Will you still love me to-marrow - John Mycroft and Multiple Myeloma

The family's all home for Christmas again, having survived the ravages of our two day snow storm last weekend.  Nowhere near as bad as the forecast, of course, but it still dumped 6 inches on us meaning we were snowed in for a day and Sam decided to spend an extra night in High Point rather than run the gauntlet of people on I-40 who think the best way to drive in snow is to go as fast as possible. It's been a year of major and minor changes - I managed to retire rather more completely than I had intended (ie nobody wants my computer experience any more which is sobering.  Buggy whips,anyone?)  I've kept busy-ish tutoring math students at Carolina Day and Asheville High and hope to do the same next year but I really need a student or two who realises they need help earlier than 3 weeks before the final exam.  The election was a great experience, too.  The pay isn't great - about $12 an hour - but that's better than working in retail or fast food in many ways....

I've spent the last week and a half working in a polling station here in Asheville on the 2018 mid-term election.  It has been tiring, involving mostly a lot of sitting around doing next to nothing with odd burst of activity.  The last couple of days changed all that with people leaving it until the last minute to vote.  Indeed, in a number of cases, they left it until after the last minute as early voting at 1 p.m. today.  It would be inappropriate for me to comment much on what we saw - we don't get to sift and analyse the voting papers but we do know the part affiliations of the voters (most people are "unaffiliated") and several people made it clear who they were voting for (or against). We shut up shop at 1 pm and dismantled our polling station to a well worked out list of what goes where - all the computers, cables, unused stationery etc have to go back to head office.  It took close to 2 hours to sort the last few votes by precinct and pack everything up...

If you read my previous post, you will know that I was whining about not being able to ref soccer this autumn.  It's a nice activity, giving you the opportunity to boss kids about, run around a bit and make a few bob.  Well the powers that be relented and let us lot who didn't cough up our 2017 exam fees to ref games for the under 8s and under 10s.  They don't pay much and, as often as not, the kids ignore what you're telling them but it beats doing nothing on Saturday mornings.  I had my first couple of games last weekend.  It was team photo day which meant that kick-off times were nothing more than a vague suggestion.    A minor accident on I-40 (not involving me) made sure that everyone was late getting there anyway. Always one who's happy to do his civic duty (especially if I get paid, albeit not much), I have spent a chunk of this month working as a polling officer.  For the precinct I work in, it has hardly been arduous as it's in a new loc...

After all the excitement of fitting out the laundry (which is now successfully in regular use), it's been time to tidy up loose ends.  I still haven't fixed the hole in the mudroom floor or sealed the wall under the kitchen.  But then again, the folks at Asurion still haven't fixed everything that is wrong with my Toshiba Satellite laptop.  But at least they haven't reformatted the hard drive again.  And the USB ports actually work (which is why I sent it to them in the first place.)  I now have enough laptop shipping boxes to last me a lifetime. On the health front I have rarely felt better though I don't think I am as fit as I had been kidding myself.  I won't be reffing soccer this autumn as, although I could have done so without taking the 2018 exam (I've already passed the 2019 exam), the NCSRA wanted the full $100 registration fee, which is about as much as I would have made over the remainder of the year, given that I have been told by the doc that ...

Blimey - a whole month since my last post.  Disgusting.  So, what's been happening?  On the health front, remarkably little.  Trump & Co are still trying to kill me off which will be a bit easier now that John McCain has died.  Although my myeloma is now in remission, the folks at Cancer Care of WNC have kept me on 15mg of Revlimid a day.  I'm going up there tomorrow to have an armful taken - maybe they'll drop the dose if the results come back looking good.  Not that the Revlimid has desperately horrible side effects - considering I am taking meds for high blood pressure and old guy's prostate, it's hard to attribute any side effect to a particular med.  If you read the warnings online, it looks like everything causes tiredness, aches and pains, diarrhea, constipation and all the other things that make dating fun. It's been horribly hot and humid here this summer, interspersed with bucketing rain.  So much of my fitness regimen has been...

