Mar. 9: Post-it Note Tuesday #1

OK, I’m trying something new today because I’m nothing if not a big ol’ copycat. Jen E of MommaBlogsALot wrote a post on “stickies,” which can be made easily here. Then she added a link to her post over at Adventures of WannaBe SupahMommy, where she’s making new friends left and right. Seems like a fun thing to do, so I gotta play along. Here are my stickies for today, which have the theme of “randomness,” since it’s too early for me to form more than one coherent thought and by the way, shame on you for expecting anything else:

(And here’s my cork board background, if you want one too.)

Mar. 8: Handsome Men’s Club

Did you watch the Oscars last night? I thought it was kind of a yawner, but there were chuckle-worthy moments here and there. I loved Sandra Bullock’s speech. I loved that Avatar didn’t run away with every award. And I thought Helen Mirren, as always, looked better than most the women half her age.

Today I found this star-studded video from Jimmy Kimmel’s special post-Oscar show that I had to share. It’s almost 9½ minutes long, but you gotta watch until the end. And don’t blink—there’s a Taye Diggs moment not to be missed.

Mar. 8: They don’t tell you everything

Before I started chemotherapy, I knew I could plan on a few sure things: baldness, nausea, and fatigue. But there are so, so many other things that happen to a person during chemo that the doctors, nurses and a lot of books fail to mention. How did I find out about these things? When they happened to me. About a week after my first treatment I started noticing stuff going on with my body that I had not expected, stuff that made me go WTF, CANCER??? The baldness isn’t humiliating enough?

• For the first few days after each chemo treatment, everything that comes out of me is toxic. They say I’m supposed to flush twice, clean around the toilet with antibacterial stuff every time I use it, wash my hands eleventy times, etc. Why do I need to clean all around the toilet? I don’t dance while I’m sitting on it. I just sit. It’s insanity, I tell you. As far as the hand-washing, I do that like an OCD freak anyway, so no changes there. The one fun thing about being toxic is threatening to spit on people for those few days.
• My vision has gone all wonky. It comes and goes, the wonky-ness, but I can almost always count on it being bad. And the worst part is that sometimes it’s far-sightedness, and sometimes it’s near-sightedness—it’s inconsistent and annoying as hell. One minute I can’t read street signs or see my kid in his school play. Next, I can’t read the newspaper or focus on the computer screen. See? Annoying. As. Hell.
• Have you ever heard of chemo brain? I hadn’t. It’s totally a thing, though. Forgetfulness, stupidity, loss of the ability to speel words correlcty… I do not enjoy this one bit. I think chemo brain is similar to pregnancy brain or mom brain, but I don’t remember because I’m a dummy now.
• My skin is drier than normal, but not all over. It’s dry in patches. I’ve never had this problem in my life.
• Ugh, don’t get me started on my manicure. My fingernails have begun to bend at the tips. This is usually hereditary and/or a sign of low calcium, but even as I guzzle gallons of milk, it just gets worse. They’re also striped now—you can read my fingernails for my chemo schedule, just like a tree for its age. And then there are my cuticles—dry and hangnail-y like never before. I rub Bag Balm on them every night, but by morning you can barely tell. That could be because the cat loves the taste of Bag Balm, but I’m still blaming the chemo drugs. Oh, and professional manicures and artificial nails are out of the question—too much risk of infection.
