No Shirt – No Post

Almost a true threat but then I know my indulgent fans need to see something or they are liable to start showing up to help. I was wonder why I had so many visitors today.

My hunting buddy that hates driving came up from Austin, appreciated the visit Marvin, sorry bout the puking.

The weekends are for R&R, rest and recuperating, and that what I am trying to do, between the naps and pukes of course.

Loyal minion showed up and mowed my back yard again, I never mowed it, even before I was stricken, so not sure how I am going to keep him doing this after I get better.

And with two days left in the treatment plan I will start the getting better on Wednesday and plan on being back to full form in 45 days,

Bro Paul loaded up and drove in from Lubbock so you can see the problem with forgetting to post. Any way I am still above ground and moving, moving slow but moving. Actually, I move pretty quick when I need to grab the trash can, currently have three spaced out around the house.



Weight today – 201
Blood Pressure – 130/78

Got to make a beer run – I am currently out.

Laissez Les Bons Temps Rouler

Free Food Friday – NOT

No free food, at least not for me, but that’s ok because I‘m finding myself not overly excited by food at the moment, go figure. Yesterday was a Thursday but it peaked late last night or early this morning,

What is it about 2AM? Couldn’t sleep, too pukey, but didn’t feel well enough to write. Looking back I am amazed at how fast my stamina decreased in the last 10 days. Perrty sorry when you need to rest up so you can take a nap.

Looking at the bright side; counting today, three treatments of Radiation and 1 chemo remain. That’s three more days and it starts to get better. The doctor warned me that radiation will continue to work for 2-3 weeks after the end of treatments so I shouldn’t expect a quick reversal for a couple of weeks.

But it will get better, I am getting pumped at the idea of no more nausea or puking, a throat that doesn’t feel as though I‘ve been sandpapering the insides and a voice that isn’t a croak.

It is going to be great and getting better starting next week. Plus just so you know, I bought a lotto ticket and when I win the 325 million cash prize, there will be a party.

Today I am adorned in some of the finest from down South, we are talking Panama. I am telling you, a shirt from Panama City and a real Panama hat from Ecuador and I am styling.

Thanks to ex-wife#2 for these fine items.

It’s the weekend – party hardy

Weight today – 203
Blood Pressure – 111/72


Laissez Les Bons Temps Rouler

Gag and Puke

Wasn’t the best of days this past hump day. Felt more like a Thursday which has me somewhat concerned as today is Thursday and if yesterday was a preview today is going to be UGLY.

Now you know me, I am an optimist, it’s going to be OK, and it’s not that bad. Two AM and I am hoping I’m going to be right. Why am I up at 2 AM?, read the title, non stop since Wednesday morning about 10.

But it’s no big deal, just another bump in the road, and overall I have had it pretty easy. I know some of my fellow victims at the treatment center have been sick since week two and suffer mightily, me, I just skate along with minor discomforts.

But the truth be told, I am ready for this crap to be over. Four more radiation treatments, and 1 chemo day remaining. Then we can let the healing begin.

Since I am totally wore out this entry is going to be a short one, I may add to it later in the day but I wouldn’t hold my breath.

Wearing a shirt from my cousin Jake; it’s a nice little silk number;

Weight today – 204
Blood Pressure – 108/76
Gag and puke – 237 ( it’s getting old)

Laissez Les Bons Temps Rouler

Transitional Tuesday

Some how I managed to change the way I blog into a recap of the day before but with the correct shirt being shown.

It’s all so confusing. Sometimes I think this whole treatment thing has me more that slightly befuddled. Like how is it already Wednesday, that’s hump day and we just did one, didn’t we?

Still fighting the blood pressure, been holding around the 110 mark and that’s without taking the satin that was working so well for me. Now if losing the weight helps the blood pressure why isn’t the blood sugar playing along?

Wasn’t all that productive today, working from home I had issues with a customer vpn site all day, doesn’t like vpn to a vpn to a customer site, something got lost in translations plus it looks like one of the hops doesn’t like the 64bit OS’s..

ETAC recommend I install firefox, just what II need browser number 5 on my machine. Don’t think it’s going to happen. Tomorrow I’ll make Alan VPN into the customer site and I’ll guide him in the mysterious ways of a DBA.

Throat way better than yesterday and all I had to contend with was the need for sleep. Midday brought me a woot box.

Turns out it wasn’t from woot but a recycled woot box is almost as good. I now sport a fine Panama hat, one from panama that was made in Ecuador as it is supposed to be. I am styling, this is now an official part of the ensemble.