Dear World - I am retired. That means I stay in bed till 10 having had breakfast served there by Susan before she goes to work. I then get up and go to IHOP for a real breakfast. Then it's off to the bowls club for a game and a couple of pints and a steak sandwich. Nap time until getting up around 2 to watch Casablanca again. Another nap until Susan comes home to cook my dinner, followed by Casablanca again because I can't remember what happened. It doesn't mean getting up at 7:30 to enjoy fighting over the newspaper with Susan followed by a handful of pills with weird side effects. It also doesn't include getting ready to watch Casablanca only to have the drywall guy who was coming late next week phone to ask me if it was OK if he came this afternoon instead. No problem - I didn't have a pile of my tools in the room he wanted to put the drywall in. Oh, hang on - yes I did. There should be no need for me to finish a load of framing around what used t...

How do I feel? Two and a bit years into my multiple myeloma, it’s probably time to sum up how I am feeling.   For starters, I am feeling indescribably grateful to the people at Cancer Care of WNC and Wake Forest Baptist Health for fixing me.   And to Susan for putting up with my flaky, forgetful behavior and for driving endless miles up and down I-40 to Wake Forest.   Not to mention Sam for his patience in hearing for the nth time “No, I really don’t fancy going to the soccer field” and for dragging me out to the soccer field anyway.   End of Oscars speech coming up.   Above all, my thanks to President Obama for making this so financially survivable for us – my meds cost $13,800 a month and, were it not for him, I would have had to make the choice between bankruptcy and dying.   But how do I feel physically and mentally?    Let’s start with mentally.   When all this started in early 2017 or thereabouts, I was constantly asked if I...

Last Monday I went to Cancer Care here in Asheville for a bone marrow biopsy.  This involves drilling a small hole in my right hip and sucking out a couple of tablespoons of bone marrow along with a small piece of bone.  They then get sent to a lab where they look for signs of myeloma.  It's an unpleasant procedure though, here in Asheville, they give you a decent dose of happy juice first.  It feels a bit like a dentist hitting a nerve while drilling only 10 times greater.  It also gives you new respect for anyone who has ever had a leg amputated without anaesthetic. Unlike my usual blood tests where I can read a chapter in the waiting room while they get done, this test takes a week to come back.  So yesterday I was more than delighted to get a brief email from Cancer Care saying " Normal marrow, no sign of myeloma".  Short and to the point. I don't know exactly what this means in terms of whether I have to keep guzzling expensive medicine forever ...

After a bit of nutty couple of months, life is threatening to return to normal.  Not that I'll be sitting on  the deck drinking beer and eating cheese & pickle sandwiches but at least I should have a clue what I am doing from day to day.  My medicine taking has become so routine that I sometimes forget to do it - must watch that.  Today was the last day of a Revlimid cycle so I should feel a bit more chipper as the week goes on, not that I walk around in a fug while I am taking the stuff.  Tomorrow I get to see the nice ladies at Cancer Care here in Asheville - they'll take an armful of blood and send the results to Wake Forest for my oncologist there to look at.  I then go to see him next week to hear how I'm doing  Apparently he has 24 appointments that day. Rather him than me. I'm keeping busy at home turning the big storeroom under our bedroom into a monster laundry.  This means that all the old boxes, Lego sets, roller coasters, CD cases...

Blimey - is it that long since I last posted here?  Shame on me.  So, what's new?  As the page title is meant to imply, I have been busy busy busy, far more so than I ever was when I was gainfully employed.  So, in no particular order, here's what I have been up to with varying degrees of pleasure (but all on the plus side). Tutoring About this time of year, many kids / parents realise that a decent math grade will be a good idea to take to college or next year at high school and so tutoring work ramps up.  I've been lucky this year with two bright new students whose Bs I am helping them turn into As.  It's good to know the old brain cells can kick into action when required (oddly enough, I have discovered that I can't remember the names of people I have met over the last couple of years but can still solve differential equations - at least first order ones - in my head.  Weird.)   Me and my big mouth If you've been to our house, you'll kn...