• Approximately two weeks after each chemo, my neck and chest break out with an acne-like rash. I’ve bitched about this in recent weeks because I’ve never had an acne problem, EVER. It disappears right after each treatment and then comes back again about a week later. Fun! And so pretty!
• Yeah, they tell you your hair’s gonna fall out, but you kind of assume it’s just your long, flowing tresses that you’ll lose. Then one day you look in the mirror and see that girl in high school who shaved her eyebrows off for no apparent reason but she looks psychotic and everyone suddenly suspects she’s the one who pooped in the gym shower. Losing your eyebrows sucks BIG. Eyelashes too. The hair loss on the rest of my body, I’m not complaining about—that kind of maintenance I do not miss. But the eye hair! I curse the missing eye hair!
• The hair on my head did not come out at its roots—oh no, that would be too clean. Instead, it broke. It broke off right near the skin, but left a teensy root, like a practical joke played by Paul Mitchell himself. What this means is that my head is not smooth-bald, it’s stubbly-bald. Stubble is sexy on some guys, but not on my head. Worse yet is that between each treatment, the hair begins to grow back… and then breaks off again. I wonder if God gets a huge kick out of this. Someone must. It sure ain’t me.
• Don’t get me started on what chemo, pain meds, and anti-nausea stuff do to one’s digestive system.
• I’ve read in every cancer book about mouth sores and what a problem they can be. They are easily infected, can interfere with the ability to eat, are extremely painful, etc. I’ve had one small mouth sore and I think it’s not so much due to chemo, but because I bit the inside of my cheek while I was showing off blowing huge bubble gum bubbles for the kids.
• I’m dizzy a LOT. And not just the weird for-a-second dizziness, but the for-a-couple-minutes-I-might-just-fall-over dizziness. I’d do well to get myself a cane, but I don’t want to look like a pimp.
• This one I’m not complaining about too much: chemo can put women in a state of menopause. If my body starts in with huge hormonal fluctuations and hot flashes, I’ll be very upset, but for now, I’m fiiiine with menopause.
• Fatigue? Depression? I could go on for days about this stuff. I won’t though, because I’m too fatigued and depressed.
• I read about loss of appetite being common with chemo patients, often as a fear of eating due to nausea. And I’ve definitely experienced it—the oncologist said I’ve lost ten pounds since this started, in fact—but the odd thing is that it comes and goes, changing within seconds. It’s not like I don’t want to eat for a day or two; it’s more like I don’t have an appetite now I have an appetite here comes my food oh wait I don’t feel like eating this now I’ll take it home I’m starving I don’t want to eat. My tummy is a total food tease.
• Not helping the appetite problem is that my taste buds are different now. Things taste bland where they used to be delicious, or they taste metallic where they used to … not. This is something that happens with a lot of medications, and is a well-known chemo side effect. I hate it.
• I’ve been lucky not to have too much trouble with nausea. This was a huge fear of mine, after being rehydrated in the ER three times last year during particularly bad migraine episodes.
• I’m wetting the bed again. Not with pee, mind you, but with sweat. I have awakened several times on drenched sheets. What is with the night sweats? I’ve tried different types of sheets, different types of jammies, no jammies, a cold room, a warm room, no blankets, piles of blankets. Nothing seems to stop them. Am I running a fever? NO! So, um, again I ask, WTF, CANCER???