Next Monday I am going to be wearing the Banana shorts, banana shirt and wearing my Panama hat – photo’s will be posted. Eat you heart out Tom Selleck.

But for today, (hump day) I am adorned with the shirt offered by Jeremy and Patti, it’s a sedate little thing in casual grey and red, actually one of my favorites.

Weight today – 204
Blood Pressure – 128/78
Rats caught - 3
Panama Hats received -1
Panama shirt received - 1

Laissez Les Bons Temps Rouler

Monday Morning Madnes

One of the issues with sleeping all the time is waking up all the time. Case in point; Monday morning I was wide awake at 4:49, and hungry. It seems that the body can tell when Fillmore has been doing his job, let the gut run dry, and it reminds you, that it also has needs.

So I am sitting up poking a 8 oz can of goodie down Filmores’ throat and get back in bed and catch a few more winks. Best laid plans go asunder, I end up doing the regular 3 can feed and all the morning pills, then attend to my morning routines and get ready to meet the day.

Mondays are usually pretty good days, an I suspect this one to be the same. Ok there were a few glitches, Claude the Cyclops x-ray machine has turned stupid, his program won’t load and my session is moved to 1:30. This sad state of affairs means my neck gets no wonder salve until afterwards.

Plus blood pressure is once again low 93/62, so there is concern that my blood pressure medicine needs to be halted. I admit I took one today but I have not been taking them since last Monday. But seems to me and the nurses at Texas Oncology, Bp’s of less than 100 are not good.

All in all, great Monday, I managed to finish the chemo day and get home by 4, made it to the CVS store to pick up a new blood pressure meter but they are out. In fact, all CVS stores are currently out of wrist blood pressure meters, seems they are in thee process of changing providers. On to Walgreens, there I found and purchased one, now I can check my blood pressure every day as directed.

Four can Filmore night and I am fixing to make the final crash of the evening. I don’t plan on getting up but maybe twice tonight :)

Wow !, Monday night was a good one, I woke up relaxed and throat is felling 100% better(inside throat). And what do I owe this to? Maybe it was the SUPER B COMPLEX pill I added to the med mix. I really like super B complex; I sleep so much better when taking them.

Mondays’ shirt was a blue dolphin thing, Très chic, but this Tuesdays I am going with the big purple, takes almost as much a man to wear this as the pink flamingo shirt. Tuesday's shirt is the royal purple XL

Weight today – 203.5
Blood Pressure – 128/78
Blood Sugar - 138
Sunburn – redneck under control
Throat - under control
Voice – less disgusting croak


Laissez Les Bons Temps Rouler

Smooth Sailing Sunday

Sunday was another good day of sleeping and sleeping. No visitors that I was aware of, but then I was asleep a lot.

Faithful minion did some clean up and I appreciate it. Being worn out all the time, is takes everything I got to stay semi-caught up. Nice phone conversations, (two), both short, which is good as I can barely talk and the throat really is in a bit of pain when I do.

But overall, in the grand scheme of things, Sunday was a success. I hope to leverage that success in to a great chemo day. This may be the last chemo day. I will find out for sure when I see el doc and have a final planning session. But this I know for sure, seven(7) radiation days remain, and these are been shortened versions of the initial blasts I was getting so, no problem, piece of cake.

Seven days and the throat can start the return to a painless state, I can’t wait. In fact the healing starts after Thursday, I figure that’s the last low day of the course.

Today’s fine apparel is provided by Aimee and Rich, from the Hawaiian Clothing, Aloha Shirts Honolulu, we have the Island Dolphins in Blue with a boarder of red hibiscus flowers as accent.

It almost time to go wage war against charley, I truly feel we are in a cleanup operation mode now, but we are going to lay down a full assault of chemo and radiation to make sure that sucker is dead. A long time ago in West Texas, an old Mexican man told me one of life’s great truisms, “. . . something mess with you, kill it, it never mess with you again.”


Weight today – 201.5
Hair loss – none, still need a hair cut
Sunburn – under control
Throat – dry and scratchy and hurting
Voice – disgusting croak


Laissez Les Bons Temps Rouler

Super Saturday

It was, it really was! Of course all I did was sleep, but then that’s all I do any day of the week.

Saturday and Sunday are rest and recuperation, no treatments so the body gets a few days to semi recover, and I’ll take it. Had a nice visit with pope Buford, he showed up while I was taking nap number 12 but since I only sleep for about thirty minutes at a time he didn’t have long to wait before I was there to cuss and discuss life in general.

On the weekends I am filling Filmore multiple times a day, but only with a couple of cans each time, this stuff still runs my blood sugar through the roof. I think I need to consult my nutritional expert friend and see what she might suggest as an alternative.

