on women that my, admittedly limited, experience leads me to believe are somewhat suspect, but at least there aren’t any articles on how to achieve orgasm while caulking your windows. (I swear to you I actually saw an article like that in a women’s magazine when I was working as a security guard in college! I would not lie to you about something as important as this!) I’ve even bought several of their cookbooks now, in an attempt to eat better, and healthier. If I can just stop going out with friends so often, I think I’d do better there.
And, of course, all of this is just smoke and mirrors if I can’t get my shit together and actually start working out. Doing anything, really, would be better than I’ve been doing for the past couple of months. Just walking the dog would be a start.

So, that’s why I took the before pictures. I see those guys in Men’s Health all the time, those “before-and-after” guys, those “Bellyoff! Club” guys, and I want to be one of them. I need the “before” clearly in front of me. The last time I lost a bunch of weight, it was because I saw a picture of myself when my ex-wife and I were buying our house. I couldn’t believe I’d gotten so fat! Well, this is the same thing.

Now, I just need to make my “after” happen.

Update:  I discovered this morning that it turns out that I’m not quite at my heaviest ever, but I’d still like to lose thirty-five to forty pounds.

Okay, so I had the appointment with my oncologist yesterday to get the results of my CT scan, instead of Thursday, like I originally thought I would.

The news is good.  I am still cancer free.  What’s more surprising is that the scar tissue left behind in my lung after chemotherapy has shrunk even more!  In just a little over three months, it went from being a 2.8 x 4.0 cm mass, to being 1.8 x 3.7 cm. My blood work showed me as being mostly normal, a fact which may surprise many of you, though I’m still a little on the anemic side. And, the scan showed a small kidney stone, too, so the doctor reminded me to drink lots of water.

Other than that, though, everything is going well, medically at least. And I’ll have another scan in about three months.
I’ll keep you all posted!

I hate getting CAT scans.

Thursday, I go into M. D. Anderson for the first of four scans this year to see if my lymphoma has come back. Next year, I’ll get three scans and two the year after that. And, from then on, unless the protocol changes, I’ll get a CT scan, with contrast, or a PET scan every year for the rest of my life.

I hope one day it becomes so “old-hat” that I don’t think anything of it, because, right now, I’m about to step sideways out of my skin. I honestly don’t think the last time was as bad as this. Last time, I’d finished treatment just a couple of weeks before the scan, so I was confident that everything was clear. This time, though, I’m nowhere near as sure. I feel good, mostly, except for a lingering runny nose and cough which is probably just a cold and allergies. Probably. I mean, I’m sure when that guy at work asked me why I was so pale that he was just exaggerating for effect. And, when the veins on my arms look funny, it’s just the light and my imagination. And, the fact that I can’t seem to sleep at night, but I’m tired all day is just stress and will go away after I get the results of the scan.

Unfortunately, I won’t get the results of that scan until next week Thursday, so, a week after getting the magic, barium enema that is everyone’s favorite part of a CT scan with contrast, I’ll know the results of that indignity.  The worst part of it all, though, is all that radioactive material that I’ll have dumped into me.  Something about those chemicals just really mess me up inside.  And, no, I don’t mean emotionally.  I’ll probably have indigestion for days afterward.  Not to mention what it’ll do to my lower G.I.
But, eventually, I’ll know.  And, knowing is better than not knowing.

Of course, no matter what the results are, in the end, I’ll deal with it.  I survived the chemotherapy once, so, if I have to do it again, I can survive it again.
But, I do have to admit, the idea of going through another year like last year terrifies me and exhausts me, so I really hope I don’t have to do it.
If you’re the praying kind, I wouldn’t turn any down, no matter what flavor you favor.

Advice from your Uncle Jim:
"Character is the ability to carry out a good resolution long after the excitement of the moment has passed."
   --Cavett Robert

…And the first of this year, in review.

First, there was the Simpson’s Movie. That was part of the Saddest Bachelor Party ever. Half of us didn’t drink, half of us were gay, and I wasn’t quite done with chemotherapy treatments. No alcohol, no strippers, and I looked like a walking corpse. Hell, I felt like a walking corpse.
I’ve never been a huge Simpsons fan, to be honest, though I love Futurama. We went at the request of the groom, J. I bought dinner at my new, favorite Thai restaurant and I bought J.’s ticket. The movie was hilarious. Everything that was ever good about the Simpsons crammed into one movie. At one point, Homer is trying to catch up to his family and save Springfield. He’s using a dog-sled to do so and driving the dogs hard. They run away in the night and Homer whines “Why does everything I whip run away?” I verbally sympathized. We missed the next five minutes of the film while we laughed. But, really, if you missed this one, rent it. It was good, even if you’re not a fan.