I have to just keep telling myself: IT’LL ALL BE OVER SOON. IT’LL ALL BE OVER SOON. IT’LL ALL BE OVER SOON.

Mar. 6: Cat + balloon = funny

Mar. 5: Inspiration

I love to read meaningful quotes. There are a lot about courage and hope and faith and healing and all kinds of cancer-related things, but to be honest, many make me angry. The stuff like “anything is possible if you believe” is total BS, in my opinion. Sure, the idea’s nice, and if it helps you keep a positive outlook, here’s an even bigger “yay.” But we all know that all the hope in the world isn’t necessarily going to bring people back to good health. If that were so, DUH—nobody would ever die, right? Maybe Hitler. Nobody else.

Call me a pessimist, fine. But I prefer “realist,” thankyouverymuch. It’s not that I’m hopeless about life in general, or specifically, how successfully my friends and I will be able to fight cancer. And weeding through piles of quotes, I can occasionally find something that really speaks to me, something that is beautiful and lifts my heart or gets me in FIGHT! mode. You might think these are just as BS-y as I think the others. Meh.

Since I just shared a bunch of quotes from Twitter yesterday, I’ll keep this post short, but I couldn’t resist these few:

Courage and cheerfulness will not only carry you over the rough places in life, but will enable you to bring comfort and help to the weak-hearted and will console you in the sad hours.
~Sir William Osler

 

Some days there won’t be a song in your heart. Sing anyway.
~Emory Austin

 

The only courage that matters is the kind that gets you from one moment to the next.
~Mignon McLaughlin

 

Courage is being afraid but going on anyhow.
~Dan Rather

 

I have heard there are troubles of more than one kind.
Some come from ahead and some come from behind.
But I’ve bought a big bat. I’m all ready you see.
Now my troubles are going to have troubles with me!
~Dr. Seuss

I love these about companionship:

Call it a clan, call it a network, call it a tribe, call it a family. Whatever you call it, whoever you are, you need one.
~Jane Howard

 

Remember, we all stumble, every one of us.  That’s why it’s a comfort to go hand in hand.
~Emily Kimbrough

Mar. 5: Lisa Schroeder’s new book

I’ve talked before about my author friend Lisa Schroeder, whose young adult novels have been published in the past few years. She’s got a new book coming out—her first mid-grade novel—on March 9. It’s called It’s Raining Cupcakes, and here’s the synopsis from Lisa’s web site:

Twelve-year-old Isabel dreams of seeing the world but she’s never left Oregon. When her best friend, Sophie, tells her of a baking contest whose winners travel to New York City, she eagerly enters despite concerns about her mother, who is opening a cupcake bakery. Includes cupcake recipes!

Katie’s been looking forward to this book’s release for months now because she’s grown jealous of me attending Lisa’s readings without her. Soon she’ll be old enough to “get” the young adult novels, but until then, she’ll have this one. We can hardly wait to read it! And is that book cover NOT the cutest thing you’ve ever seen???

Here’s the really cool thing: Lisa’s doing a reading/Q&A/signing at Powell’s Books at Cedar Hill Crossing on Sunday, March 14 at 2:00 p.m. Katie and I are definitely going—this will be her first time meeting a real, live author who can autograph her book, and she’s very excited. I’m hoping if you have a tween that you’ll go too! Lisa’s super-nice and an amazing writer, and I promise you’ll have a good time—come support a local author!

Are you craving cupcakes now? It’s not just me, is it? We totally need to treat ourselves to cupcakes afterward, right? See you at Powell’s!

P.S. This is not Chef Lisa Schroeder of Portland. It’s Author and Good Person Lisa Schroeder of Portland. Chef Lisa Schroeder owns Mother’s Bistro and Mamma Mia Trattoria and sounds wonderful in all the interviews she gives. Trust me, she’s anything BUT wonderful, and I know this firsthand; she single-handedly sabotaged our 20th high school reunion at Mamma Mia with her psychotic last-minute mind-changes. I wouldn’t be a bit surprised if she spit in all our food too. Evil. Pure evil.

Mar. 4: Even more witty twitters

Do I follow some witty twitterers? I sure do! Twitter names below link to their twitter pages so you can follow them too.

strutting That sense of delight and fulfillment that whispers in your ear, forever a fingernail's width beyond reach? It has a name. Quesadilla.

adamisacson O cruel circumstance! Why are we condemned to live in a world where IHOP doesn't deliver?

_mattie Dairy farming expenses? Railroad investments? Mining depreciation? Apparently I'm filling out IRS Form 1040-OldTimey.

scottsimpson "Half Marathon" seems unfairly diminutive. It should be called a "Ten Miles Farther Than Your Fat Ass Can Run."

essdogg If you ever want to turn a roomful of 3-year-olds into a violent mob, just make a joke about eating all the cake yourself.

FakeAPStylebook Use "gay" or "lesbian" to refer to people, "alternative lifestyle" to refer to Trekkies and Twilight fans.

JephKelley With the free Wi-Fi, I could work out of a Panera if they put a supply closet near the coffee stand so I can still steal pens and stuff.

FakeAPStylebook hyphen - SERIOUSLY, THE HYPHEN IS ONE OF THE BEST PUNCTUATION MARKS EVER-- SEE? AWESOME.

JephKelley One of life's biggest mysteries to me is why socks always disappear in the washer and dryer, and I'm also not sure where babies come from.

wordlust Sometimes a friendship is ruined by the smallest things, like feeding ants to babies.

scottsimpson If the name of your disease has an umlaut in it, you're fucked.

thedayhascome Just trimming my nose hair and drinking a soy latte. Damn it feels good to be a gangsta.

