November 2002 rediagnosed with a recurring tumor I am going to bring you through the whole fun thing   Archives << current   This is where you stick random tidbits of information about yourself.

Brain Tumor History And Other Rants   Saturday, December 20, 2003   12/20/03 So I can't be the only one that gets stoked by Bobby D. Bob Dylan to all you hipsters. The man can write a song. Standing in the Doorway from Time Out of Mind I'm walking through the summer nights Jukebox playing low Yesterday everything was going too fast Today, it's moving too slow I got no place left to turn I got nothing left to burn Don't know if I saw you, if I would kiss you or kill you It probably wouldn't matter to you anyhow You left me standing in the doorway, crying I got nothing to go back to now The light in this place is so bad Making me sick in the head All the laughter is just making me sad The stars have turned cherry red I'm strumming on my gay guitar Smoking a cheap cigar The ghost of our old love has not gone away Don't look like it will anytime soon You left me standing in the doorway crying Under the midnight moon Maybe they'll get me and maybe they won't But not tonight and it won't be here There are things I could say but I don't I know the mercy of God must be near I've been riding the midnight train Got ice water in my veins I would be crazy if I took you back It would go up against every rule You left me standing in the doorway, crying Suffering like a fool When the last rays of daylight go down Buddy, you'll roll no more I can hear the church bells ringing in the yard I wonder who they're ringing for I know I can't win But my heart just won't give in Last night I danced with a stranger But she just reminded me you were the one You left me standing in the doorway crying In the dark land of the sun I'll eat when I'm hungry, drink when I'm dry And live my life on the square And even if the flesh falls off of my face I know someone will be there to care It always means so much Even the softest touch I see nothing to be gained by any explanation There are no words that need to be said You left me standing in the doorway crying Blues wrapped around my head Aaaah according to Bobby D. he aint never been treated fair I guess. Some people don't like his whiny voice or politics whatever. Read the man's words and they will hit you on some level. It seems like the more time we have the more we waste. Ever notice that? Time and real estate are cast in stone you can't create more of it. It sucks feeling like you are old. I mean there are crossroads in your life. When you are real young the older girls are better looking, well they develop sooner the boyish looking ones your age. And then you catch up with them. In High School the girls try to look college age, but they don't have the hips. So they go to college drink beer, and low and behold they finally get the curves. It's all down hill from there. So I think college time is the ultimate, that's your peek. That's why the military loves to get you at 18. Then you leave college, another landmark is one day you are out and then you say to yourself. Hey kid, mommies looking alright. That is a scary day, but you accept it, and move on. You have matured, you have no need to drive past a high school anymore, remember, no hips. I don't think colleges ever lose their appeal. But you have moved onto another phase. Then you wake up one day, you are not involved in current music, you don't get it, you are not changing with the times. You no longer buy the new CD's every year. You buy old standbys, Bob Dylans catalogue, etc. Man it sucks getting old. You realize that you are no longer in that loop you are out of it. You are the age that The Who sang about dying before you got old. Welcome to getting older. Hey The Who did it, but with a lot more money, and if they need to print more they just do another final tour and kill off a band member (that killing off a band member is going to shorten their career for sure). I have not enjoyed 30. I thought I hated 25, that was a picnic, at least I was still in the game then. I feel like the kid in the home alone movie. Here's where all my free time goes, this introspective crap. Maybe it's just this crap I have gone through. I dunno. I have basically been dropped out all year. I haven't accomplished anything I should have been doing at age 30. I should have been working my ass off getting somewhere. When your health drops out, then it is all down hill. I haven't driven a car in a year. I have no personal freedom, just what friends and family drive me around for. It is a change of lifestyle bigtime. There are no close stores living on top of a mountain in Jersey. Most of the year I haven't had any money to go shopping anyway. A point here, only that it sucks losing your freedom of driving. It's like, ok let's take your health your driving your job. Go have fun. It's been a constant adjustment. I am not used to not having my freedom at all. Sometimes I have dreams of having a motorcycle again. The freedom I had when I had the bike and would go out alone riding was awesome. That might have been the most fun with my clothes on. Funny it was great because it was all that existed you, the bike, the open road, no job, problems commitments etc. The cool part is in your dream you can have the new bike you want, and not have to figure out how to pay for it. In life it's like here's what you can and can't do. Cars, bikes on the list of can't do's indefinitely. I have told people it is like I can become a random drunk driver at a moments notice with a seizure. I will always be on medication for them, and one can strike at anytime anywhere. So who knows, that bus that just drove past you might have jumped the curb and got you also. And the person that did a quick pick after you won the big one. I finally started doing some mail stuff for kids that have brain tumors. It is a website where you can read about kids, their situations, you can send them, their brothers sisters, and parents cards saying I hope you are having a nice day. They recommend not putting in hope you feel better because a lot of the kids won't ever get better. The first kid I started writing to was an 11 year old boy with a brain tumor. He had been through leukemia when he was younger and now was near the end. This is the type of perspective crap. Well I may hate being this old but I made it this far, go ahead punch me out. Davin, only had 11 years and fought a lot of the time. It sucks, I used to see it at NYU because there were children there being treated. I may hate being this old, but I got this far. A lot of these kids never make it out of the gate. It really bummed me out. I had just sent 2 Christmas books out to Davin and his sister, and then I read the email that said he died. It was like I knew it was gonna happen. Well ok we knew it was gonna happen, but it doesn't make it any better. So Bob's big Christmas story goes to Davin I guess if you are older than 11 be happy. And to paraphrase South Park: If you are sad about something, you must have been happy about something once, so just be glad you had that happiness at one point in your life. If you got little ones, don't forget them, no matter how annoying they are. Dying at 11 sucks, he never got anywhere near the hey kid mommies looking alright phase (see stages in life above). Davin passed in his sleep, and I am glad he doesn't have to be tortured with any more treatments, that's no way to live either. I mean I like living don't get me wrong. I just wish I didn't miss my life. I mean this whole year was a wash. It don't do much to boost you up. Yeah Ok some drugs kicked me down and propped me up. But is it as simple as a common cold being gone, no remember, the end can suck for me, but so can anyone who walks on a sidewalk as a bus drives by. I guess it is the not having control, you can always jump from a bus, but you can't run from the big C if this thing wants to kick my butt it will win. I just wish I could have a life back again and have a little fun once in a while. Davin kid you missed out on a lot of fun crap. 8:57 PM   12/9/03 Melancholy shit…you just get to feeling that way sometimes. I figure I would decorate the house up with all the lights. A kind of F U to cancer for Christmas… But I have said that before. 30 has been the pits I don’t recommend it to anyone. Avoid turning this old at all costs… it’s just an over-rated year. You know I speak from experience when I see people being treated for Cancer it just sucks. If the battle ends for them, at least they don’t have to be beat up anymore. The treatment will just kick your ass to the point where even if you complain a lot it doesn’t help. I complained a lot don’t let me fool you. I just know there are times in treatment when you are all shitted up that you just don’t want to fight anymore. Kind of like the morning after my first chemo. Throwing up on the floor I was not about to want to be involved in this treatment. If you know someone going through this realize they are in living hell. It is one thing to find out you are being eaten alive it’s another thing to be put through physical hell to try to fight it. People say you lose your battle with Cancer when you die. Be happy they are not suffering anymore. We are nicer to our pets, we let them go with some dignity sometimes and end their suffering. People we push on and on. If you have no chance to win, why go through all the suffering at the end of your life. Why do we insist on torturing people at the end. Let them live their time out. I mean it seems I have come out the other side again and am stable, much to the happiness to a lot of people around me. Your body tends to suppress the hell out of all the bad stuff. I don’t want to let it all go. I want to stay aware of what I kicked through to stand here today. A little perspective. I started a new medication yesterday. Now I take 2 different medications to fight off my seizures. I am hoping this cocktail will fight off future events. It would be nice to stabilize those events. Oligo-astrocytoma, low / intermediate grade, recurrent. Another name for the hole in my head. 7:43 PM Friday, December 05, 2003   Snow. One word. We are getting hit something silly. Need some I will send it to you. What is new? Well we will do the cliff notes version here. My platlets are still recovering. I had them checked on Wednesday and they were low. Had a big seizure on Wednesday night, it was just like the one 2 weeks ago in the car (see that previous note about the roller coaster analogy). I spoke with my neurologist and he has decided it is time to add a second medication in to try to help control the seizures. He has had good luck with this stuff. So he called the pharmacy. The pharmacy called me they will have it Monday. I can’t get it before then anyway I am snowed in!!! So if you are keeping score I am having a seizure about every 2 weeks, and they have gotten a little worse. I had a couple that were just facials now they are whole left sider’s. I have an appointment with my neuro-onc in the city on Thursday but I don’t think much is going to come out of that appointment. My platlet levels are not high enough to start the maintenance chemo yet. SO that is about it. I had a feedback about the lyrics post. I guess it didn’t bore as many as you as I thought. So I will throw some in here and there as the mood hits me usually they are songs that are hitting me at that time. Here’s one you don’t know about: There’s this local blues guitarist named Billy Hector (go to www.billyhector.com – shameless plug) He kicks ass one of the most talented guitarists I have ever seen, ever, ever!! He has this record called Undertow and one song in particular that is called Fix me Babe. This was my damn mantra for my last surgery last January. Check it out: Billy Hector Fix Me Babe From The CD: Undertow Fix Me Babe, I’m Broken Gril I’m lost in a jealous rage Fix Me Babe, I’m Broken And I just can’t act my age Hold me till you heal me baby And I won’t break no more, Fix me babe, I’m broken, Like that handle on