Next was Dragon Wars. This was a Korean import staring mainly unknown American actors, or B-movie actors that should have retired years ago. The best thing I can say about it is…
“Dragons! With rocket launchers on their shoulders!” It was our catch phrase for the evening. Don’t bother even renting this one unless you want to reenact Mystery Science Theater 3000.

Then, I went to see American Gangster with J. and L. just after Thanksgiving.
This was very, very good. It was so hyper-real that it was almost unbelievable. But, it’s pretty well all true. This is the story of the Black Mafia in Harlem in the Sixties and Seventies. It’s all about gangs, criminals, heroin, and the mob. Again, very real, very violent and very good. Another one to rent if you missed it in the theater.

After that, though, we started picking up speed.
Midway through December, I saw the disappointment of the year, the Golden Compass. After the massive build-up and comparisons to C.S. Lewis and the Chronicles of Narnia, I had high expectations for this film. I was betrayed.
The entire movie was rushed and it felt like huge sections of plot had been left out leaving indecipherable gaps. The only thing that saved me, frankly, was having talked to a friend who read the books about the premise of the first book, on which this movie was based. The CG was very good, but not good enough to distract me from the butchered plot and lack of real sparkle in the film despite some brilliant actors. To say that it was a huge disappointment is, at best, an understatement. If you haven’t seen it, but feel compelled, I’d wait to rent it.

On Christmas Day, I went with my mysterious artist friend, for whom I’m doing some creative work, to see No Country for Old Men. If you haven’t seen this yet, skip work this afternoon and go see it. Yes, it is that good. I hope to see it again while it’s still in the theaters and I almost never see a movie more than once in the theater. That is how good I think this movie is.
First of all, it stars two of my favorite actors, Tommy Lee Jones and Josh Brolin. Yes, Josh Brolin, son of James Brolin and husband of Diane Lane. Very, very under-rated actor, in my opinion. Also, I didn’t realize that this was a Coen Brothers’ movie until I was there with Mark. So, by the time I sat down in the theater, I had pretty high expectations. They were exceeded.
Now, true to their form, this is a violent film. And, a very realistically violent film. I’ve seen a lot of wounds, on myself and others, fresh and not quite so, and the effects in this film are very, very good and the most realistic I’ve seen outside of… Well, actually, they’re the best I’ve seen anywhere. Period. So, if you have a weak stomach, don’t plan on eating Italian after seeing this one. However, if you’re up for a bit of the old ultraviolence, then this movie is for you.
The story follows Brolin’s character, who finds a drug deal gone very wrong in the Texas scrub while hunting. He hunts around until he finds the money from the deal and takes it. The rest of the movie is about the consequences of that decision and that act. Brilliant work.
If you see no other movie in the next twelve months, see No Country for Old Men.

Now, to wrap things up, I started my year with I Am Legend.
The weakest thing about this movie was the CG. Based on a book, which I’m currently reading, by Richard Matheson, this is the story of biology gone wrong. Will Smith plays an Army doctor who is the only survivor in New York City after a plague sweeps the world. The plague, which is the side-effect of a reengineered virus meant to cure cancer, kills most people and transforms the rest into Dark Seekers, zombie-vampire-like creatures that feast on living flesh and hide from the day-light. A classic monster movie. From what I’ve read so far, the movie is only vaguely similar to the book. In fact, it’s more like the Charlton Heston version of this movie, The Omega Man. (Apparently, this was also a remake of an even earlier version of the story staring Vincent Price called The Last Man On Earth, but I haven’t seen this version. Yet.)
As far as the movie goes, it’s worth seeing. I won’t spoil anything, but it does end on an up-beat. I do recommend that you see this with a friend, though, not alone like I did. At least, not if you’re feeling depressed or lonely. This is a very, very lonely film and Smith gets that feeling of hopelessness and futility across to the audience very well. If they’d spent just a little more on the CG, this would have been a truly great film. As it is, if not for Will Smith’s fame, I doubt it would have done well.
Of course, I might have enjoyed the film more if not for two of my fellow audience members that intruded on the experience. The first was an older gentleman that kept asking his much younger companion, daughter I assume, what was happening. When he asked where all the people were in the opening scene, I almost asked him if he knew what movie he’d come to see. The next time he asked a similar question, I had to bite my tongue to keep from snapping back at him that if he’d just shut up and watch the movie, the plot might answer his damn question! The other audience disturbance was the non-English-speaking family that brought a toddler into the movie 3/4 of the way through. You know, right before the horde of monsters stormed the hero’s stronghold. Perfect timing to scar the kid for life.
Other than that, though, it was an enjoyable experience.

