I Whip My Health Back and Forth! I Whip My Health Back and Forth!

Well, 2010 isn't through screwing with me, I guess.

I'd had this poking pain in my right side all weekend, sometimes at intervals of 30 - 40 seconds apart (it got so bad I was timing them like contractions) and on Monday the intervals were much shorter and the pain was enough to take my breath and make standing upright exhausting. So I called the doctor to ask if there was anything on the PET scan that could be causing it. He called back at 5:30 that night and said that there wasn't anything in that particular spot, but there were plenty of other things in the scan to worry about.

Progression happened again. New spots on my shoulders, clavicle, and both femurs, which gave the doctor some concern because, he said, those are supporting bones meant to hold up my upper body. We can't risk having them break. Great ... time to get the cane out again. More spots on my spine too. Man. I got shot in the ass for 3 months for this???

So he schedules a bone marrow biopsy for Thursday because this means chemo and chemo means trying to somehow increase my platelet count to accommodate the infusions. This means getting some junk called Nplate before getting chemo, but I have to get the biopsy before I start the Nplate.

In the meantime, the pain is now excrutiating on the right side so cousin/roommate and I go to Urgent Care on Tuesday night, me thinking it's maybe gall stones or something non-cancer. What do they say? They say "You look like you're in agony," like this is a surprise. Well, schaaah der I'm in agony. Why else would I be here? But they can't find anything on x-rays, so the UC doc takes a look at the PET scan with another radiologist and they see something that "might be a slight lesion" on my ribs over there. That's as good as I get, which boils down to "you'll just have to deal with it like the other spots." They shoot me full of dilaudid (which always makes me think of Drugstore Cowboy) and send me home. Dilaudid wears off leaving me seriously constipated (yep, I said it) and back in agony.

Thursday morning I get the biopsy. Friends, the cousin/roommate was my hero. He held my hand through the whole thing. I probably would have fainted. He said it was pretty gnarly and that bone marrow looks a little like a smoothie. eeeeeuuuuw cool.

And now I wait. If the results come back good I start an infusion of Nplate for the platelets and then my choice of Abraxane (hair falls out) or Xeloda (skin peels on my hands and feet); or they find leukemia or non-Hodgkin's lymphoma and I get Rituxan (flu-like feeling ... not bad on the side-effects compared to the others); or, worse-case, I have myelodysplastic syndrome (MDS) and chemo will be "dangerous" in the doctor's words and Nplate, as the literature says "may worsen your cancer or condition and may cause you to die sooner." (!)

So, remember, we don't want MDS. MDS = bad.

I have a lot to read over the next few days and a lot of things to think about. But I'm going to sleep through most of it because it makes me tired, although I'm hoping steroid euphoria will carry over into a New Year's Eve visit with friends. But mostly I've got to figure out what kind of changes this will have on my day-to-day life. Am I going to be doped up on percocet forever? Maybe so. Do I pick the chemo where I lose my hair or the one where I have sunburn-like peels on my hands and feet and is that a choice?? Gee whiz.

Anyway, if you call me and I don't answer, it's probably because I'm sleeping. Cousin/roommate is also recharging his batteries this weekend. We're going to start the hard part now and it's going to require more energy than we have. I don't know where we'll find the resources, but since we don't have a choice, we'll just have to dig it up somewhere and deal with it.

Flippin' 2010.
Get out of here already.

Another one bites the dust-ahhh

Christmas is all done, long live Christmas. I hate the pressures of the holidays, but I love presents. Who doesn't? Really. Some of the best this year were:

- Learning that Vitaly Petrov was signed for 2 more years at Renault
- Getting the forbearance approved on my student loan for a year (yay!!!)
- The sound+book Farts: A Spotter's Guide sent to me by my little brother. He has never sent me a better or more useful gift in his entire history of gift giving. We have already left phone messages with it and used it for background noise while watching television. Number 6, "The Poof" is my favorite.

So I'm closing the year out with a bang (or a poof). So long 2010. You sucked. Seriously. Could it have been worse?

Oh yeah, so, yes, the PET scan made me sick, but I think it was my fault because I told him my weight (which I'm not telling you) and the Wii gave me a weight 6 lbs lighter this morning. I have a feeling my actual weight at the time of the scan was less than what I said and he overdid the nuclear crap because of it. My bad.

But I'm getting better bit by bit (it's actually hanging on a little longer than I thought it would) and I did manage to get out to the show for a couple of movies last week:

It's a Wonderful Life (1946)
Dir. Frank Capra
Starring: Jimmy Stewart, Donna Reed, Lionel Barrymore

Poor bitter, disillusioned George Bailey ... could it get any less wonderful?