your back door. Heal me with your laughter Make me smile honey, it’s been days Hold me in your arms now Lock me in your gilded cage Hold me till you heal me baby, Fix my hearts gaping hole Fix me babe I’m broken, Like that screen on your back porch Fix me babe, I’m broken Now don’t let this thing run its course I’ve been angry and I’ve been shouting Oh, don’t you know I’m a little hoarse Hold me till you heal me baby And I won’t break no more Fix me babe, I been shattered Like that coffee cup on our floor Now I guess after typing it up it seems he wants her to fix his temper, because he is mad at her. Now I never realized that angle. The temper sounds like the old grouchy me now. But the parts that hit me before were the lines at the end of the verses about the handle on the back door screen on the back porch, coffee cup on our floor stuff. As I was going under on the table that is what I was humming to myself. That and Sympathy for the devil, because that is what the surgery team was playing for my surgeon. My last question, is that song for me, am I the devil? Remember I always think everything is about me!!! 10:59 PM Tuesday, December 02, 2003   I have always been really into music. A lot of times I throw pieces of songs that I am digging at a particular time into this blog. Lou Reed, Dylan, NIN, Springsteen, Prince, Ani Difranco I really dig songwriters. This coming from a guy that grew up on deeply philosophical groups like Kiss, Motley Crue, Van Halen. I should be an unemployed beach bum reading Playboy!! Well I am unemployed, and I am not allowed to have Playboy in the house, besides, too many blondes. So back to what I was saying, sometimes you just hear a song, and it hits you. Maybe it’s that moment in time, but I dig when that happens. I caught this one the other night: Bobby Jean Bruce Well I came by your house the other day, your mother said you went away She said there was nothing that I could have done There was nothing nobody could say Me and you we’ve known each other ever since we were sixteen I wished I would have known I wished I could have called you Just to say goodbye bobby jean Now you hung with me when all the others turned away turned up their noise We liked the same music we liked the same bands we liked the same clothes We told each other that we were the wildest, the wildest things we’d ever Seen Now I wished you would have told me I wished I could have talked to you Just to say goodbye bobby jean Now we went walking in the rain talking about the pain from the world we hid Now there ain’t nobody nowhere nohow gonna ever understand me the way you did Maybe you’ll be out there on that road somewhere In some bus or train traveling along In some motel room there’ll be a radio playing And you’ll hear me sing this song Well if you do you’ll know I’m thinking of you and all the miles in between And I’m just calling one last time not to change your mind But just to say I miss you baby, good luck goodbye, bobby jean Now I had heard the song’s original version, and it didn’t really hit me but I heard an acoustic version that just kicked ass. There are hundreds of songs. I guess it is when you can relate to something in the song in some way. You know what every songwriter tries to do (insert sound byte of Kiss “Christine Sixteen”- you see they were way out ahead of Michael Jackson on that stuff!) Sometimes it’s not even the exact words, but an image or a feeling that they give you that rules. Tell me this doesn’t rule: Ani Difranco: I know this bar With a jukebox full of medicine And Christmas lights blinking Around a clouded mirror It’s not that far From old voelkers bowling alley Just go up there and turn right It’s about three blocks from here You’ll probably find Grace Her shift starts around happy hour She’s got this sweet face Easy as tea leaves to read You gotta know what to look for You gotta know what’s there to find But then I guess you don’t really know her So nevermind I used to hang out a lot around there In that part of town Where all the white kids Still have feathered hair I know this song With this one really killer line I don’t remember it exactly But it slays me every time It’s on the jukebox there I know it’s number 55403 Go put that song on for me won’t you And make Gracie think of me Another Ani one, sometimes it’s just so cool when you can picture the whole song: the diner i'm calling from the diner the diner on the corner i ordered two coffees one is for you i was hoping you'd join me 'cause i ain't go no money and i really miss you i should mention that too yes i know what time it is in fact, i just checked i even know the date and the month and the year i know i haven't been sleeping and when i do i just dream of you dear i miss watching you drool on your pillow i miss watching you pull on your clothes i miss listening to you in the bathroom flushing the toilet blowing your nose i'm calling from the diner the diner on the corner i ordered two coffees one is for you the cups are so close the steam is rising in one stream how are you i think you're the least fucked up person i've ever met and that may be as close to the real thing as i'm ever gonna get but my quarter's gonna run out now or so i'm told i guess i'd better go sit down and wait for you till my coffee gets cold Dylan: Seen a shooting star tonight And I thought of you. You were trying to break into another world A world I never knew. I always kind of wondered If you ever made it through. Seen a shooting star tonight And I thought of you. Seen a shooting star tonight And I thought of me. If I was still the same If I ever became what you wanted me to be Did I miss the mark or Over-step the line That only you could see? Seen a shooting star tonight And I thought of me. Listen to the engine, listen to the bell As the last fire truck from hell Goes rolling by, all good people are praying, It's the last temptation The last account The last time you might hear the sermon on the mount, The last radio is playing. Seen a shooting star tonight Slip Away. Tomorrow will be another day. Guess it's too late to say the things to you That you needed to hear me say. Seen a shooting star tonight Slip away. Dylan again: Just a minute before you leave, girl, Just a minute before you touch the door. What is it that you're trying to achieve, girl? Do you think we can talk about it some more? You know, the streets are filled with vipers Who've lost all ray of hope, You know, it ain't even safe no more In the palace of the Pope. Don't fall apart on me tonight, I just don't think that I could handle it. Don't fall apart on me tonight, Yesterday's just a memory, Tomorrow is never what it's supposed to be And I need you, yeah. Come over here from over there, girl, Sit down here. You can have my chair. I can't see us goin' anywhere, girl. The only place open is a thousand miles away and I can't take you there. I wish I'd have been a doctor, Maybe I'd have saved some life that had been lost, Maybe I'd have done some good in the world 'Stead of burning every bridge I crossed. Don't fall apart on me tonight, I just don't think that I could handle it. Don't fall apart on me tonight, Yesterday's just a memory, Tomorrow is never what it's supposed to be And I need you, oh, yeah. I ain't too good at conversation, girl, So you might not know exactly how I feel, But if I could, I'd bring you to the mountaintop, girl, And build you a house made out of stainless steel. But it's like I'm stuck inside a painting That's hanging in the Louvre, My throat start to tickle and my nose itches But I know that I can't move. Don't fall apart on me tonight, I just don't think that I could handle it. Don't fall apart on me tonight, Yesterday's gone but the past lives on, Tomorrow's just one step beyond And I need you, oh, yeah. Who are these people who are walking towards you? Do you know them or will there be a fight? With their humorless smiles so easy to see through, Can they tell you what's wrong from what's right? Do you remember St. James Street Where you blew Jackie P.'s mind? You were so fine, Clark Gable would have fell at your feet And laid his life on the line. Let's try to get beneath the surface waste, girl, No more booby traps and bombs, No more decadence and charm, No more affection that's misplaced, girl, No more mudcake creatures lying in your arms. What about that millionaire with the drumsticks in his pants? He looked so baffled and so bewildered When he played and we didn't dance. Don't fall apart on me tonight, I just don't think that I could handle it. Don't fall apart on me tonight, Yesterday's just a memory, Tomorrow is never what it's supposed to be And I need you, yeah. Alright Dylan has a ton of ‘em OK Enough!!! Dammit.. you are still awake? I will just continue to throw some in here when it strikes me. 9:23 PM Saturday, November 22, 2003   So what’s been new? Well this month so far 2 “events”. I had a smaller facial seizure about 2 weeks ago. You know that first drop on a roller coaster? The one you know is coming? Like you climb up and up, and then you look down and DROP. That’s the type of take off these things have. Except you don’t start a seizure on purpose, you put yourself on that rollercoaster. So after that climb you drop and then everything goes rushing by and you can’t stop and get off until the end, you just have to ride it out. Even if you are scared shitless, you can’t stop until the ride lets you. I personally like to flip the bird when the camera takes that picture of you that you see when you get off. Hey it makes me laugh and that is all that counts. Well the second “event” I had just this past Wednesday. And I usually know that I am due for one depending on my stress level (more stress= better chances, less sleep=better chances, and chemo that’s a given). I also usually have all these tiny little ticks like warning signals that I am due for a beating. So for the past 3 weeks I have randomly had a few ticks, usually facial, what’s it feel like? Like a jerk in your face that you didn’t do. So back to Wednesday we are driving back from the vet and BAM, I am looking down the first drop of the rollercoaster, and have been dropped. My face started ticking, tick tick tick, I am thinking to myself, “OK no big deal just a facial one. I am staring at the clock in the dashboard it is 3:11 pm. I thought great I can time this one. I remember just my left eye going bang bang bang by itself from right to left. It was pinning left bang bang bang (no pain but it felt like my eye was a bouncing ball going left left left). I remember thinking damn my eye is pinning real hard. I kept thinking no big deal this is just a facial it will be over quick. My tongue too was doing loopy loos in my mouth too. Like after the first drop the rollercoaster gets easier. Not the case on this trip. I thought it will end quick no big deal. I remember the dog was crying a little, I think he probably had to pee, it had nothing to do with me. I kept thinking ok stop now, no more, stop now. You know the OH SHIT feeling when after the big drop you go up a little down some more and bank left. Then I start to feel my left arm shake, but it is more like a vibrating feeling, and I am just waiting for it to go numb so I stop feeling it shake. You know that vibrating feeling from a wooden rollercoaster, bingo! That’s why I like steel coasters so much better. I like a smooth ride for my torture. This is like getting an even bigger drop in the middle of the ride, where you don’t expect it. Or when you realize now you have to ride the whole thing over again but backwards. Because now I know this thing isn’t over. The seizure is going to be a biggie. I am still awake for the whole thing, if I pass out, that is a worse signal, and I have to go to the hospital. So I want to stay awake, but I don’t want to live through it. I remember I was motioning with my right arm, but then even that I couldn’t do anymore. You know that feeling you get when the rollercoaster suddenly stops and you just slowly pull back up to the gate. Like, WOW OH SHIT. That’s the type of feeling at the end. It slows down to an almost stop and then I know it is over. I can’t talk at the end I am wacked out. I feel about ½ of my body. I can’t feel my left side at all arm or leg. I feel virtually paralyzed at this point, I slowly start to regain my speech. I am a little disoriented. But I just have to wait for feeling to come back. So you know how that long rollercoaster is only like 60 seconds of a ride. Same deal here. You wait through all these warning ticks (like waiting on that line) you jump on the ride (start the seizure) and it’s over before you can stop being scared. Except I think a seizure is scarier, I actually like going upside down on rollercoasters, I hate these seizures. Screw Six Flags. I have seizures (and it doesn’t cost me parking, park admission, the piece of my car the monkee’s stole in the drive through safari, overpriced food and drinks and a souvenir.) So we get home about 5 minutes later, and now I have to try to get out of the car. My left side is really dragging and I still don’t have much function or feeling in my left arm. I tried walking up the stairs normal and my left leg kept dragging so I tripped up like 3 stairs so then I realized that I had to step up with my right leg first. I couldn’t judge the steps with my left leg it was dragging. I got inside and sat down a little while. I tried using the computer, but my left hand just laid there lifeless. And my right had was a bit tired too. My eyes were tired. I had to stop it was too frustrating trying to do something and my eyes being tired and my left hand wasn’t even moving. How was your Wednesday? Ok you lasted this far how about a shameless EBAY plug for me? http://members.ebay.com/aboutme/draculabear/ Later. 