Remiel You can fool some of the people some of the time. So just fool those people into eating the other people, and you win.

sween Just saw a co-worker at the supermarket and had a nice long talk about what's going on in her life lol jk I hid behind the potatoes.

secretsquirrel A burly, angry man installs our new washing machine. I try to appear unintimidated. "I know all the maths!" I shout, and flail out the room.

JephKelley What kind of empty, lifeless shell of a person buys unfrosted Pop-Tarts? Do these people feel pleasure? Or do they only experience pain?

KatyDidSays Getting new glasses today. I want a pair that say, "Smart, together and hip." As opposed to, "Nerdy. Watches PBS with cats. Bedtime: 9 p.m."

hollyburns Look, I am not a bad person, but I am having to sit on my hands to restrain from physically punching you.

rafitorres Fact: It's only after the third round of Public Restroom Macarena that you realize the motion-activated towel dispenser is broken.

MooeyTie When stating "six of one, half dozen of another" to illustrate similarities, following up with doughnuts will really drive things home.

Dogphorisms All I want to do with squirrels is *talk* to them & learn about their amazing culture. Swear to God!

hotdogsladies Might be years before the boys on my block realize dressing alike makes them look less like a gang than a gay pride float.

MooeyTie There are more embarrassing things than getting caught belting out "Philadelphia Freedom" by a group of 16 year olds, right? Lie to me.

wordlust One way to teach your children the value of money is to sell them on Craigslist.

thedayhascome Even when you're playing opposite day with your wife, it's still not a good idea to tell her she looks fat.

gknauss The guy who decided that crab legs are romantic gets a handshake for the great prank and then punch in the face for putting me through that.

gknauss At some point you give up trying to control the kids and just accept the fact that you're the redneck family at the fancy restaurant.

JephKelley I bet Billy Joel only needs to type in "Cad" before his phone's dictionary chimes in and recommends "Cadillac-ac-ac-ac-ac-ac."

sween Mardi Gras in Canada is annoying. The beads get tangled in the moose's antlers and they cry and who wants to look at a crying moose's boobs?

wordlust I bet it was hard to get taken seriously as a Viking if you pillaged, even once, in bunny slippers.

CranberryPerson We sent our 6 year old to bed for complaining about dinner, so he slept for 12 hours and didn't have to eat vegetables. THAT'LL TEACH HIM.

phyllisstein Maybe I spend too much time matching celebrities up for imaginary gay relationships, but don't Ices Cube and T seem so right for each other?

FakeAPStylebook Flyover states - Areas of the United States lacking in Disney parks or Baldwin brothers.

scottsimpson He asks for my discount card. I fumble around and hand him a snapshot of my family, then we laugh and laugh. My male prostitute gets me.

phillygirl Now, in NYC, my best girls from home are out for drinks with my man. I feel a mix of utter happiness & OH MY GOD DON'T YOU TELL THAT STORY!

hollyburns When IM-ing your sister "show me the dress you wore," it's advisable not to accidentally put an extra "h" in "wore."

CranberryPerson I think this is the perfect birthday to get my son a bunch of books, because he is going to be seven and therefore can't punch that hard.

shitmydadsays "A parent's only as good as their dumbest kid. If one wins a Nobel Prize but the other gets robbed by a hooker, you failed."

rafitorres What doesn't kill you makes you send her flowers and apologize really hard.

ChristFinnegan GOP pundits, you can't portray Obama as a threat to our way of life and then, 90 seconds later, call him "more of the same". Pick one.

JimGaffigan I wish all fish tasted like goldfish crackers.

ChristFinnegan At an outdoor mall in Miami, where a reggae band is playing outside the Burberry store, just as Bob Marley would've wanted.

fireland Wrote MARRY ME in flames on her front lawn but then the wind picked up and oh god it was horrible just horrible

scottsimpson The bank owns a good chunk of this house but hasn't once taken out the garbage. Worst roommate ever.

ChristFinnegan I think handguns should be banned, but every citizen should be issued either Chinese throwing stars or a book of spells (your choice).

strutting The lady shoving in line clearly knows something I don't. Is this the day they give out a golden transfer for being first onto the bus?