So, here’s to the new year and many great movies to be seen!

I’m not sure how well I communicate with God.

The other day at one of the men’s group meetings I go to, we were talking about maintaining a conscious contact with God, about our personal relationships with Him. Naturally, that led most of us to talk about prayer. Me? Not so much.
I feel like I’ve stopped talking to God this year. There was a point at which I stopped having anything nice to say, so I stopped talking. In fact, I was a little bit pissed off at God. I mean, I know I haven’t live the best life always, but I just couldn’t imagine what I might have done that deserved the divine retribution of lymphoma. And, really, as a fellow cancer survivor sitting next to me pointed out later, it’s not the disease that’s hard to survive, but the treatment. Take it from me. That is the truth.

Now, it’s important that you understand something. I don’t think that God turned away from me. Though I may not understand His plan or how He works, I knew that God was with me the entire time through treatment. But, I got so angry at Him that I couldn’t pray the way I used to pray. And, I’ve always struggled with the idea that God cares, really, truly cares about someone as small and insignificant as me. Or you, really, so don’t start feeling all sorry for me. I mean, I get that there is a God and that he’s all powerful and created the whole universe and the laws that govern it. That’s not a hard concept for me. Hell, Darwin believed that evolution was evidence that God existed. So, I’m good there.
But, I’ve always struggled with the idea that something so huge could possibly care about me, us, at all. Doesn’t He have larger concerns than that? How could He have the time and patience for our little, flyspeck lives?

So, before my chemotherapy was done, I’d all but stopped praying.
Oh, I still read my morning and evening devotional. And, I still worked through my prayer beads, when I had time and energy. After I started to get back into my normal pattern of life, albeit somewhat altered by my medical “stuff”, I got back into working through rote prayer with my prayer beads almost every morning. But, it was hollow. An empty gesture. A habitual, almost superstitious, pattern of behavior. There just wasn’t anything behind it. No emotion, no connection.

So, with all that in mind, we started talking about prayer and being in touch with God at the meeting.  I listened, and spoke.  Mostly, I talked about how I was afraid to listen to God for fear of what He might say to me.  I was, and am, still afraid that God will challenge me to be more than I am, do more than I’m capable or willing to do.
But, I’m also afraid of what will become of me if I don’t pursue that personal relationship with God.  I know that I won’t last long on my own.  As in “nothing good can come of it”, right?

A couple days later, I was thinking about a conversation I was going to have with a friend.
I wanted to allay his fears that anything might be wrong and I wanted to say it the “right” way.  So, as is my habit, I rehearsed the conversation, trying to work out how to say what I needed to say and what his responses might be.  And, yes, I spoke out loud.  At least, I spoke my half of the imagined conversation out loud.  That’s one of the advantages of living alone.  The dog thinks I’m talking to her and just wags her tail.
In any case, I’ve had this habit of rehearsing important conversations to try out assorted responses and plan out my contingencies.  It’s actually served me well over the years.  I usually have a good grasp of what folks are going to say and how they’re going to react to what I say.  But, somehow, running through all this makes it easier for me.

And that was when something that someone said at the meeting clicked for me.  I don’t think he meant it this way, but it sort of fit me.  It occurred to me that perhaps in doing this conversation rehearsal, what I was doing was talking to God.  Maybe, I was just hanging my friends’ faces on God, to make Him easier to see and hear and talk to, so I could find Him and tell Him, in a way, what was on my mind.  Not as a lowly follower to an all-powerful God, but as a younger, smaller friend seeking help and advice from an older, more worldly, more experienced and capable friend.

So, maybe I’ve been talking to God all along.  Maybe my prayers don’t start with supplication and end in “amen”, but they’re still there.  It’s possible that in my efforts to hide from his message, I’ve found it after all.

Advice from your Uncle Jim:
"A pessimist is one who makes difficulties of his opportunities; an optimist is one who makes opportunities of his difficulties."
   --Reginald B. Mansell

My laptop saved me.