8:42 PM Tuesday, November 18, 2003   11/18/03 So this past weekend I went to just outside D.C. with my parents to see my brother and his new wife. We got to tour around D.C. a little on Sunday we didn’t go into any of the buildings / museums but basically drove around a bunch and walked all the important monuments. Wouldn’t you know it we are standing on the steps of the Lincoln memorial and the president and his 3 choppers come up out of the white house and circle around us and fly off. So I am safely admitting to seeing the president now. Well it’s the closest I will ever come to meeting him. It was almost surreal to see some buildings that you really only know from some dusty classroom history or from the back of money. We should all have to visit the capital when we are young to see how massive it is. But then again we wouldn’t appreciate it then anyway. Certain things people my age will never understand. The way wars used to affect us in this country is one of them. I think the closest thing we can compare to the country wide passion for things is 9/11. That seems to have brought about an impact close to Pearl Harbor. Even the Korean war, no one now knows about that. And the turmoil that society went through with the Vietnam war we will never know. Nevertheless my father was drafted into the war and went over in 1968. It is not something that we talk about over meals. My father did what he had to do. The government called him and he went in and fought for us. Was my father the most famous soldier to go and come back. To most people no. To me he was. Think about it I wasn’t born until 1973. If he didn’t come back, I wouldn’t be writing to you now (I know you are on a long journey to get to my point here). Like I said we don’t really talk about what happened there, it was a time that my father faced up to a responsibility and lived through a lifetime of experience in one year. My father was a hero in that war, and managed to come back and have a successful life her in America. A country he fought for, and he succeeded. He was a hero in combat and life. And for that my dad will always be my hero. I bring this all up because this weekend we were walking around D.C. and went to the Vietnam Veterans Memorial. I think my father has always wanted to go. In some sense there is a piece of his life on that wall also. I had mixed feelings about it. I had pride for what my father had done, I felt terrible for what he had to live through also. Things I will never know about, and he has kept inside for over 30 years, and will always live with. We walked the wall and then came out one end where there were the books where they list the names on the wall. My father was going to look up a couple people then turned away. I felt horrible and went and hugged him and told him I was sorry, thanks for coming home. Think about your own family and the past they have and never forget to thank them for doing it for you. Who knows they might be your hero also. Just like my dad’s mine. 7:44 PM Friday, November 07, 2003   So tomorrow I sell my car. How do I feel about this? My wallet is very happy to not be spending money on a car I can’t drive. What’s the Countdown to driving now? It’s still 6 more months I had a facial seizure this past Wednesday. I thought the irony would be now that I sold it I wouldn’t have anymore. Doubt it. How do I really feel about selling my car? It sucks. I dig my car. For those that don’t know, 2000 Black Mustang. I think the car is killer, not in a snowstorm mind you. In the snow that car will leave you high and stuck. Don’t let me fool you, but for getting up and going on a nice day, the car is a kick ass ride. We had some times. That’s the car I bought when the doctor said I could finally drive after my 6 month waiting period after my first brain tumor. I couldn’t afford much, but wanted a cool car. I used to dig that car out in the snow, even though I didn’t drive it last winter. I would still dig it out. I guess it was part denial, part I don’t know. But selling the car finally is like admitting to this thing in my life. It’s letting it win dammit. I am doing the right thing. I can’t drive when I don’t know if I will have a seizure and hurt anyone. But it is going to be a reality that this thing has taken that away from me to. I think part of the time when you are faced with this crap, survival is denial. Yeah you also have to deal with it. Hey I did my time in dealing with it all year. I wonder what the hell next year has in store for me? But I got 2 more months of surprise’s left in this year yet. My doctor said that my scans looked better again. So there doesn’t seem to be anything worse. At best my MRI showed some improvement in my head he said. There is nothing to show anything that is indicative of tumor activity. They can not see anything on a cellular level of course. What your cells are doing is always your own business. So for now things are stable. Hey I worked for this stability. It’s the rest of my life I keep in chaos and disorder. My platlets have been lower again. They have seesawed a bit in the last couple months. They were up then dropped again. Nothing is wrong with this it is just the platlets are the last thing to recover and nothing I can take to make my bone marrow recover. Once they recover I am due to go on a low dosage chemo maintenance program. The theory is to just give me a little toxic stuff to help keep the crap from growing back. It’s a weird feeling going back into the doctor’s office where I had my transfusions. I mean the people there are incredible. Really nice, one of those places where you know it is a job for these people but they must also really like working with the people that they see day and day out. But I do not miss going there at all. Especially in Morristown I am the youngest guy being treated there I mean by a good 30 years plus a lot of times. I mean that’s not to say that the people being treated there aren’t nice people, it’s just I feel way out of place. Makes you jaded to have to be the one in there like I should have had another 30 years to not to have to deal with this. I should be working my butt off now and trying to make a dent in my life. But I am on hold. I guess a lot of us are on hold just in different ways. Some out of work, some in work, some sick, others just can’t get out of their own way. Quitcherbitchin. To continue the old war story: with anesthesia it is like a hit and miss practice in a way. Everyone seems to react differently. So one of my side effects I had was muscle fatigue. So the only activity I had in bed was eating. The thrill of the day is filling out those hospital menus. Choose between cardboard and cheese and apple acid juice, old lettuce salad, you know the type of choices or maybe you don’t. If you know someone in the hospital and they are not on a restrictive diet bring them outside food. Do it now. I will wait here, I am serious, I am not joking…. So back to the muscle fatigue here’s how it felt. I would eat one spoonful of that hospital jello, and once I got one spoonful to my mouth my arm would be burning like the last set in a crazy weightlifting session. You know that burn when you can’t do one more, but for me it was just resting between spoonfuls. So when the anesthesiologist came to talk to me. I told him to do away with the 3 day muscle burn. They did for the second operation. So I went through the burning you know what, the burning arms, I did the brain mapping. No new seizures the whole week just like I told them. I was in the room with 3 other people, most of them had some sort of seizure problem. Towards the end of the week there was a girl from Japan in there I think. They would let her get up and walk around, even get up and go the bathroom on her own, the trouble was the poor girl would have random seizures all the time. Here I was using the damn pee jar thing, not having seizures, and this girl was allowed up and around I was a bit jealous. And I was scared for her safety, she should have stayed in bed. I worked the system a bit though. They have this chair bathroom thing for the number 2 events (are you with me here). I was not going to do that in bed. So I waited until I got the nighttime round doctor came around, I figured he was an easy mark, and I asked him if I could use that chair thing, and he said yes. I was on my way. So I will skip the old people magazine they gave to me, and how I sat on the chair behind my private curtain, there are no more details, so I will skip the rest. I made friends with a woman diagonal from me Debbie, we still send Christmas cards, good people. No one in the world would operate on her. Dr. Doyle my surgeon was willing and believed he could help her. And he did dammit! She has been doing better ever since her operation. There were a few other people through the room also while I was there. But the nurses and doctors were all great. If you can just hide out there and not get cut up, the people are great. So anyway back to some gore. I had to wait out the week until Monday the 25th for my operation. I made it through the weekend with visitors, and bad food. Then the 25th came. They wheeled me and my wires down to the operating room. My surgeon came to see me before the operation to see if I was ready. If I said no, what would happen? The guy had a piece of my skull on ice. So he asked if I had any questions. I said yes, what if while we are in there you realize you have the wrong person’s skull bone? He said well then we will send someone out quick to get yours then. I felt better after he told me this and I was ready to go. Go figure? So I don’t remember anything really for a while. I woke up with another catheter feeling crappy. Real crappy, the catheter is 75% of the discomfort. Now picture this I am laying there post-op all uncomfortable, rolling on my side to drain the dragon, my dad gets up and walks out of the room. He goes, I am going to the bathroom. So I said shut up show off. So I was just waiting around asking for pain med’s, I was on perkiset (sp?) for the whole last week. They were my wonder drug. And the hospital’s theory is not to put you on a regular dosage, but if you feel uncomfortable just ask and you shall receive. So by this time after my 2nd operation I was popping these things for like 8 days. I think they started to lose their punch when I asked when I could have more and