Really, what needs to be said? You've seen it or you haven't. Tell you something for nothing, seeing it on a big screen (actual film!) made me cry a lot faster than usual. Cahhhhhhhhh I forgot all about poor Mr. Gower and the pills. And the scene with Sam Wainwright on the phone and that weird angry sexual tension between George and Mary is still electrifying. It's such a very un-Hollywood way to court your girl.

But, yeah, it drops into Hollywood type pretty quickly anyway: Mary without George is an "old maid" and a librarian. Pfft whatever.

Black Swan (2010)
Dir. Darren Aronfsky
Starring: Natalie Portman, Mila Kunis, Vincent Cassel, Barbara Hershey


Just take a Valium before you go see it. That's all I'm sayin'. Otherwise it'll just make you edgy. And the scenes involving what my friend called "Cuticle Horror" really are intensely unpleasant. I had to close my eyes. Otherwise it's relatively predictable with few surprises, kind of like The Wrestler, but with Natalie Portman instead of Mickey Rourke and she's easier on the eyes, let's face it.

Mila Kunis tho' ... wow ... she needs to do more. Seriously.

"A Merry Christmas to us all, my dears."

"And thanks a lot for the gold and frankincense,

but don't worry too much about the myrrh next time."

After the holiday: how to get sick from a PET scan, a week of legit movies in theaters and some relatively legit movies at home, and why buying a Christmas tree at the last minute makes it the bestest tree ever. Ahhhhhhhh I love our half-price, drippy tree.

Until then have a Joyous Kwanzaa! See you on the other side.

A Movie Nearly Every Night: The Great Race

The Great Race (1965)
Dir. Blake Edwards
Starring: Jack Lemmon, Tony Curtis, Natalie Wood, Peter Falk


As tribute to Blake Edwards, I could have picked from his Pink Panther series or Victor/Victoria or even the serious well-made films like The Days of Wine and Roses, but rather than retrospect his career I decided to focus on a single movie because it made such an indelible imprint on my childhood.

At least one a year, usually during a holiday weekend like Thanksgiving or Christmas, KTLA in Los Angeles would show The Great Race. I don't think we ever missed it. When VCR's came out it was one of the first movies we taped from television, but by then my whole family had it memorized and could easily re-enact any scene on request.

Professor Fate (Jack Lemmon) readies his cigar

This movie is like a jolly family member that visits for dinner one night every year and leaves you happy and waiting with expectation for his next visit. Maybe he brings cake. Maybe he just makes you laugh. Maybe you fall asleep before he finishes his story, but you know he'll come back next year and tell the same story and then you'll be old enough to hear it all the way through.

Fate and Max (Peter Falk) --Push the button, Max.

Yes, it's a very silly movie. No, it doesn't mean a thing. There are no great messages to impart, no deep study of film technique to be gained from it -- it's just Blake Edwards taking elements from other silly movies and rolling them into a brilliant confection that tastes sweet year after year:

It's got salty dance hall dames in western towns,

"He shouldna' hadna' oughtna' swang on me"

Swordfights,

"He who fights and runs away, lives to fight another day.
So until another day, Mr. Leslie.
I have a boat. waiting."

Pie fights,

"Brandy. THROW MORE BRANDY!"

Saloon fights,

How not to light a match against your teeth.

And even a sing-a-long.

When I saw this at the LA County Museum of Art, the audience really did sing along

It's got good guys in white and bad guys in black and sometimes they have to share a living space --- but who hasn't had to experience that at least once in their lives, right?

"He always yells like this in the morning."

But most of all, deep in the silliness, we learned a lot from this movie as kids:

How to get a job in journalism for instance.

Has it really changed over the years?

Why you don't want to yell "HEY PROFESSOR!" during a pie fight.


How to deal with disloyal members of your staff when you're the monarch of a small country.

"I'm getting a new tucker-inner. You're banished, banished, banished."

That you should always laugh even while others disapprove.

"Someone who looks like me? Poor fellow! Wah ha ha ha ha ha ha ha!"

And, no matter what's happening, always pose for the camera.


This was not one of Blake's biggest box office winners. In fact, in 1965 it was considered kind of a stinker, but I think it was just released at the wrong time. So much was changing in 1965. Movies were getting serious --- I mean, honestly, The Sound of Music is a musical, but it's got nuns falling for whistle-blowing military men and it ends with a perilous mountain escape from invading Nazis --- and fun fluff like this didn't appeal to people wanting to grapple with deeper issues past and present. Even Cat Ballou had death and its repercussions. No one dies in The Great Race (although you wonder a little about what happens to Baron von Stuppe after he "fights and runs away"), but the "message" doesn't get any deeper than man + woman = marriage.