As most of my regular readers know, my laptop really saved me when I was in the hospital getting my chemotherapy treatment. If I hadn’t had that, I might have just about gone crazy. For one thing, it kept me in touch with many of my friends via e-mail and blogs. For another thing, I was able to get some things done at work via that laptop and a secure, remote connection to our server. That wasn’t my intention when I bought it, but, still, it’s been a very good investment and I’m very, very happy to have made it. I’d even say it was worth going into a bit of debt to get it when I did. It was something I’d put off doing for… Well, for a very long time.

Anyway, if you’re thinking about getting a laptop, the upcoming Christmas season is as good a time as any. These days laptops go on sale just like all electronics do, at Christmas, after Christmas and at the beginning of the school year. But, with deference to the TechRepublic article from which I drew the main points, here are ten things to keep in mind when buying a new laptop:

#1: Operating system

#2: CPU#3: RAM

#4: Video card

#5: Ports

#6: Screen size

#7: Integrated wireless

#8: Integrated Bluetooth

#9: Track pad

#10: Battery life

So, if you’re taking advantage of the great sales at the last minute, keep that in mind.  And, if you’re in the market for a laptop, Microcenter is going to have some pretty great sales just after Christmas this year, it looks like.  They’ve always done right by me.
That’s NOT a paid endorsement, by the way.  They’ve just always done right by me.

Time!

Well, I guess to balance last weekend, I got virtually nothing done this weekend.
Okay, that’s not quite true, but I got nothing done that I planned on doing or really wanted to get done.  I did work on a cd cover for one of the Culturcide projects and see The Golden Compass, which was fairly disappointing, but everything else languished.  I blame it on the clinic visit I’m about to have.
In just a few short minutes, I’m going to wolf down some lunch and dash out the door to get blood drawn, then wait to see my oncologist.  I’m feeling…  Anxious, I guess.  Unsettled.  Tense.  I’m afraid of what the results might be from last week’s PET scan.  I’m not sure if I could take another year of chemotherapy.  I’m really not.

Oh, I also pulled some pictures off my camera, but I haven’t edited them at all to put up.  I suppose I’ll end up linking to my Filckr account and spending the minimal money for a “pro” membership.  Well, maybe after the first of the year.

I’ve been given a six month sentence, but it feels like a reprieve.

Though I’m a young man of almost thirty-nine, I have a cardiologist, as of today.  But, he’s given me good news.  After wrestling with the idea that I was going to be on blood thinners for the rest of my life, I probably won’t be after all.

I went to see him today, to find out about long-term monitoring of coumadin, after being referred by my general practitioner.  I had an EKG and an ultrasound done when I got there and explained to several people that I’d recently survived cancer.  After a final explanation of why I’d come to see him, the doctor told me that I had a slight weakness in one valve that was allowing a minute amount of blood back into the heart.  Thankfully, it was so minor that it didn’t concern the doctor at all, outside of future monitoring.  But, after some more questions about what kind of chemotherapy I had, the doctor was actually quite pleased that I didn’t have more weakening of my heart!  Apparently, andriamycin, which was one of the “flavors” I had, can weaken the heart quite a bit and he didn’t see any of that in the ultrasound.

However, the best news was that, unless I presented with more problems or a hyper-coagulant disease of some kind, there probably wasn’t a reason to keep me on coumadin for more than six months.  Yea!  So, for the first time in I can’t remember, I have good news about my long term health and care.  Double yea!

I’m sure that’s all it is.

I’ve been coughing again, like I was last year about this time.  I’m sure I’ve just caught a cold and the cough will go away soon.  I’m sure it’s not like last year.  I’m sure I won’t start coughing blood.  Everyone at work has been sick, it seems, so I’m sure that I’ve just caught one of their colds.  I end up at everyone’s desk, after all.  If anyone is going to catch something, it would be me.  Sure, I got a flu shot this year, but there’s that super cold going around.  I’m sure that’s all it is.

But, I’m afraid.
I started to cough and spit in the sink to see if there was pink in it.  I started to wonder how I’d make it through another year of chemotherapy.  Knowing what it’s like now, I started to be afraid of the cough, of what it might mean.
I have an appointment with a cardiologist Thursday to monitor my blood thinner and my high-blood-pressure medication.  I go in for a scan on December 10th, which is a Monday.  But, if I’m not significantly improved by the end of the coming week, I’ll make an appointment to see another doctor about my cold, or whatever it is.

I don’t think it’s my cancer come back, but I’m afraid anyway.