they said a couple hours. So I just decided to suck it up and deal with what pain I had left. This was on Monday, Tuesday they had to take me down for a post operation MRI. So first they wanted to take out my catheter. Well you knew I wasn’t going to take this lying down. But I took it lying down kicking and squirming. The nurses didn’t know what the hell my problem was. I was bugging. I my defense the steroids they give you to help keep any swelling down, make a guy feel like he is PMSing. Men are not built to feel this way all wacky and emotional. So these 2 nurses come in for a standard tune up on me. One has to take out my artery line in my left wrist. The other has to pull out the zip cord on my ding a ling (I don’t think I ever saw them after this again). I was crawling up the bed bugging. The lady promised me it wouldn’t hurt, and I was squirming. The other nurse pulled out my artery line and I had blood squirting everywhere, (Mr. Kodak where were you?) And you thought the Paris Hilton video was supposed to be hot. This was me with 3 women!!! So my surgeons nurse practitioner happened to be around (lucky her). Heard the ruckus and came in. When it was all said and done, it wasn’t bad. She asked if I wanted to put off the MRI I said no I will go. She wanted to give me a valium to help me calm down. So then I started arguing with her that I didn’t like taking anything and didn’t want to start a habit? HUH? I don’t know where I got that from, so she said it isn’t habitual it is medicinal so I took it. Needless to say by the time it kicked in I was so happy to be in the hospital. I was telling people around me that this was a great place to be. Meanwhile my head is wrapped in a gauze turban. I look like a wounded soldier. The MRI tech said that they should have given me the valium before the ripped it out. Where was he when I was exposed? To be continued Sometimes It Snows In April Tracy died soon after a long fought civil war, Just after I’d wiped away his last tear I guess he’s better off than he was before, A whole lot better off than the fools he left here I used 2 cry 4 tracy because he was my only friend Those kind of cars don’t pass u every day I used 2 cry 4 tracy because I wanted to see him again, But sometimes sometimes life ain’t always the way... Sometimes it snows in april Sometimes I feel so bad, so bad Sometimes I wish life was never ending, And all good things, they say, never last Springtime was always my favorite time of year, A time 4 lovers holding hands in the rain Now springtime only reminds me of tracy’s tears Always cry 4 love, never cry 4 pain He used 2 say so strong unafraid to die Unafraid of the death that left me hypnotized No, staring at his picture I realized No one could cry the way my tracy cried Sometimes it snows in april Sometimes I feel so bad Sometimes, sometimes I wish that life was never ending, And all good things, they say, never last I often dream of heaven and I know that tracy’s there I know that he has found another friend Maybe he’s found the answer 2 all the april snow Maybe one day I’ll see my tracy again Sometimes it snows in april Sometimes I feel so bad, so bad Sometimes I wish that life was never ending, But all good things, they say, never last All good things that say, never last And love, it isn’t love until it’s past 9:59 PM Saturday, November 01, 2003   I had to start getting the funds together to pay off my car today. Monday I will go and fed-ex ford motor credit what I owe them. Then I will get the title back and then my baby-doll (my car) will be gone. I dig that car. I got to see my nieces for the first time in like about 11 months today that was nice. They beat the hell out of me, but what good is an uncle unless you can climb on his back sit in his lap, play monster all that stuff. I feel bad I don’t do more for them. But I am going to excuse this year, I was busy. Hey I use that excuse for everything else this year. So when I was at the doctors Thursday. I told him that there are some nights I literally watch the clock, every ½ hour 11:00, 11:30,12:00,12:30,1:00,1:30,2:00, 2:30, 3:00 (and I start thinking, ok I only have to lay here like 4 more hours.) Most of the time I am tired enough to fall asleep, but some nights, I just don’t, and it wipes my whole next day. Plus being tired, run-down, stressed are all great ingredients for seizures. So he prescribed something for me to take on the nights that I can’t sleep. He wrote on the prescription for insomnia. It is almost weird, I mean that is what I told the doctor I had, but I would never have called it that. I guess I am in denial about my conditions I don’t know. But when a doctor throws conditions at you or names your problems it seems a bit shocking I guess. I mean hear I am discussing a few odd nights a month and I have been through 3 brain surgeries, if that didn’t shock me what will? All in all the last brain surgery I had was a cakewalk. I recommend it to everyone. It’s chemo everyone should avoid. At all costs! So to continue my old war stories here we go. So last time we left I was getting all prepped by my new doctors on my brain surgery, and how it was going to be a 2 part operation. See the a couple posts ago if you are not up to snuff. So on Monday October 18th 1999 I went to the table. They wheeled me down to the table and opened me up. I woke up post op, pretty uncomfortable. I now had like 20 wires sticking out of my head. Before I left post op they pull your catheter out. Now here’s the problem. I got a nurse that does NOT want to be there that day. And maybe she has men issues. I don’t know. For those of you that have had a nice life without ever experiencing a catheter I will explain. They put you under then put a tube down your jimmy, when it is in there they blow up a balloon that sits in your bladder this helps to make some pressure so the pee comes out the tube. OK enough about that. Back to the monster, I believe to this day she did not deflate the balloon enough and pulled out this balloon out of my you know what (Every man can say OWWW right now). Exactly I was in pain for 3 days. As if the whole vacation wasn’t enough fun already, they injure my you know what. So I was now moved out of my private room and into a room with 3 other patients. The set up is a patient in each corner of the room. It is a pretty big room, so you all have your space, plus don’t forget we have divider curtains for our privacy when we need it. But in this room we have 2 nurses on duty 24 hours a day. Not the same ones they come and go in 8 hour shifts. But always 2 nurses in the room just for us. Plus my head is hooked up to a machine with these 20 or so wires. And a video camera is on my 24 hours a day that is running video tape on me. You see as they rolled me back to this new room they told me they were hoping I would have a seizure. This way all these machines could record it. I told them flat out, well unfortunately you are not going to get your data because I am not going to have another one of those. Aries we are stubborn, but I didn’t have another one in the hospital. One thing I skipped over for the squimish after the surgery they also had a drain tube out the back of my head held in by a staple, this was to drain off excess blood, nice. But anyway let’s get to this grid I keep talking about. The whole point is to stimulate it so they can map the outside of your brain. Great this should be fun. So the big day for mapping comes, they tell me this usually will stimulate a seizure, but it isn’t a real one since this guy will be stimulating it. And just let them know when it happens they will hit me with some drugs to calm it right in my vein, ah modern medicine. I wish I could carry this needle with me daily, except, could you imagine trying to inject while seizing, ok skip the needle. Early in the day they hit me up with some dope to mellow my noodle out for this test. Then this guy comes in with what looks like a 1970’s stereo amp, you know the look, silver front with big dials and some wires that he strategically hooks up to wires that run to the map in my head. This all applies to this rough picture on paper. The deal is he sends in little electrical impulses to see what will happen. This is painless, remember the brain feels no pain. Unless of course an impulse hits my brain sac which I might feel a burn. So he starts the test. This should be your left hand and my left hand raises. This should be your tongue and my tongue wags. Left thumb. Etc. When he gets to my eye I think, he trigured the seizure, so I yell out seizure. The nurse comes over hits me in the vein. Seizure ends. Now I am high as a kite. Now you are talking about a guy who the only drug he did was drink. So now you are hitting me with heavy narcotics. So now the hallucinations start. Something totally new to me. You know those metal poles that are all over hospitals that they use to hang bags off of to feed you crap. I watched one of those bend in half. And the right side of my bed I just knew that I couldn’t look there because there was this rotten decaying green, yellow and black torso corpse. So I didn’t look to the right of the bed. The guy doing the test had black hair of his hand and fingers, and he held out his hand and I saw the hair fall off of his finger. FREAKY! Later that night I saw a moth fall from the ceiling and go down my girlfriends shirt. Psst, it was never there. Heavy stuff. I even asked them is there any way you can take the edge off? They said um, no. So is this what people feel like when they are stoned, well our stuff is a little more pure. The whole test wasn’t that long and I was so wasted I just wanted it over. But imagine some guy sending low voltage to your head and making your body do things you didn’t ask it to do. So more drama was in store for me, I was supposed to go in for mapping surgery Monday and removal surgery on Thursday. But they were mad I didn’t have a seizure on film and with the wires in my head so they pushed my surgery to Monday. I was one pissed puppy needless to say. My surgeon found out I was mad, and stopped by to visit me. He said the team of doctors really wanted to wait longer, and it wasn’t him. Dr. Doyle was as Rock N Roll as a doctor could be, the guy is a brain surgeon, but don’t let it fool you. He is all about Rock N Roll, Very cool guy and wanted me to be comfortable the whole time and offered to roll it to Sunday if he could, I said Sunday or Monday really didn’t make a difference, and on Monday he would have his “A” team of doctors with him. So Monday the 25th it was. To be continued…. 