Oh, and that you can't really save time by following the railroad tracks.
Good to know.

So, sure, it's a cartoon when the world was turning serious. This is all well and good and quaint, but what does it say about Vietnam?

"Get off of the bed!" a statement aimed at Western imperialism?
Nope, just at pugs.

But for kids of my generation, this movie came a long at the right time. I know so many people my age who watched it with their families every time it was on television and they can quote as many lines from it as I can:

"Red sky in morning, sailor take warning.""Why you simple-headed gherkin, do you know the chances of a storm in this part of world at this time of year?""No, what?""A hundred to one!"

"May I present Baron Rolfe von Stuppe. His prowess with the blade is surpassed only by his reputation with the ladies."

"Brrrrrrrrrrrrrranday!"

"I ain't no native! I was born here!"

"That would make quite a story for your competition: Woman Starves in Men's Room of the New York Sentinel!"

"Come on, professor, up and at 'em. It's 7:30." "UP and AT 'EM?!?" "It's 7:30, rise and shine." "YOU rise. YOU shine."

And, possibly the best line in the history of comic film:

"Leslie escaped with a chicken?!?"

Dear Mr. Edwards,
You don't remember me, but I once rang up your wife's copies of Majesty and Royalty magazines at Rizzoli, South Coast Plaza. I could barely make change for you because there was so much I wanted to say. The same thing happened years later with Peter Falk. That's some kind of crazy voodoo and it all comes from living so long with this movie, my family friend, my close kin.

So I just wanted to say thank you.

Love,
Li'l Hateful

A Movie Nearly Every Night: B-Noir Double Feature

Armored Car Robbery (1950)
Dir. Richard Fleischer
Starring: Charles McGraw, Adele Jergens, William Talman, Douglas Fowley

Sorry, yes, more black and white. Honestly, we've watched a lot of stuff in color, but it's usually an episode of Dallas or 30 Rock or Iron Man 2, which I wanted to like, but ... ah no, I just couldn't. Dallas and 30 Rock on the other hand = choice viewing.

And, as long as I'm being completely honest ... uh ... okay, all honesty ... um, I fell asleep at the end of Armored Car Robbery. I know. I know! But it's winter in Oregon, people. The sun goes down at 4:30 and by 6:00 you feel like going to bed. Maybe it's just me, I don't know. So I can't tell you how this ends, but I can tell you that it has:

1. an armored car robbery


2. William Talman, who should re-think a haircut that emphasizes his absurdly high forehead


3. Sidekick-type, Benny (troubled Douglas Fowley) in a great stork print tie, and


4. Adele Jergens, the B-Movie Virginia Mayo, as Benny's wife, a "burley-que" stripper who doesn't really take much off, not even her gloves.

But, what really sets this movie apart is the inclusion of Charles McGraw. Not really apart, because he's played cops before, but I like to believe it was Fleischer who took McGraw out of small cop parts and gangster roles and made him a big detective, starting with this movie.

Talk you rat or I'll put the screws on ... harder

McGraw was huge and built to be a great gangster with his gravel voice and chisel face, but Fleischer made him a detective in this and The Narrow Margin (1952) and it changed McGraw into the protector-type, the guy on the police force you'd want on your side because he looks like he could do some serious damage to the bad guys. In Armored Car Robbery he even hints at police brutality -- where's the ACLU when you need 'em? Probably out gettin' donuts.

zzzzzzz...

But, yeah, it made me sleepy.

Why get this from Netflix? Friends, because it comes with a second movie on the disc:


Crime in the Streets (1956)
Dir. Don Siegel (whoo!)
Starring: James Whitmore, Sal Mineo, Mark Rydell, John Cassavetes

The Hornets are gonna rumble to-niiiiiiite

Oh yeah. Hell yeah. I saw this on Turner Classic Movies a few weeks ago and it totally hypnotized me. And it wasn't even James Ellroy guest programmer night! (By the way if that happens again, set up your DVD/VCR, because he picks great B-picture teen classics.) Sure, it's a little stagey, a little G.E. Theatre-ish, but it's directed by Don Siegel, who is beloved in this household.

Sorry, that's Donald Siegel

If we had an icon, we'd light candles to his greatness. Without him would we have Dirty Harry (1971)? Or Hell is for Heroes (1962)? Or Two Mules for Sister Sara (1970)? I think not! God bless you, Don Siegel.