I invented a wonderful salve for the neck, a neck which is peeling and burning and feels like crap most of the time. I think I could make a billion dollars with this stuff, not instant relief but a relief that works and lasts up to 4-6 hours.

One part 2% lidocain cream to 3 parts radialplex which is a aloe based cream, and one part Aquaphor ointment which is a petroleum jelly type of compound,; a cream that removes the pain, eases the burn, sooths the skins and lets you function normally.

So for the most part yesterday I slept, watched a movie, visited , slept, invented wonder rub, slept, visited, filled Filmore, slept. All in all, I would say that it was a pretty good day.

I did wear the banana shorts, two witnesses actually saw me in them, I didn’t push the envelope by wearing the shirt this time but I think next excursion the world gets to see both.

FYI here is the shirt that Ms Deb made a long time ago. The pearl snaps are a royal purple and go well with the over all color motif:

I must have been a tad bit thinner way back then. . . .


Weight today – 203
Hair loss – none, need a hair cut
Sunburn – under control
Throat – dry and scratchy


Laissez Les Bons Temps Rouler

Free Food Friday!

Yea, it’s free food Friday. Went in to the office yesterday, not sure why, but I did. At our fine establishment, we have lunch catered in every Friday, Yesterday it was BBQ, and all the trimmings.

Man it looked good, smelled good, and judging from the decrease in background noises, must have tasted pretty good as well. This is like the sixth week of free food that I haven’t enjoyed.

In fact that is what I find myself day dreaming about, food. Not just the taste, but the way it looks the way if felt as it is swallowed, can’t believe how much texture is involved in making something appetizing.

Now I’m pretty happy with my canned food, it’s keeping the weight steady, easy on the gut and the two times I early recycled it, pretty easy on the throat. But it is not food, nourishment yes, food no.

On a slight down side, it seems that after a couple of hours the smell of BBQ is not particularly pleasing . In fact, it tends to exacerbate the feelings a nausea that tend to creep in to my world. I do seem to have a heightened sense of smell, lots of things don’t smell very nice and I notice them a lot.

So anyway about 2:30 I realized the dice were being loaded for a unpleasant and potential disgusting episode if I insisted on remaining in the office. I left, headed home and managed to be asleep by 4:30.

That pretty much describes my daily routine, I’m up smelling things, sleeping or somewhere in between. That’s the gist of it, just so tired all the time.

Well it’s the weekend so I most likely at to this post as the day goes on, between naps and such.

Laissez Les Bons Temps Rouler

Nasty, Just plain Nasty

Thursdays’ seem to be my bad event day and yesterday was no exception. I made it home from the nuke session and was just sitting in the truck resting up when I felt a warm wet feeling.

Now I’m sure there are valid good warm wet feelings but none that I could remember ever happening while sitting in a truck parked in the driveway, by yourself.

Opps, look like I am a victim of a belly puke. One or more plugs in Wilbur have come undone and he is busily spewing the breakfast contents from this morning into my lap.

What a mess, all over the shirt, the jeans, in my lap, and when getting out I unload a fair amount on my shoes. Thursday has struck again.

Formal word is seven more radiation days after this Friday, and the nurse thinks two chemo days but still checking. Then the recovery begins.

Milestones in the recovery process, as I see them:
1. Filmore gone, gut plugged up
2. Mediport removed
3. Food by mouth,
4. Throat no longer raw as the dickens
5. Red neck reduced to farmer tan lines only
6. Back to work
7. Teeth or something close to them

Late entry – Fed-Ex delivered box from the lil bro, seems as I am no longer considered to be portly and the loss of my trade might be the end for Omar the tent maker. Anyway, in the box of L size shirts, there was a true rare gem. How John ended up with it is unknown but in the box is a one of a kind original handmade Deb shirt!

That’s right, way back in the days, before she became ex-wife#2, Deb made me several classic shirts, all in the Hawaiian style and all with pearl snaps. We were to poor to afford the fancy buttonhole maker for her sewing machine, but I could do the pearl snaps. This shirt is one of the last ones she made. I will post a picture of it later this week.

The second half of the Miriam or Donna shirts today:
Hawaiian bottle shirt in blue, but is it Duke blue?:

Weight today – 204
Hair loss – 3, found three short hairs in comb
Sunburn – getting tight and itchy,
Throat – dry and scratchy



It’s coming up on the weekend!! Lets party hardy

Laissez Les Bons Temps Rouler

Dust Bowl Dry

Drier than a West Texas Playa lake in August, we talking drier than OC Fisher in San Angelo, all shrunk up and cracked, that’s the condition I think my neck is in. ‘It’s accumulative’, that what they keep saying, what they should be saying is it isn’t going to be getting better for a while, just worse.