leather skin and the fingers of a three year oldHmmm.  Been a long time since the last post.  Nothing ominous about that - I had a few days feeling crappy in there somewhere and suffered from really gruesome jetlag upon my return to NC but I am really feeling fine. I had a lot of fun in NZ getting lab results - the results from some labs got emailed to me (or not) while other labs insisted on mailing them to me for security reasons.  The mailed results never arrived so I hope whoever got them enjoyed them.  So, having had a couple of weeks to recover from the NZ trip, I trotted off to Cancer Care of WNC to find that all my blood numbers are pretty healthy - a couple a bit out of whack and most of them towards the lower end of the  "acceptable" range but nothing to set the alarm bells ringing.  I will have a quick whinge about the format of the new reports, though - the old ones came in a simple table form, one line per item.  It is all now laid out "p...

I'm most pleasantly installed at Jeanette & Kevan's place in Maraetai, housesitting for a couple of days while they are away.  I woke up this morning unsure whether I was awake or not - I've been fighting a cold / sinus infection and today was the "I am an idiot" phase.  My original plan to catch the ferry to Waiheke went completely out the window as I simply couldn't get my arse into gear.  So having consumed my entire daily water requirement as hot tea, I finally hopped on a ferry to downtown Auckland.  I hate to say it but this erstwhile lovely city has become quite ugly - maybe it will be better once it's finished.  I do like the name of one of the takeaway places downtown, though.  Pausing downtown only long enough to buy a delicious but extortionate ice cream cone, I hopped on the next ferry back to sanity. But there was more insanity to come.  I had decided that the Franklin pub looked promising for dinner so I set it in the GPS in my phone...

Everyone remembers where they were when JFK died - I wonder if I will remember that I was sitting on the couch at Georgia's place when I heard that Billy Graham died.  I have the luxury today of having about 10 hours to do the two and a bit hour drive from Waihi to Auckland so I'll take the back roads and soak up some sights.  Until I suddenly realise that I am not going to Auckland, I am going to Hamilton to stay with my friends Hugh & Maureen.  So, with bags of time in hand, off I trotted by the back route (I don't think there is any other kind between Waihi and Hamilton).  Hugh, in true Hugh style, had sen me detailed instructions with which my GPS agreed so I was confident about getting there.  The high spot of my stay, other than Maureen's brilliant cooking, was the one day cricket international between the kiwis and the poms.  Our tickets had us sitting on a grassy bank for 8 hours but a quick appeal to the ticket office revealed that a large ...

As you may recall, I seriously considered staying another night in Wellington but was beset with an excess of energy on Sunday and walked up Kaukau, visited our old house in Ngaio and went to Te Papa so, along with a load of other little odds and  sods, I had pretty much done all I wanted to do in Wellington.  Besides, there was the tail end of a cyclone on its way and I didn't fancy driving through that.  So I headed for New Plymouth. Please excuse the lack of photos.  My beloved Lumix camera has decided that several thousand photos is enough for one lifetime and has shuffled off.  So I am reduced to using the camera in my phone which, to be as nice about it as possible, is a piece of crap with a mind of its own. STOP PRESS!!!!!!!!!! My camera lives!  Holding down the power button for half a minute caused the lens suddenly to groinch into action and I am apparently becameraed again.  I promise to be nicer to it in future and not just shove it in ...

[My camera cable is in the car which is parked 100m up the road and I am too idle to go and get it.  Will do so tomorrow] This morning I woke up moderately bright and fairly early in Taupo (or Wairakei), almost ready to hit the road.  Georgia and I had one last stop to make - at the thermal valley near the Wairakei thermal power station.  Rather than go to the fancy manmade area at Wairakei, we went back to nature and trudged along the slightly crumbly bush tracks.  We were given a thermometer to take with us to measure the temperature of the ground which is a neat idea.  I think we topped out at 60C. Having fed the local ducks and chickens, Georgia and I parted ways, her to head north back to Waihi, me heading south to Wellington.  I could have chosen the fancy new road bypassing Taupo but I fancied a look at the lake and the mountains so I went through downtown.  Scenically this was a good choice but it added maybe an hour to my trip.  This ...