8:29 PM Friday, October 31, 2003   Sometimes I feel so happy Sometimes I feel so sad Sometimes I feel so happy But mostly you just make me mad Baby, you just make me mad Linger on your pale blue eyes Linger on your pale blue eyes Thought of you as my mountain top Thought of you as my peak I thought of you as everything I’ve had, but couldn’t keep I’ve had, but couldn’t keep Linger on your pale blue eyes Linger on your pale blue eyes 9:35 PM   Halloween. Well it’s been a weird day!! A guy called from Staten Island to check out my car today. For those who don’t remember because of the seizures I haven’t been able to drive all year. So I have been making car payments and paying insurance on my car all year. And he bought the damn thing!! Go figure. I gotta get the title from Ford now, and then the car is his. I am gonna miss that car. Even though I can’t drive it, I love the car, and just having it there meant at least I still had a car. Now watch I won’t have any more seizures now that I sold the car, fat chance. I got a call from my new Neuro-Oncologist, he had the results of my new MRI I went for yesterday. From what he is said in comparison to my last MRI (August 26, 2003) this new MRI is even better than the last one. The hole in my head is closing up which suggests no tumor activity in there. On the scans they don’t see any tumor residue either, but there is nothing that can tell them anything on a molecule level. But these MRI’s are the best way they have of looking in there. So there maybe it took me 2 times but I might have got this thing kicked. If I could just kick this little seizure hobby, I would be happier. You can’t have everything. Don’t you know that by now. 7:57 PM Wednesday, October 29, 2003   Some anniversaries I forgot to mention this month. October 11th 1999 was when I was diagnosed with the brain tumor 4 years ago. I made 3 years clean then re-diagnosed last November. October 18th 1999 – first brain surgery October 25th 1999 was when they pulled the junk out of me in my second brain surgery. October 27th 1999 the Yankees won the world series, but if you know me I didn’t care then or now, but my surgeon came in to tell me the first biopsies said that the tumor was non-cancer, I said I could kiss him, he told me I could hug him some other time! October 29th 1999 Friday they kicked me the hell out of the hospital after a 2 and a ½ week trip. Just some history to the brain blog. Did I celebrate this stuff this month? Not at all, why celebrate it when it came back, I am just thinking of this now. 8:27 PM   So here I am doing a recap. I am going to take you back 4 years from now to when I found out that I had a brain tumor to begin with. So if you haven’t heard this here it is. If you lived through this with me, maybe you forgot some of this. Read it again. I typed it you read it!!! So life starts to change when we hear my company is being sold. But for the day to day activity is still the same, until someone officially tells us what is going on. They had gotten some vouchers for us to get some computer training. When you can get a day out of the office and they are letting you learn something, go for it. So that morning I trek into the city. The training center was in this building on 34th street right over Madison Square Garden killer view of the city from like 23 floors in the air. The class I took was with several other people from my office. It was an intro class to Excel. The class takes all day. We got through the whole morning some of it pretty mundane, but a few new tricks. We broke for lunch and went to Wendy’s, a normal day by anyone’s standards. On the way back from lunch, one of the guys said he wanted to go to the bathroom. I think I went before lunch so I was OK, but went for the walk anyway. So the bathroom was on the right side of the bathroom I had been to it earlier. All of the sudden my head pinned left, I was like what the hell? I heard the guy with me say, “Hey Bob here it is you passed it.” So I headed for his voice I said, “Doug I need your help.” “Bob what’s wrong?” At this point I couldn’t talk I think I got out, “Sei Sei Sei…” As if I was trying to say seizure. Then As I fell everything went black. From what I was told Doug caught me so I didn’t fall, and I think my other co-worker Jeff was bugging out. Doug told Jeff to go call 911. So Jeff who probably wanted to pass out himself ran into the hall and yelled for someone to call 911. Remember this wasn’t our office and here is this stranger running out of the men’s room yelling call 911. Now the only thing that ever happened to me like this was the day before when I was having a conversation and while I was talking my head turned left. It was weird because I was having a conversation and without my control my head just tanked slowly all the way left. I never lost my train of thought but when it was done. I was like what the hell was that. I didn’t turn my head left myself. I drove home that night that was the scarier part in looking back. So the next thing I remember was waking up and having a lot of people there with me in the men’s room. There was Doug, Jeff, the owner of our company’s assistant, who was a woman, in the men’s room, who let her in here!! And there was 2 medics asking me questions. I knew the answers and then they were like well we have to take you in. I was like wait a minute I am not going anywhere. I have to go back to my Excel class and we have to go back to work later….. They said, no you are coming with us. But just know I went out kicking and complaining. So we are on 34th street and instead of going to NYU on 34th and first they take me to St. Claires on 50th. First bad move right there by the medics, but we won’t get into that yet. They take me in and ask me a bunch of questions, all routine, take me in for a Cat Scan, the whole time Doug who came with me is waiting in the waiting room. Now you know unless you show up with a major gun wound you wait in an Emergency Room, so eventually I get taken to a Cat Scan to peek under the hood. Then they brought me back to the E.R. The woman on one side of me (behind the proverbial curtain) is a pregnant junky. On the other side of me (behind another curtain) is a man sick with aids, he is getting quizzed if he has been careful and told all his sexual partners. I am having a good time, by now my parents have shown up. They come in and ask me what’s going on, I told them of course I don’t know. Then a doctor shows up and tells them he has to talk to me in private. So he throws them out of my curtained room. And I remember he leaned over me as I laid on the gurney, and said, “You have a brain tumor.” So right there I don’t know what the hell he is talking about and I am about to punch out world. I figure it’s a wrap, I am done, what do I know? So they tell me I am staying for the night. Great! They also tell me they don’t have a department to treat me there but they will send a neurologist to see me the next day anyway. And I am being made to stay here, why? So this is my October 11th, 1999 what were you doing on that day? Nobody else probably remembers that day at all! Side note Doug was sitting in the waiting room right next to my parents and they didn’t realize they were both out there for me. I think there was a really smelly homeless guy the hospital kept out there that everyone was pre-occupied with supposedly. The next day I am just hanging around. Some budget neurologist comes to see me. He sends me for an EEG. To check what’s doing up there. But again there is no department to treat me there. So I get a call about a doctor at NYU to check with. He came under recommendation of a person who went through this and researched doctors. So I called him left and left a message. Around 7pm I got a call back. He said I needed to get out of St. Clairs (By now even I knew this). But said either get to Columbia or NYU. I was impressed that he didn’t just say I had to come to him. I said can you put in a transfer for me to NYU. He said if that’s what I wanted he would put in the order in the morning. So first thing the next morning I had to sign off on my transfer, and wait for an ambulance to drive me across town. I did get one more visit from the budget-neuro doctor. He came in and said, “So you’re getting transferred?” I said, “Yes I can’t get treatment here so I am going to NYU.” So he replied, “Well good luck.” And left, they tried billing me like $350 for that (which they did send to my insurance company after they shook me down for it) So that afternoon I got another ride in an ambulance to NYU, and I started getting some results and answers about this crap dammit!!! And my accommodations kicked ass, a solo room, overlooking the river nice digs!! There were a couple calls made I heard to push me into such digs. But the people were great there. All the nurses were really nice. I had a camera mounted on the ceiling watching me and taping me 24 hours a day. I had a private bathroom and shower, which I quickly demanded to be able to use. It had been 2 days! So there I am and now if I can even remember it, they start parading doctors in to see me. My dad was there like 16 hours a day. Some people came down from the job. My old companies original owner had announced when I went into the hospital, that he sold the company, but the gossip that went on during that was, did you hear Bob is in the hospital (There I was stealing the mans thunder on his day). He finally climbed high enough in his years of hard work to reap the rewards and I try to steal his thunder! So they tell me after an MRI and some other tests that we are going in for some standard brain surgery for my tumor. Wait a minute standard surgery for a brain tumor, can I get a week to think about it (NO). They tell me I have to have a 2 step process. The first surgery, they open me up and put in a grid with wires that come out of my head. They use this to map my brain for the second surgery. They map my brain with little bolts of electric to my brain, but more on that later. So meanwhile during this time a piece of my skull stays out of my body on in a freezer somewhere in the hospital. But again even with all this crazy planning, all the doctors and nurses are great. To be continued… 8:21 PM Thursday, October 23, 2003   Any new occurrences? Not really. Nothing really happening. I had a 2 week reprise from doctors which was nice. I went yesterday and had my blood checked again. My platlets are a little low. Nothing dangerous, they are still riding the rollercoaster up and down I guess. I have another appointment next week in the city on Thursday the 30th. I have to meet my new neuro-oncologist, and get a new MRI. I am thrilled 45 minutes in the tube with an injection. Just once let me get away with going to the doctors without something going into my veins!!! I mean these people aren’t talking to me for my personality but rather for my mental defects. So we will see soon I guess what this new scan shows. So I have to go back to my local Morristown doctor in 2 weeks by then he should have a report on my scans. 2:46 PM Sunday, October 19, 2003   It’s weird the way you start to think when you don’t have complete control over your body. In this I mean the seizures that I still seem to have that strike randomly. Whenever I am out it is a huge stress for me. I look around a room and always think, “OK, where would I run to hide it out if it strikes. I think of everywhere I go like that. If I take the bicycle around the corner I think about hitting the dirt. At a wedding I attended the other week, I thought the table clothes make under the table the perfect place. I search out nooks where I can go and hide out the storm. I try not to think about it at all but the anxiety is always within arm reach. Thinking about the actual experience of it is the worst. There is no explaining the feeling unless you have ever had no control of yourself. But even then, you lose feeling in parts of your body, so you don’t even feel everything happening. Afterwards is the craziest, not feeling your whole left side speech slurred, not being able to move to get up or roll over. Imagine your body being a skipping record, and you know how annoying that is, ok maybe some of you only know how annoying a skipping CD is. Then imagine you can’t get it to stop. During the whole thing sometimes I feel a pulling backwards, I don’t know if that is a twitching thing or a mild in and out of consciousness. Because sometimes when I am falling asleep I feel the same type of slipping away. I have a reaction to anesthesia the same way. After surgery for a week or two it is hard for me to fall asleep. I keep thinking that I am falling under. For anyone that’s ever been put under it is weird because you are passing out not under your control. So falling asleep is the same way. I would imagine if you die peacefully it’s gotta feel the same way. So I guess my mind gets messed up from that (hey my mind is messed up enough already). So it takes like a couple weeks of falling asleep for it to go away. It’s almost funny I am just about to fall asleep and I jump up, like I am fighting sleep. But my mind is just fighting slipping away. I guess I really do have some fight to live instinct or something. But enough fun stuff for now we could get back to that fun stuff later. DJing is weird. I have done a ton of private parties. There are certain families I have seen several times in a year. They have parties for everything. Then you have families like mine, you are lucky if there is a wedding, but don’t worry we will get you on the other side at the