StephenAtHome man did i wake up on the wrong side of the bed today. i need to remember not to fall asleep on the side facing the rabid raccoon den

scottsimpson Lots of people think I squandered that third wish, but I've been saved countless times by farts with that new car smell.

emilybrianna My personal trainer eyes me with concern. "You look nauseous," she observes. "Nauseated," I correct her. So obviously superior in every way.

CranberryPerson He doesn't know the word hypocrisy, but when I glance up from my blackberry to tell him he plays too much Wii, he probably gets the concept.

MikeyADHD YOU MEAN ALL I HAVE TO DO TO WORK AT MCDONALDS IS NOT DO MY HOMEWORK ANYMORE?

emilybrianna QUINN:[runs through house despite my constant nagging] ME: Can you guess what I'm about to say to you? QUINN: That I'm good at making boats?

adamisacson My cat purrs and rubs against me when he's about to be fed. I'm glad I don't do that. The guy behind the Subway counter has it bad enough.

thedayhascome Trying to exercise more. Just burned 100 calories shaking the vending machine for the Baby Ruth that's RIGHTFULLY MINE.

MooeyTie I rode an electric cart at WalMart today to see what I was missing. Apparently a lot of malicious stares and an inability to reach the soup.

And a special collection of some of my favorite Olympics-related twitters:

(Stephen Colbert) StephenAtHome i'm in vancouver. up here they call it "twitteur"

StephenAtHome what i've learned so far in canada: resist the urge to strip naked at karaoke bars and announce that you're doing this one "full mountie"

(Neil Patrick Harris) ActuallyNPH I friggin' love the Olympics. I never thought I could care so much for people or sports that I just learned about six minutes beforehand.

StephenAtHome i think there should be a version of figure skating with hurdles

During the nail-biter of a hockey game: sween I'M POOPING MY PANTS I MEAN I'M PUKING MY PANTS I MEAN I'M PEEING MY PANTS I REALLY DONT WANT THESE PANTS ANYMORE.

essdogg Russia spent all of their money on this show so the 2014 Olympic Village will be the couch in your mom's basement.

FakeAPStylebook When writing about girl sports, remember to pretend they're as important as real sports or we'll get letters.

Mar. 4: PT is stinky

I went to my physical therapy appointment yesterday even though I felt like shiat because I’m a good little patient. And I’m actually glad I went, because remember how I said the other day that I wasn’t sure it’d do any good? Well, I can already tell it’s going to do some good. And you people say I’m close-minded and stubborn and incontinent and resistant to change. Little do YOU know; I haven’t wet my pants in weeks. Take that!

The coolest part of yesterday’s session was that I got these resistance bands—I think they’re latex or something; they totally stink, whatever they are—that I use for stretching exercises. They look sorta like this:

(That ain’t me.)

I stick this strap/loop thing in the door and close it, then put one of the stinky bands in a loop on the strap and yank the hell out of it (haha, that’s what she said). I can totally feel it working my weakened muscles and it’s way cool because it doesn’t hurt, except that I think the whole thing would be improved if the stinky band was a feather boa. I asked Lisa, my physical therapist, if they had anything fancier and she said, “I guess a feather boa would go perfectly with the IV pole dancing, huh?” See why I love her?

The only reason Lisa knew about the pole dancing is that at my first appointment we talked about the chemo process, and I told her how my friends turn chemo into a big ol’ party and make it the most fun thing about having cancer. It’s not like the rumors are going around that girls are IV pole dancing in the chemo room upstairs. Well, there might be rumors going around, but if there are, Lisa totally pretended not to have heard them. She could just be the queen of discretion.

For my next PT session, I’m wearing something sparkly, for sure. Maybe that way Lisa will be impressed and give me the good exercises. I’m going for the record books—maybe the “Most Likely to Be-Dazzle Her Way Back to Health” category? I can sooo win that one.