My neck is a dark tan, somewhat akin to the color and texture of an old, dried up saddle. Come to think of it, neatsfoot oil and saddle soap are about the only two things I haven’t tried on it to ease the burn.

On the plus side, I look like a oil rubbed bronze work of art, at least my neck does.

I plan on working from home again today, Yesterday it worked out a lot better than I thought, thanks to Alex getting the kinks out of my VPN connection.

Thanks for all you guys that weighed in on the ST disability issue, I have decided to move forward on it, I am being less effective every day and the stamina just isn’t there. After I logged off last night I think I was asleep in less than 5 mins, just sitting on the couch.

Today’s shirt is provided by ether Miriam or Donna, these two beautiful ladies sent me a couple of shirts but I don’t know if they were individually picked out or a joint effort. So today and tomorrow, shirts by Miriam and Donna!!

Hawaiian Sunset in Paradise Aloha shirt:

Feed bags hung - 1
Weight today – 206
Hair loss – none
Sunburn – maybe not as bad as yesterday,
Throat – dry and scratchy


Laissez Les Bons Temps Rouler

Hump Day Part Deux

Want to know what really chaps my butt? Forgetting to save my work, and then having windows forget to auto recover it. I am pretty sure I started today’s fine missive last night during one of my midnight strolls, made a pretty good start on it.

But I get up this morning and find that my computer decided to reboot last night and no auto recovery file to be found, dang it bobby, that’s just worong.

And seeing as I running a bit behind, and lost a lot of the stuff I put to paper, this post might take most of the day to get posted, pardon me while I save this.

Today’s shirt is from hunting buddy Marvin and his bride Sue, two good people from down Austin way, Marvin is somewhat of an oddity, he was actually raised in Austin, there aren’t that many people living there that can claim that status.

Anyway, true to form the Hawaiian shirt he sent me is green bamboo, jungle camouflage, but will work in a pinch with upland birds in Texas.

It is hump day that means I am looking down the barrel at Thursday. Historically Thursdays have been my bad days so this week I am going to try to come out on top.
It’s a lot of attitude and knowing when to push and when to back off.

Had a pretty good day at work yesterday, Bob and I improved a process reducing processing time by about 60%, good but we need a bit more. May try to work on that today again.

Still no decision on the short term disability need to talk to the HR lady and get more details.


-----> NEWS FLASH It's official I now have 9 nuke days remaining NEWS FLASH <---

Weight today – didn’t weigh
Hair loss – none
Sunburn – worst day yet
Throat – really scratchy (wonder if related to red neck)


Laissez Les Bons Temps Rouler

Tuesday !

So, yesterday pope Buford comes by after work to check on me, or did he?, perchance he wanted to ensure that I had actually worn that fine shirt he provided. Proof is what you see is what you get. As I opened the door I am pretty sure the flash of orange cause him to take a step back , shield his eyes and realize the shirt was on.

So today I wear one from Sissy, and as like the one from Monday, it to is a parrot shirt, it is a subtler shade of red, adorned with purple parrots. Looks like last week was fish this week parrots, so far.

Dudes, these are some fine shirts, if I was up to kicking up my heels I would be out at the bar strutting my stuff. Guess the ladies will have to wait it out till I’m man about town again.

Chemo went fine, still feeling the Mr. Happy bag of drugs that is included with the course of treatments. Without that one I would had been in bed at least twice by now, instead I am about to go enjoy another double chocolate shake of the low carb design.

Dr. Visit went well except for low blood pressure, seems losing 32 pounds might have had a good effect on the blood pressure and now the benicar is working too well, my new instructions are to watch the blood pressure.

Also Dr Nguyen was very pleased he could no longer feel the secondary mass that was so apparent in my neck at the start of treatment, and that’s a good thing.

Looks like the plan going forward is going to be something like this; end of mission is on the day of the last radiation treatment, that’s ether 30 March or 3 April. Healing and recovery should run for about four to six weeks with a PET scan scheduled around week 6. This tells the tale; the PET scan is used to locate any active sites that might have survived.

I think today or tomorrow I make a decision on short term disability, it’s getting harder and harder to get to and stay on task at work, I’m just so tired. That I think is the worst part of this, being so tired all the time.


After a few sips of clamato juice I decided to pass on the rest of it. I’ll try something new today.

Weight today – 207 might be due to the 3 liters of fluid I received yesterday
Hair loss – none
Sunburn – not so bad


Laissez Les Bons Temps Rouler