This is also notable for bringing to the screen this guy:

Yep, he's staring at a tooth someone just knocked out

John, of the perfect head of hair --- I said PERFECT --- plays the leader of a gang called the Hornets, and they prey on defenseless old men and other gangs, so the plot is kind of typical, but also a little edgier than typical. The scenes with his mom and little brother make you want to leave the room because you know, you KNOW, something's going to give and when it does you don't want to get hit in the head with a bottle.

"Back off, ma"

So, yeah, things get out of hand quickly, mostly because Frankie (that's John) is a bit of a psychotic.

I know, big surprise.

This movie also has future director Mark Rydell (On Golden Pond, The Rose, etc...) as a really odd character named Lou, who stands like a girl, holds his cigarette like a girl, and still has a thing for Sal Mineo's older sister. And, let's not forget, our real star, James Whitmore, who plays this Father Flanagan type who really knows how to rap with the kids and dig their lingo.

You can see how well it's going over.

Yeah, Merry Stinkin' Christmas

Platelet Count: 30

Whatever.

Got shot again today and pumped full of stuff, but I feel pretty good. I'm trying not to stress out too much about Christmas, but I'm way behind on mailing things out. Nerts. Again, Christmas cards ... they're right here on my desk staring at me and I can't scrape it together enough to write them up. I know. I suck. ergh. What's a girl to do? I've got a sick cousin/roommate (man cold ... you know how it is: coughing, sniffling and television watching --- like a woman cold only with Dirty Jobs instead of Pride and Prejudice) and there's just no time. NO TIME.

Anyway, so, here's the thing that's really making me crabby and irritable: I didn't like the look on the doctor's face today when I told him that Bitey (the primary tumor -- the big one) has been acting up. But I felt he should know. They ask "Any pain?" and I feel like an arsehole for mentioning it, but doggone it, he's a doctor, right? He's supposed to fix it. So I says to him, I says, for the past few days it hurts to sleep because that little sucker is constantly poking me. It feels like I've got a sunburn and someone punched me right on my ... erm ... okay I can say breast. Yeesh. I'm an adult. Breast. What's the big deal? I feel like someone punched me in my sunburned breast. There. Although "breast" always makes me think of chicken.

Anyway, so that's when he started to question whether or not the faslodex shots are really working, because apparently I shouldn't have this kind of reaction out of Bitey if it is. Swell. That's just what you want to hear about your last chance hormone treatment.

Fehhhhhhhhhhhhhh.
I said feh.

So this has made me cranky and barky and menopausally pissy for the rest of the day. (All this cranky, barky menopause for what?!? FOR WHAT?) I even ripped into the kids today in the office: "Get up you bunch of ragged-arsed tinker cow thieves!" No, I didn't say that, but one day I'm going to use it. That and "Shag your butts you slug-a-beds!"

mrrrrrrrghhhrrrrh.

PET scans are coming and I'll have results on January 3rd.

God hates ... oh wait, apparently everyone

Friends, this being half of one of those kinds of blogs, I'm going to a post a note on Elizabeth Edwards. Particularly in the wake of messed up news stories about how those nut-jobs at Westboro Baptist Church are going to protest her funeral. Honestly, what the what, people? What is "Thank God for Breast Cancer" even mean?? Well, apparently their God, who hates fags, dead soldiers and "the World" (he does, it says so at www.godhatestheworld.com) now hates Elizabeth Edwards for dying. Well, God, I'm sorry to stand up to you like this, but I have a feeling you'll understand.

I didn't know her personally, but the more I read the more I see how similar our experience is --- I mean, apart from the parrot-tongued cheating husband, having and losing kids, and time on the podium at the Democratic Convention. She's not so much someone I'd drink with in a bar, but if she was at a party and we ended up sitting together in the kitchen with a bottle of wine, I think we'd have a lively conversation.

Her first diagnosis was 2004. She wasn't high risk and just came across the lump in the shower because it was "so friggin' large." She had chemo to shrink it and then a lumpectomy along with radiation and, as everyone gets, a bottle of aromatase inhibitors. She was "done" in 2005. In 2008 an MRI showed it in her bones. I found my own lump (not self-examining, just because it was there) and I'm also not high risk. I was originally was scheduled for chemo and a lumpectomy, but then that PET scan gave away the bone lesions and I skipped a few years on Elizabeth's time-line. But she had 6 years total, albeit only 2 officially at Stage IV, but I can work with that ... kinda. Everyone is different.