funeral. Heck I am a rotten uncle that misses most birthday parties for my nieces. For that 4 hours you are playing music you have to be up, the encouraging life of the party. Dealer with drunks that like music, people who think their music is the best, no I won’t play light my fire at a wedding. It’s the type of situation where for me, before and after it’s like having mood swings just to get the energy up. So before a gig and after grumpy is around, think about it I have to hide grumpy for those whole 4 hours. I think this especially happens when I am doing gigs by myself and I don’t have someone else to bounce energy off of. Everyone thinks it’s such a great gig. Well you have to enjoy it on some level. For me number 1, it pays great for the time you put in you do great. I think I finally figured the whole thing out when playing to a crowd that loved cheesy disco one night, Djing, it’s not the job that sucks, but the music. You will have crowds that want to stay on one genre all night and that sucks, you run out of killer songs from that time after awhile. But after X number of jobs am I psyched about it, nah. I mean fun for me is something at least different. A biker event when you can blast out any rock you want is cool. 8:55 PM   Your prison is walking through this world all alone 11:57 AM Saturday, October 11, 2003   Where did it all go wrong? You get old. You start looking back at everything in your life. Everything in your life gets a glossy coat. Even if someone shits on you, your mind can rewrite history and you can think of that person. You wonder where they are what they are doing. Sometimes I think like when I think of a person and place. Maybe they are there, like some freaky psychic connection and they are opening the memory by being in that location. Or maybe they are thinking of you also, and that is how the mind works it brings up a positive thought. But how does this theory work if that person that is thinking of you is thinking bad thoughts, like how much of an asshole you were. Convoluted theories that mean nothing or anything you want to believe. Life’s like that I guess good for what you want it to be. Hey remember what Bret Michaels said “Give me something to believe in” (Him and Bon Jovi are the great philosophers of our time!) Too much time breeds too much thinking also. So where did it go wrong. The common answer is the childhood trip. Was I the weird one growing up? Were you? I mean I did grow my hair long. I did buy a motorcycle, but those were days that I stayed busy enough so dust didn’t settle on me. You didn’t look back, you just moved forward, the good old days. I guess if you think you had a good little run it’s better than no run at all. The rest of your life you live vicariously through your little run. If you know what I am talking about then you are old too. But a sign of getting old is that you have slowed down enough to reflect on the past because your current life is empty. You have somehow slowed down, or lacking something, or your mind is just telling you that a part of your life was better. Remember your mind gloss’s over things. Think of a bad illness you had. You really don’t think of these. Pain is temporary, unless you are in it right now, then it is all encompassing. But once it’s gone its gone, your mind gets rid of the bad stuff. Convenient how that happens, must be a protection device, so why does the mind allow bad people in your life? “God” gave man free will, and that allows us to make every mistake ourselves. Even if you outlined in a book every teenage mistake and it’s consequences, teens would still have to roll the dice on at least ½ the risks to gamble the consequences themselves. That’s just the way it is. What do you get out of it. Hopefully you have bonded some friendships so you can commiserate about your good runs together. I have bonded a lot closer with a small group of friends even more in the past year. It makes it better and harder. They stick with you like bbq sauce on ribs to help you hang in there. But when you want to punch out you realize you can’t hurt them. It’s a double edged sword. When the cards are down and the pain is an 11 it is easier to punch out all the pain is gone. It’s amazing what doctors have to go through sometimes to save people. And what happens if you are left a vegetable, you were saved for a machine to keep you in limbo. There are some ways to live that aren’t worth living. I still contend if you have your health that is the 1st right of passage in this life. If you have something health wise holding you back, everything is that much harder. We bitch and moan about so much but if you are able to bitch and moan you are still breathing do it and get it over with. One thing we can’t buy back with all the money in the bank is time, wasting it sucks. Regrets are a horrible curse, if you don’t do or try something you can never go back to that time, you can’t change what you do. Sometimes you can’t change what you say or do here or now, and you can never come back to now to fix that. Maybe I am the only one not having fun anymore – not bitter! Life’s like mayonnaise soda. Life’s like bacon and ice cream That’s what life’s like without you. Life’s forever dealing in hurt Now life’s like death without living that’s what life’s like without you So, so here we are again in the attic of trash seeing what rattles. It’s easy enough to say what’s wrong, that’s not what I want to hear all night long. I want to walk baby not be carried out I don’t want to give it up I’m not meant to be married I am no dog you tie up and put in a parked car 6:05 PM Thursday, October 09, 2003   So I went to the doctors today and guess what my numbers were all pretty solid. How about this, he told me to skip my next appointment and come back in not one but 2 weeks. How crazy is this. This is the first time I am going 2 weeks with out a doctors appointment in like 8 months or so. I used to see people that were coming in for their monthly blood check ups and be envious. I might just become one of those people one day. I was up to 4 days in one week on the worst weeks. And now I am aiming at 3 times in one month big change. I guess that has to be positive. 9:12 AM Tuesday, October 07, 2003   So where are we at? Well the blood is doing ok. The platlets are a little low but whites are up, and I will forgo juggling knives any day if I can eat whatever I want, and not have to worry about germs. I got over the shop rite “event”, went to see Billy Hector. Unbelievable. The guy is a vampire that doesn’t age, but his talent is like wine and always gets better. Never pass up Billy Hector. I got to talk with him for a minute after the gig. I was trying on each break, but the guy gets busy with fans, and dammit the women love Billy. No guy has a chance when Billy plays, it’s Billy’s house! So at the end I got to grab him for a minute. I said, “Hey Billy, my girlfriend called you earlier in the year about me, I went in for some surgery for a brain tumor and all yadda yadda, he looks at me oh yeah… hey there is another friend of mine here going in for brain surgery, do you have any words of wisdom. I said well the first time I did it, my friend wrote to me fuck that tumor and that helped keep me on track. So of all the random nights, I finally get to see Billy with some of my friends that picked me up, and there at the club is a woman going through the same surgery, non-cancerous. How weird. I have been trying to see him all year and on that night there is another head case. Well she goes this month and I know she will kick ass. Fastforward to last Thursday I went into NYC for an EEG and a doctors appointment. I met a new Neuro-Oncologist I think I am going to use that works with my current doctor and is seeing a lot of patients from my doctor who moved away. I told them about my shop rite seizure. I got a once over they talked about uping my medications and I discussed staying out on disability because I really don’t feel up to the work thing right now and they agreed. So then I got to go to work with some friends from my old job. This guy Tim had organized it and got Rocker Diva Lisa and Party Diva Molly to attend also (3 of the many laid off musketeers). It was a very cool lunch and great to see everyone and not at the office but in a social setting. Big props to Tim the social coordinator of all things lunch! Seeing close friends from work make you realize the things you liked about your workplace, and not seeing those people anymore stinks. Fast forward to Friday. We went to Brooklyn for some parties we had to attend. We pack up the dog, abandon the cats, iguana, and fish and go! Friday’s excitement. Well we got to Brooklyn settled in and wouldn’t you know it BANG. I get another big one. I go into the living room, I lay down on the carpet. Twitch, twitch twitch. I am face down, and I can feel my face just rubbing away at the new carpet. My arm starts to go a bit. Twitch, Bang, Bang and the hits keep coming. This is turning into a bad day. Bang Bang Bang Bang Bang Bang, Release, twitch, pull, twitch. DONE. I have no feeling on my left arm or I don’t think below the waste. The insult to injury is my right side of my face on my cheek bone I have a rug burn from my face rubbing on the carpet. So Mo who is sitting with me through the whole fish out of water experience drags me over to the couch. I see my left arm plop down but it might as well be someone else’s arm because I don’t feel it. Man I hate these things. Why they gotta mess with me. Reset the Bob’s never gonna drive clock. I have never had more than one in a day. So one relief I get is if I have one I am set for the day! Hey you have to grab onto the little things to relieve you. Fast forward to Saturday, we are traveling to a 1 year old birthday party. I am a bit wound out in the morning. I am hoping nothing will happen, and at the same time I was kind of thinking I hope something happens before I get there so I can get it over with for the day. Talk about talking yourself into it. So of course Bang. Twitch, Twitch Twitch The face starts going right there in the car. This one is short though maybe a minute of really just face twitches. So there it is. Over for the day, I paid my dues. Now my most recent theory is the fact that I spread my med’s out. Instead of taking them 3 at a time. I take one an hour for 3 hours. Then repeat in the afternoon and night. I haven’t had one since Saturday and haven’t heard back from the doctor yet. I go in tomorrow for a blood check, and I will check my drug levels also. Anything else new … not really just trying to stay sedated and on the level. I am questioning being in public at all especially alone, I live a big what if “it” happens. It stinks and who needs it. 4:05 PM Thursday, September 25, 2003   So I am realizing I guess that a lot of this blog is dark. I guess if you are feeling happy and want to take the edge off this is the place to come. And all those people that yell it could be worse you could be in a lot worse shape. So if I was would I have the right to bitch then as opposed to now? I dunno any-who. Big action this weekend I might actually go out on a Saturday night. Billy Hector kids he plays 5 minutes from my house twice a month, and I haven’t been out to see him since like Oct / Nov of last year before all this stupid crap. I have been wanting to go for months I was mad I couldn’t make his birthday gig. OK some of you non-believers don’t know the great Billy Hector. Go to www.billyhector.com quite possibly the most kick ass blues guitarist of our age (or one of). And he is playing the Stanhope house this Saturday. I have enough white cells so I am safe to be around people. So I have roped a couple friends into going I think and will mooch a ride off of them. I always thought about taking a cab to a show. I just don’t want to go anywhere alone now in case I have a shop-rite episode. I have to keep myself aware of my limitations. Some people might think I am self-limiting myself. But picture this: I say F it and go alone. I have a seizure, and no one there knows me. What