Day 113, Year 7: Leap Year Snow Event
Date: Wednesday, February 29, 2012
Weather: Mixed Sun and Clouds AM, Overcast with Wet Snow PM
Location: Brewer Fiddler’s Cove Marina, N Falmouth, MA
As all of you know, all days don’t end up like planned. In fact, many days
don’t end up as planned and today was another one of those days for Mark and
me. After our “bubbly night” we got up and found it quite pleasant outside.
We went to the clubhouse to take showers and then headed out to an
appointment with Mark’s oncologist. So far the day was going as planned.
But on the way to the doctor’s office, Mark got a call from a work colleague
at West Marine asking if he could come in to work this afternoon. He
hesitated as he had planned to put a second coat of paint on the beehive and
I had planned to cut his hair, but he wanted to help out, so he opted for
the afternoon of work. He will also work in the morning, so he is going to
have to go to New Hampshire tomorrow afternoon without that haircut. But
life will go on.
The appointment with the oncologist was routine. He will see Dr. Crook on
the Wednesday, Thursday, or Friday before his chemo treatment every other
Monday for the next six months. First they draw blood to check his white
cell, hemoglobin, and platelet counts. Then he meets with a nurse who
records any symptoms he has had since the last chemo treatment. By the time
he meets with the doctor, she has the results of his blood tests. Dr. Crook
was very pleased that all of Mark’s counts were at or near optimum levels.
She confirmed that the tingling fingers from the cold and the mouth sore
that he has are all par for the course, but otherwise, she agrees with my
assessment that he is doing great. She said that she gets the sense that
his normal activity level is a little higher than the norm and that it is
her guess that by the end of the six months, his energy level will be lower
for him, but maybe more like the average for many people. She thinks that
by October or November he will be back to normal. Watch out, world!
While Mark worked at West Marine, I kept Sam and Jonah. They both had
dentist appointments this morning and Jed had stayed home to take them.
They had just returned when I arrived. Jed left to go to work after
explaining that they were not to have anything crunchy to eat for the rest
of the day because they had both had fluoride treatments. After nap, Sam
was sad because he wanted a crunchy cookie. I suggested that we bake a cake
or chocolate chip cookies as an alternative. I told him he could eat the
cookies while they were warm and they wouldn’t be crunchy. But he decided
that a chocolate chip cake sounded better. We made Toll House Squares and
called that a cake and that pleased everyone. We stayed and had a sushi
dinner to celebrate the completion of Heather’s radio series that aired this
week. She produced four programs that gave a local perspective on global
warming. This week is bittersweet for her. The series has been very well
received with lots of positive feedback, but Climatide, the blog she started
almost two years ago is ending this Friday. NPR funded the blog through
WGBH in Boston with the hope that WGBH would continue it when the grant
funds ran out. But due to budget constraints, WGHB has decided not to
invest further in social media and to keep their focus on radio and
television. Heather will still be employed by them as a science reporter,
but will be doing a weekly call in show and radio reporting instead of the
Climatide blog. Understandably, she is having a bit of separation anxiety
after investing so much of her life into the blog for the past couple of
years. But since she doesn’t control the decision making, she knows she
just has to move forward.
I made Miracle Mineral Broth this afternoon at Heather and Jed’s. It is one
of the recipes from the new cookbook. Heather and Jed offered to get it in
the jars and into the freezer for me tonight. It smelled yummy, but we
didn’t even get a chance to taste it. When we do, and if it is as yummy as
it smelled, I’ll share the recipe. I got a couple of offers after my
comments in last night’s log for good friends to try out some of the more
complicated recipes from the cookbook for us. I didn’t really intend for
anyone to make such an offer, but it is a really great idea. Give good
friends a complicated recipe, have them prepare it, and then have them
invite you over to eat it. Why didn’t I think of this idea years ago?!!
I can’t end the log without talking about the weather. The bubblers are
going again tonight and the snow WAS coming down. It has now turned to rain
here on the Cape, but over the next couple of days there will be more
snow/rain mix. Who knows what it will be like when we wake in the morning.
Further north where we are headed tomorrow, it will be snow. We are just
hoping that by waiting until the afternoon we will have a bit of a weather
window where the roads will be clear even if it is snowing.