Woke up this morning feeling just a bit dopey.  Indeed, for the first time in ages, I rolled over and went back to sleep.  Odd considering I'm halfway though my chemo-free week.  Anyway, couldn't lounge around the house all day so, after a latte and an apricot pie with George in downtown Waihi, it was time to hit the road.  Plan A was to head for Whiritoa, then to Tairua and back to Waihi via the back roads.  As I knew my way to Tairua, I hadn't bothered to charge my phone much.  Besides, there was a Tomtom GPS in the car.  Sometimes belt and braces just ain't enough as the charger in the car wouldn't charge my phone and the TomTom had decided to turn the brightness up to unreadable level and mute the voice. On arriving in Whiritoa I was greeted with much arm waving by a gentleman who I took to be telling me that I was driving too fast (I was) so I slowed down and waved back.  It turned out that he was trying to tell me that his rental car was de...

“Well George, we've knocked the  bastard  off.”  Somewhat appropriate today as Georgia gave me a ride to Tauranga, ( https://www.stuff.co.nz/business/property/100763642).  First task - some vigorous exercise so up Mount Maunganui I headed.  It's a mere 2100 metre gravel path to the summit at 250 metres and there's a choice of tracks.  I opted for the 4WD track, figuring that it would be fairly navigable and have no stairs (not fond of stairs). It was a nasty cruel track having virtually no level stretches to catch you breath on, just an unrelenting 7 degree slope (calculated that myself - it felt like more).  It didn't help that many of the local nut cases like to run up it.  It wasn't particularly hot today - 25 degrees max but the humidity was 100% and I was soaked in sweat when I go to the top. There was a school party of 120 kids arriving in small groups and some in the first group had neglected to bring water bottles with them so I offered m...

I did decamp from Red Beach more or less on schedule the day before yesterday and took the long route via Maraetai to visit Jeanette & Ben.  So I arrived in Waihi much later than expected even though I didn't stop at the Hunua Falls (will do so on the way back).  Yesterday wasn't much of a beach day as we were copping the tail end of yet another tropical cyclone (insert sarcastic comment about climate change being fake news here).  I did need some exercise, though, and as Georgia had the arborist coming to deal with some undesirable trees (a rotten willow, a leaning gum and an evil bloody bunyabunya (a kind of armoured monkey puzzle), that seemed like good exercise. The lady with the chain saw had the fun job of climbing the trees and chopping them into bits while Georgia and I carted the bits, by hand and with two ancient wheelbarrows, into a  number of sorted piles which got progressively less organised as the day went on.  Once that was done, we unleashe...

This will be a short post as it is past my bedtime and my laptop is playing silly buggers, deciding that charging the battery when it's plugged in is a dumb idea.  This is my last night at Red Beach before I head to Waihi.  I have felt moderately brain dead the last few days as I get near the end of another chemo cycle.  It will be good to have a week off though I do wonder if the lab in Waihi will actually manage to send me my results this time. The sea has not been at all inviting at the bottom of Jacobs Ladder the last few days - much as I love a big surf on the beach, I am less enamoured in a rocky cove.  So, given my mental and physical condition, I gave away my daily swim in exchange for a daily extended dork listening to the waves.  This evening I took a long farewell walk into the teeth of a gale to say by for now to the local oyster catchers.  I nearly made it to the bridge into Orewa but the tide wasn't quite out far enough for me to be able t...

I enjoyed my trip to Kawau so much last week that I thought there was no better way to finish the long weekend than with a return visit with Georgia and my grandsons Mack & Murphy.  So, grabbing our togs, water bottles and towels, we all leapt into Georgia's vehicle for the road trip to Sandspit. We arrived in good time and I indulged in the sadistic pleasure of watching a group of people about my age fighting with their cellphones to retrieve their reservations.  They were still at it as the boat left but, as they were on board, the ferry company had obviously taken pity.  (I will confess to having had a dry run retrieving our reservations from Dropbox on my phone yesterday evening so I could look like I knew what I was doing.)  The sun was shining brightly and we were all glad to be wearing hats and lashings of sunscreen.  It also wasn't as windy as the weather forecast had predicted, with the tail end of a cyclone coming in from the northeast. I'd go...