November 26, 2003

The 1.5 year post-chemo CT Scan was last week, November 19. The 1.5 year post-chemo blood test occured about 15 minutes before it. The blood came out the left arm, the iodine went in the right. The right arm got a bruise. The left didn't. Does it have something to do with things going in or out? I don't know. I don't care.

I went today to see my lovely oncologist. The people who were in the room before me gave away their reason for being there all too readily. The room smelled disgustingly like cigarette smoke. I can't imagine that anyone would be in one of those rooms for more than 20 minutes, but they had managed to make the air in that room entirely toxic. So it smelled horrible. Then my onclogist came in and sat down, looked at me seriously and said, "So, you've started smoking" like she had found me out or something. I said, "Oh! No! It was the people in here before me!" like I was hiding something and she knew it. But that would be something that would give me the loser of the year award. "Cancer's nothing! I've got it beat! Light'er up! Bring it on!"

Anyway, she seemed sort of distraught and that worried me. She made me do the physical check-up first, so I thought she was avoiding bad news and when she made me take a deep breath in and out, the out breath was all shakey - an obvious sign of nervousness. But I passed the test.

Then I sat down again and she flipped to the back of my records folder. And she looked at a sheet, and sighed. Then she said, "Well your CAT Scan was really boring to look at. Nothing going on there, everything's normal, but that's good." Woo!

So that's it, one and a half years down. Not. Too. Bad.

I see her again in four months but that's it for the CT scans unless I have some reason for concern. If everything's good in four months, I'll see her every six months for awhile and then on we go.

Other than that, school is getting all too hectic right now and I just want it to be done. The calendar I made myself that gave me a visual reminder of how behind I was had an extra week added into it by accident. So I'm actually farther behind than I thought I was. And I thought I was pretty far behind. Great.

I'll be home in the O.V. on the 12th until the 31st. Then I'll be back on the Van Isle to give it my all for another semester of slack-assed (expensive) fun. I want to snowboard more this year than I did last year. The most snowboarding I've done in the past four years was during my chemo winter. Geez. Whataretheoddsofthat.

So, I've got work to do. Including that research report that is just going to be the end of me. The interviews went fine and dandy, now I've got to compile and analyze it all and like I know how to do that. Pssssshhhhh!!!!

OK dudes. High fives for my insides! Have a fun end of November.

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