Eight months and counting

Well, I just had my sixth brain MRI and I want to thank all of you who pay your health insurance premiums for supporting me through this ordeal. I apologize for running up the cost of health care by repeatedly using this most expensive technology. One would think that a frequent flier like me would get an occasional freebie. At least when you go to the car wash they punch your ticket and every tenth on is free. Good luck Obama in getting your arms around this one.

The report on the MRI was good.... or as the doctors like to say "there was nothing there". I assume they don't mean that my brain went missing, but that the tumor is not visible. We assume the tumor cells are still in my brain hidden away in my love center which is warm and toasty and they are fleeing madly from the hate center which is cold, frosty and very inhospitable. Thus I'm on chemotherapy monthly to mop up residual cancer collections and again I thank you and apologize for using this expensive therapy($150 a pill-four daily). I tried to get the meds through Canada at one-third the cost but it is now against the law and my insurance company wouldn't cover the cost if I chose that route. Sigh!

Fatigue and lack of stamina are the big side effects of the chemo and if I leave my feet for long a nap is close behind. Such a waste of time.

Bimonthly MRIs and monthly chemo will be the norm for the future. Most of the time the tumor is back within 15 months, but some people go four years or rarely even decades before the tumor reappears. We are always hopeful for new therapies that extend quality life.

Margie and I and the family extend our loving thanks to all of you for your kindness and support.

Valentine's day thoughts

These thoughts on love were collated by Ben Schott and I pass them on to you not as mine but something we share.

From the Hindus who recognized the symptoms of love:
1. Love of the Eyes
2. Attraction of the mind
3. Birth of desire
4. Loss of sleep
5. Loss of flesh
6. Indifference to objects of sense
7. Loss of shame
8. Distraction of thought
9. Loss of consciousness
10. Death


Hollywood definition of love in 1918- the formula for love at first sight

Enlarge the eyes to indicate wonder,
then smile, suffuse the face , to register satisfaction,
ending in pointed brows by which one interrogates.
The chest heaves to indicate the heart has been stirred to the nethermost depths,
followed by determination to have her at any cost;
this is shown by a toss of the head, thrust of the chin, and tense clenching of the fists.

This was followed by Ricardo and Lucy in single beds in I Love Lucy- very suggestive leaving little to the imagination- at what might be going on, to Desperate Housewifes, where we are told too much with no punctuation. How far we have fallen in 90 years.



My favorite

Love:-What a Volume in a Word

An Ocean in a Tear,
A Seventh Heaven in a Glance,
A Whirlwind in a Sigh,
The Lightening in a Touch, and
A Millennium in a Moment

by Martin Farquhar Tupper

Thank you Martin

Happy Valentine's Day. Love to All, Eric