if it got in the way of Billy’s performance, I wouldn’t want to upstage the MAN. So there is a positive swing to this page. Billy Hector Saturday, unless everyone backs out on me. Then I will bitch slap you all right here so don’t do it. Other news I don’t know nothing new. I have a couple doctor appointments next week, I will see what becomes of that and update y’all accordingly. And as always I add rants as they come along. Can TV be more morbid than parading the ghost of John Ritter out there on TV. HEY, look at this he’s dead but we can sell his last 3 shows for lots of money and then we will kill him off in the show (can you say jump the shark?) Carnavale on HBO I wish they would finally put some of all this set-up to use. It is like reading a book with 2 episodes of set-up. But the coming episode for the 3rd week looks good. I mean I thought the Sopranos started a lot of threads. This show is way deeper than that. When you stop the life train, take away the work, the running around, all the crap that distracts you from yourself, and having to deal with your own head, there are a lot of questions. There was a time when I used to run around like crazy, working 2 jobs, joined a gym, for all the free-time between the 2 jobs, bought a motorcycle to obsess about a new hobby, had a couple cats.. the works. I never stopped so I never had to deal with the questions or feelings, I kept a couple feet ahead of myself at all times. It wasn’t that bad of a time, as long as I never stopped, or else I would catch up to myself and have to deal with the emptiness that was there. I had all these plates spinning in the air and never wanted to drop one. I guess eventually I dropped the largest one and got sick. Then I just ran through that one like, “Fuck that tumor” and it kind of came and went and I denied the whole damn thing. I was also pretty medicated. I ran like a bat out of hell back to my life after a minute of drug induced stupidity where I almost thought I might change something. But then I figured why the hell should I? Well I got almost 3 years out of that run being 1 foot a head of myself. I no longer had as many distractions, but I did try to stay busy and work as much as I could. There was a small period where I didn’t actually work 2 jobs. Then BAM, it came back, and now everything has changed this whole year. I have been 2 feet behind myself the whole year, and it has still flown by, where I have accomplished nothing, well except that healing and chemo stuff… ok so I was pre-occupied with the drug stuff. But someone once said that the surgery stuff turns into a bad dream later on. And once you are past this chemo stuff you kind of block it out of your mind. Who the hell wants to remember that crap anyway? So now I am at another crossroad of trying to see if I feel up to trying to work again. I have a great fear about the crazy seizure trip. It obviously isn’t under control yet, and who wants to be on a bus or at a new job and have it sneak up. I kind of feel a new job and stress of work would work me up to be pretty stressed. I am trying not to think about it, but to procrastinate it a bit. I have to discuss it all with the doctor next week. My recommendation to everyone run as fast as you can 2 feet ahead of yourself at all times. If you start to ask yourself questions or have to deal with too many skeletons in your own attic run faster. I miss running. The questions to avoid is knowing why we do things. A lot of psycho-babble crap. What we are really looking for, what are we running from. Where we are running to. Why we do the things we do, act the way we do, look the way we do. OK if I still had my rock star hair do I would have almost looked like the greek poser guy on queer eye. He made me happy I cut my locks. Now more than ever I have been slowed down so bad, and think well I am on borrowed time and 3 strikes I am out. This seizure thing keeps me just in check enough so that every-time I think I want to sell the house buy a bike and ride off and start over somewhere else. My brain says… um yeah we won’t let you ride a bike. Wrong answer retard. So I get to thinking and I want to do better things with my time sometimes. Like how could I get involved to help people? Well I have to be able to get out of my own way first things first. I mean is someone wants to drive up to my house and pick me up so I can help them, then I can come up with a system. But usually people need you to come to them. And what do I mean with helping people. I don’t know exactly. That is the other problem. I mean the only way to make a living at it (not that I am trying to abuse the needy, it’s just the mortgage company doesn’t accept a check of good deeds at the end of the month) Is that you need some degree or something to really make a go at something. I mean I would not mind volunteering with some stuff. What exactly I don’t know. When I was in Morristown Memorial Hospital for what I call hell-week. There were some volunteers that came around at night to talk to people, there was one person that would play guitar, and another one that would give you a message. I never saw the guitar player I don’t think. The masseuse I just thought who would want to touch a guy that hasn’t had a good shower in like 4 days. Sponge / towel bathing is not the same. So vanity got in the way there. So like I was saying this one woman volunteer came around and you know me I can get to talking sometimes, and in the hospital it gets lonely, especially when you are isolated. There are those really beat times like after visiting hours to until breakfast. Those hours suck. During the day that is broken up by at least 3 meals and sometimes you get a visitor during the day and night. So it was cool we talked for awhile and I found out about what she did, and I told her about my condition and crap. There are also clergy that come around and talk to you, but not being a proper church going guy, I always feel like I am going to say the wrong thing or that I am a sinner or something, even though I am Presbyterian which is not really a very strict church. I don’t know. The point to this whole thing is and as this blog will show you, I can talk a lot and I always thought that maybe something like that is something I could do. Go to the hospital and just talk with people. If you can find an older person that could be a great experience I think. A lot of people have lived through so much. And many people get lonely. So I guess now that the cards are down and I am looking around maybe I am not supposed to go back to running so far ahead. I guess it breaks you down. Who knows people read what they want into anything and everything. So that is my inspirational story for today, Bob wants to help a little! Or a do-over of my life, but I aint getting that, because I would call a time out by 27 at the latest, and want another do-over so none of this happens. I want a trade in. A 14th chance at this life. 10:00 PM Tuesday, September 23, 2003   OK here is the skinny from my neuro-oncologist (head cancer doctor) about where I am at with my condition, I tried to through in a couple comments to explain some stuff you will see them in parenthesis. If you have any questions email me at b_blasser@yahoo.com. But most of this has some attached stories explaining more of these events in detail earlier in my blog. This covers some of my history with this hell in a compact version. Enjoy! It cost my insurance companies a lot of money to bring you this story. August 28th, 2003 RE: Robert Blasser Dx: Oligo-astrocytoma, Low/Intermediate Grade Recurrent DOB: April 12th 1973 (Current Age, 30 yr old) I met today with Robert to review his recent MRI of August 26th, and to discuss plans for his future management, in view of my imminent departure for California. (for those of you who aren’t aware on neuro-oncologist at NYU has moved to UCLA) I am pleased to report that his brain MRI remains entirely stable, without evidence of any new gadolinium enhancement. More importantly, MR multi-voxel spectroscopy and perfusion imaging are entirely without FLAIR/T2 residual abnormality being gliosis rather than residual tumor. (He is thinking that there is nothing new in my head, a lot of people knew that already and have been big supporters of the fact that my head is empty. But I have seen pictures of a brain in there I swear.) Robert himself, as you well know, has not recovered his blood counts following his last cycle of carboplatin/ temzolomide (the 2 chemo drugs I was on), and required a platelet transfusion yesterday, and is also re-starting Neupogen (shots in my belly to help my low white count) due to his ANC dropping again to 400/mm3. History of Present Condition: Robert initially presented on October 10th 1999 when he experienced a partial complex seizure: he was in the middle of a conversation with his girlfriend when he became aware of his eyes then his head deviating to the left; he was well aware of the event, was able to describe what was happening to him, jumped up and “snapped out of it”; the event lasted no longer than 20 seconds. The following day, while walking down a corridor at work, he experienced a second episode, his eyes move to the left, followed by his head. He walked to the mens room with a friend, asked for assistance, became incoherent, and dropped to the floor. He was apparently “out of it” for about 3 minutes. He was transported by EMS to St. Claire’s Hospital, where a brain CT scan revealed a right frontal lobe lesion. (Stay away from St. Clairs in the city if you can). Dilantin (Anti-seizure medication) was given and he was transferred to NYU on October 13th following consultation with Dr. Devinsky. A Brain MRI on October 15th revealed a minimally enhancing 3 cm x 3 cm lesion in the right posterior frontal lobe. On October 18th 1999, extra-operative functional brain mapping was performed, with placements of subdural and depth electrodes. (I went in for surgery to put a “brain mapping device into my head to help located the important parts of my brain for surgery. Basically they opened me up, put a piece of some material with electrodes on it, closed me up and left a bunch of wires coming out of my head. And oh yeah a piece of my skull was put on ice until my next surgery). No seizures were recorded. (They really wanted me to have a seizure while this map was in my head to locate the bad area, but I didn’t have one for them). On October 25th, a right craniotomy was performed by Dr. Werner Doyle. (Picture the coolest brain surgeon who loves the stones and zeppelin, only I would find this guy, he’s good!!) The post-op brain MRI performed on October 26th confirmed a near total resection of the tumor. (Dr. Doyle said I couldn’t have planted it better for him to remove). The pathology was called a difuse low-grade ganglioglioeurocytoma by Dr. Douglas Miller at NYU. Review by Dr. Marc Rosenblum at MSKCC yielded a diagnosis of low-grade oligoastrocytoma. (Don’t ask me I look up the names, but it seems all the doctors have their own nomenclatures for tumors). Robert was switched from Dilatnin to Tegretol, (again my current anti-seizure medication, I have been on it for almost 4 years). and subsequently followed with serial follow-up MRI’s, (first every 3 months for a year, then every 4 months then every 6 months which led me up to my 3 year anniversary of my tumor where I was caught recurring) which were entirely stable until the study of October 15th 2002. This study demonstrated some extension of the T2/FLAIR signal abnormality inferiorly to the operative cavity, without any obvious gadolinium enhancement. (Basically I had a recurrence on my motor controls side of my tumor cavity hole in my head, the wrong side to have the recurrence on) Accordingly, I referred Robert to Dr. Werner Doyle, who re-operated on him on January 17th 2003, with resection of the recurrent tumor. (He pulled out what he could). The pathology at NYU, reviewed by Dr. George Kleinman, was called a recurrent ganglioglioneurocytoma, but far more densely cellular than the initial tumor in 1999, with fewer oligo-like