Cancer doesn't care who you are, what you do for a living, what tragedies or triumphs you've had in your life. It's just going to do its thing. It's always going to be there in some form, even if it means you just think about it every day. You just have to keep going and get as much done as possible .... erm, with the exception of Christmas cards, which I'm just not getting around to doing. You may all receive them in January. I'm just sayin'.

Yeah, so that Westboro Baptist Church thing is very sad. They're sheep led by fire and historically that ends up with a lot of burning. But like a kid playing baseball in Little League dreaming of being Nolan Ryan, these crazy religious guys all want to be Jesus whose death changes the world. Fred Phelps, something tells me your monster will eat itself someday and everything you've looked forward to, your martyrdom and infamy, will pass out of history without changing a damn thing (unless you count those who go through your town to gawk at your idiocy and those who pass it by altogether to avoid contamination).

For an interesting story on Elizabeth Edwards (where I learned the most) click here.

"So I try to be strong, but not too strong. ... You're walking a really difficult line, and I don't think I always do it right. But I'm trying to get it right over time."

A Movie Nearly Every Night: The White Ribbon

The White Ribbon (Das weisse Band) (2009)
Dir. Michael Haneke
Starring: Christian Friedel, Ernst Jacobi, Leonie Benesch, Ulrich Tukur

photo from nytimes.com

I --- eh --- um --- it --- well --- German --- stark --- black and white only makes white --- eh --- creepier --- and on Blu-ray? --- dude

crazy disjointed, yet all-is-connected story

kids --- forced purity --- metaphor or prequel to Facism? --- disappearing --- punishment --- fire --- disturbing --- what's with the black chickens?

creepy --- no super creepy weird --- had to watch Star Trek episode to balance out

still gave me nightmares --- (with Oliver Reed and wooden yacht - what? why?)

photo from thefastertimes.com

only just noticed white ribbon on pastor

can't shake it lose even this morning --- need to watch more cartoons.

And I Don't Mean Eager

Sorry for the long week between posts. It was Thanksgiving n' stuff and the parents were here and we cooked and ate and put a fire in the fireplace that made my books smell like smoke, but I didn't care because it was a very nice companion to the holiday dinner with friends and family. Man ... do you know how long I've waited to have a fire in that fireplace?

Now it's December and Christmas is coming and I'm broke again (thanks cancer!) and work is a little hectic and odd, and on December 13 I get shot up again and scheduled for scans to see if the current stuff is working.

So, yeah, I've got anxiety.

Plain and simple.

I dread getting up in the morning, primarily because Veda now sleeps tucked into the bed instead of on top of it and it's hard to leave the warm, furry baby, but also because getting up means going through the motions of another day and letting the hours slip past until it's 9 at night and I remember all the stuff I haven't done yet.

Add to this, I was telling a friend yesterday that I can't remember what is was like to go through the day without thinking about cancer. How long do I have? Is this [fill this blank with random pain of choice] related to the cancer? So if this treatment works does that mean I have to get shot in the ass every month for the rest of my life? And if it doesn't work does that mean I have to be on chemo for the rest of my life??

It's hard to have those thoughts coupled with someone barking at you "You people sent me a calendar with red letters. RED LETTERS! Who would buy something like that?" "Well, madame ... erm ... you did actually."

Actually I guess in hindsight that stuff is pretty funny. The You People time of year is always stressful while it's happening, but a few hours later it can be sort of amusing.

But Thanksgiving took me away from all of that and maybe that's what's made it harder to handle now. Every day is not relaxing by the fire. Every day is someone barking crap at you.

Over Thanksgiving dinner mom was recounting a trip we took to Yosemite when we were all young and perky. I think I was 8 or 9 -- after the age of 10 I was no longer perky. To earn a "Go Climb a Rock" t-shirt (because you had to earn it, people; you couldn't just have one), we hiked to the top of Vernal Fall: "To proceed directly to the top of Vernal Fall, follow the Mist Trail 0.5 mile (0.8 km) up a steep granite stairway of over 600 steps." I don't know where in the steps I lost it, but I started to cry, then I couldn't breathe, then I couldn't climb, then I couldn't look up because my family was so far ahead that I couldn't see them anymore, then I started to panic --- that's when I heard a man behind me say "You can't stop, sweetheart. You have to keep going up. Let's go." And he pushed me, step by step, up that f...king waterfall and then ditched me at the top where mom was waiting. "Some man had his hand on my ass the whole way up!" she said.

You can't stop, sweetheart. You have to keep going up.