cells. The MIB-1 index (how they rate tumors) was also increased focally to up to 15%, compared with the initial tumor, raising the concern that this tumor was developing anaplasia (malignancy, this tumor was worse, they always are when they come back, they are more aggressive). Review by Dr. Marc Rosenblum, however, still held that the tumor was a low-grade oligo-astrocytoma. Accordingly, after much discussion with my colleagues as well as with Robert and his father, I elected to treat him first with as aggressive chemotherapy regimen on an NYU IRB-approved protocol, including temozolomide (150mg/m2/day x 5 days) and Carboplatin (AUC = 8 per day x 2 days), cycles to be repeated every 4 weeks for a total of 4 cycles. Robert has now completed his four cycles of chemotherapy, but has experienced, not unexpectedly, significant myelosuppression with delayed recovery, necessitating use of platlet and red cell transfusions, as well as Neupogen, and Neumega (and Procrit – they are all injections to help with my blood counts being suppressed because of the chemo-therapy). He has I believe required one or two hospitalizations (one and it quite possibly was the worst friggin week of my life) for febrile neutropenia (basically you have a bug or a cold and no white cells to defend yourself). Of note, concomitant with each 5-day cycle of chemotherapy, he experienced break through seizures, likely due to chemotherapy causing increased hepatic catabolism of Tegretol, resulting in sub-therapeutic levels. Impression and Recommendations: Clearly, any further therapy must await complete resolution of his pancytopenias. (getting my blood counts back) However, after his next brain MRI in 2 months’ (the end of October) time I would recommend his starting up the following “maintenance” chemotherapy regimen, which should be extremely well tolerated: (a) Temozolomide at 75mg / m2 / day x 42 consecutive days at bedtime followed by a 14 day break. (b) calcitriol 0.5ugm daily continuously. I would check his LFT’s every 2 months, and, at least initially, his CBC every two weeks. He must hold the temzolomide for at least one week if he develops any infection, cold or fever, etc. In review of his relatively low/ intermediate tumor status, his young age, the mixed (oligo-astro) nature of the tumor – all of which portend a much more slowly transforming tumor – I have not recommended either irradiation or myeloablative chemotherapy with autologous stem cell rescue to obviate the irradiation. Certainly, one more recurrence, and the latter approach is absolutely that which I would recommend. (great one more recurrence – hey now that I know what I am in for, I will chose wisely before anymore treatment dammit!) It has been a pleasure being involved in his care, and I do so much appreciate your own heavy involvement and commitment to his day-by-day management. Jonathan Finlay, M.D., Director, Neuro-Oncology Program The NYU Cancer Institute 2:56 PM   Things continue to evolve and change in my asylum I call a mind. Lately I have been wrestling with trying to get back to work now that the “labor intensive” part of this misery is over. This has been racking my mind a bit. I mean they aren’t going to let me behind the wheel of a car anytime soon. Everything I want which is to get back to having freedom in my life is not here with me. I have gotten my doctor visits down to once a week. That is pretty liberating. Things change and evolve with this whole condition. In the bat of an eye you can think you are 2 steps forward only to realize that you are still at the star square on monopoly, and you are never getting the dice. I have been making car payments, and insurance on my car all year. I haven’t driven it since December. Payment $370 insurance $120, that makes 5 bills a month to support a car sitting in my driveway, and the only safe way for me is on 2 feet and even that is questionable. Last week I actually took the mountain bike out for a ride, which inspired me to clean the dirt and grime that has built up over the years. I pulled the tires, cleaned between the sprockets type of clean. It looks good, and has taken some abuse. I was thinking about trying to get back to work, make it through the winter. And in the spring see where I am at, to see if I need to adjust my life, like if I was free to do as I wished. I would buy a bike and move to a better climate, sunny all year little rain. But life isn’t working out any way that I wanted it to. So we all know the adage that life can change in a blink of an eye. Friday we were in Shop Rite getting the weekly necessaries together. I was rolling the cart past the Entemans cakes, you know the rack that no one needs to buy from but we all do. BAM, my left side of my face starts twitching. I move towards Mo “Sei, Sei, S”, this is it, it is actually going to happen in public, twitch twitch twitch. One of my greatest fears has come true, twitch twitch twitch. I ran towards the bakery display, I just kind of wanted to hide somewhere, tick tick tick. This is another thing I have also thought about, where can I hide if it hits tick boom boom. So I got down to the floor and things just went out of control from there. Boom boom boom boom as it twitched my entire face, and I thought to myself, St… St… St… Boom boom boom, then it lulled a little, tick tick tick, I am thinking ok I am coming out. Then my hand got into it. So I think maybe trying to say stop is not helping boom boom boom. Behind me and above me I could hear people talking, boom boom boom. “Is he alright?” “Yes he gets these all the time” boom boom boom I mean hey you just want people to know nothing major is going on, I am just not in control of my frigging body. Boom boom boom “Can we get him anything?” “Do you need anything?” boom boom boom. Try a new brain! I want to turn over to see who these people are but I can not control my body. Boom Boom Boom. This is going on for like 2 minutes right here on the Shop Rite floor. Then finally, release I rolled towards my back and said,”Dun” “I’m o hey” Hey talking is really slurred at this point. I can’t really feel my legs or my left arm. Mo was holding me up. “Relax” “Don’t worry” Easy for everyone else to say they are all walking and talking. I made a plea to let me get up no one thought this was a good idea. Probably better off I don’t think I could stand. Someone showed up with a blanket, someone else with a cup of water. Then someone else with a bigger cup of water. The only joke I could think of which I kept to myself was, does this get me free groceries? Someone then rolled up the wheel chair cart. How old am I? I feel like grandma now. I don’t know who but they helped me up into it. So now I was sitting up. They gave me water to drink. I was shaking so much I couldn’t hold the cup. The manager of course doesn’t want me up and about, he suggests we use the wheelchair cart. The cart section is as big as a basket that you would carry in a store, of course this isn’t going to work. So I told Mo, to bring the basket over and I would use that to help me walk. She brought it to me and I stood up. At least I could hide the fact that I was using a walker with this thing. My left arm was numb and my left leg was kind of lame and dragging along with me. It was quite shitty. Mo was helping me steer because I was turning left a lot I think, I really couldn’t feel myself so I didn’t know if I was pushing or not. We went got some meat for grilling. I have a pretty good case of the dizzies at this point also. I just have to keep in mind that it is me spinning and if I hold hard enough to the cart it is not spinning, although it is on wheels. We went up the cereal aisle I went to grab a box or cereal I stuck my left arm out to grab it, and it just hung out there, the hand didn’t grab. Hello these are things we don’t even think about, there’s the box and you stick your arm out and the hand does its job. Well not the case on Friday, so I reached over with my right arm and grabbed the box. These are the times that suck. So we make it around the store, I make it up to the register and now I have to put all the stuff on that conveyer belt. I put my price plus card in my left hand. I of course couldn’t feel it there so I dropped it. Great I have to pick it up off the floor. Hey anyone want to take me food shopping now? This is my so called life. And I want to get back to work and commute why? Talk about turning my mind back again. “Just when I think I am out, they pull me back in again.” My mind is almost telling me, you aint going anywhere if we have anything to do with it. It kills me to think this is it. It is not going to get any better. I am that ticking time bomb that will never know when I am going to go off. No more driving, hell I shouldn’t be on a frigging bicycle. I could forget ever owning a motorcycle again. There was a small window in my life where I was free of this crap, and my own person, the rest of what I have on my undead clock is riddled with “events”. I can’t work independently outside of the house because I am bound to have a fit. I get caught up in thinking about it, and I don’t want to leave the house anymore. I don’t want to work, do anything. It gets you nuts. Do you know what it’s like to be held captive by your body. If you do then you understand. It is a crappy situation. To think that I to was free once but not no more. 12:42 PM Friday, September 12, 2003   The man has come around and taken Johnny Cash from us. If you haven’t gotten on the Cash-wagon the time to jump on is now. Pay your respects to the man in black. We have lost a great one. I have gotten onto a Cash kick in the past year, and have realized the music history in this artist. Don’t be afraid this has nothing to do with any Trisha Yearwood type of country this is good. Damn now all you band-wagon people are going to raise CD prices on half.com. “And I heard a voice in the midst of the 4 beasts and I looked and behold a pale horse and his name that said on him was death and hell followed with him….” “Everyone I know goes away in the end…” 7:58 PM   It’s been 2 years and there are those that say it is time to move on and heal wounds and forget. You are wrong. If you lived through it or around it you can’t forget or move on. It is something that is ingrained in your life. What these scum bags did to this country can never be forgiven or forgotten. There are people that died because the nature of their job was to risk life and limb to save people like you and I who just innocently went to work that day. There are the people that went in those 2 buildings that day just to put in an 8 hour work day. I dig John Lennon, but these people didn’t give peace a chance when they came and killed us. Our country has been way too lax with letting people live here. 1984 here we come. There are families, kids, parents that lost people that will never get over this waste. I remember at the time feeling like there was nothing I could do to help, but wanting so bad to go kill anyone involved in doing this. I figure if we bombed the whole region, took their oil we could build Las Vegas 2. People from all over the world would fly into these territories to gamble and we could dump all the profit into education for the USA. But enough about crazy theories, this is a never forgetter, you can’t walk away and put your head up your butt on this one. It is hardest for the families directly involved and then it has a ripple effect. If you live in this area almost everyone knows someone who was lost. There were some families who actually got closure if their family member was found. There are things you don’t forget wars, and the people that fought for this country and helped the effort, died for this country defending us so we can eat Klondike bars. Sept. 11th should never be forgotten, if just for those people that died for us. The whole situation was a spit in the face of our country. If all these hippy tree loving types that oppose us using force like to be spit on send them to live in these dictatorships to be stoned to death in place of our innocent lives. 7:49 PM