Mar. 2: Whiny, unhappy Jen

I ran errands with my nephew today. He needed to hit Voodoo Doughnut again for goodies to take back to his bandmates, and every good Portland resident knows that visitors should never be denied a trip to Voodoo Doughnut. We ran to Barnes & Noble for him to pick up reading material for the flight home, the Mac store to get his phone fixed, and finally, the airport. It was a lovely long weekend with him here, in which my liquor cabinet was drained and Scout fell in love because apparently Stephen drops a lot of food. I know rockstars don’t want to be described as “sweet boys,” so I’ll just say this: Steve’s bad-ass. He’s also such a sweet boy.

Once upon a time I hope to see him again, hopefully in concert and hopefully when he’s super-famous and everyone in the venue will be impressed when they hear me say, “Yeah, the drummer’s my neph.” That would be way cool for me, huh?

While walking around B&N this morning, a wave of nausea hit me and I started sweating profusely. Once I sat down it seemed to dissipate a little, but I still felt pretty crappy—dizzy and more nauseous than I’ve probably felt since this whole cancer thing began. I didn’t even go into Voodoo Doughnut, for fear the intense fried dough and frosting smells would make me feel even worse. I know! The sick-sick-sicky feeling didn’t really improve throughout the day, and I went to bed immediately after returning home from the airport. I’ve been here pretty much ever since, sleeping off and on, too tired to even turn on the Law & Order: SVU marathon. I know!

There’s a pain in my left side that could be my spleen rebelling, and that makes me nervous. My skin is tender everywhere, and even the lightest touch makes me want to curse loudly. It hurts to sit for more than a few minutes, to rest against my pillow, to walk across the room. Yes, I know I’m being whiny and complain-y and all that. I’m sorry; I really do try not to bitch about feeling rotten as often as I actually feel rotten. But these few days of one-week-post-chemo truly suck and make me not want to see people or talk to people or email people or even blog most of the time. I’m working on being a nicer person during this time; please bear with me. (I kinda think Stephen’s lucky he got out of here when he did.)

My physical therapy appointment went well on Monday. I have another on Wednesday afternoon. The therapist is cool and we hit it off immediately, but I don’t think she thinks there’s much wrong with me that she can fix. We’ll see. Even if it doesn’t improve my range of motion, lingering back pain, etc., it can’t really hurt, can it?

No matter how much I complain about the chemo side effects, though, I’m relieved that I don’t have herpes like some people I know. That must be so embarrassing!

Mar. 1: So, so unbelievably uncool

I don’t have a lot of time this morning, but I just wanted to post a quick little something today so I don’t go three whole days without blogging. Three whole days, I know! It’s shameful. But not really.

I’m achy and sore and tender and grumbly ever since yesterday. It’s that one-week-after-chemo feel, which is now controlled with the ever-delightful Vicodin. It doesn’t make the pain go away, but it makes me care less, and that’s probably the most for which I can hope. While I’d love to curl up in bed with a good book all day, I’ve got physical therapy in an hour and then I promised to take my nephew to Voodoo Doughnut and a coffee place downtown, so I’ll be spreading the grouchiness throughout the city today. Yay me.

Someone should probably warn the physical therapist that if he or she hurts me this morning, he or she is going to get a punch in the crotch.

So, yeah, my rockstar nephew is visiting and I’ve never felt like such a dork in all my life. Last night Victor and I decided Stephen is cooler than both of us put together, and then some. So sad. But I’m learning some things from him, oh yes I am, which are definitely garnering cool points for this Auntie Zen (in no one’s opinion but my own). For instance, when one fist bumps one’s friend, said fists should then “explode.” The fact that I’m explaining this, I believe, proves exactly how much my dork-ness has recently increased. Ahem.

But for really and for true, it’s fun having Stephen here. He doesn’t do anything to intentionally make us feel old and unhip; it’s not like he walks around telling us how old and unhip we are. He’s thinking it, sure, but he’s too nice to say so. Last night he went running in the neighborhood at midnight (to all of my neighbors: so sorry if he scared you—he’s quite harmless, but you should know he’s a black belt in karate, so don’t surprise him), and that might be the most action our street has seen at that time of night in years. Oh, and we took him all the way out to Boring yesterday to get some stepping stones for the front yard. We’re really into showing him the very best and most interesting parts of the city at the most exciting times of the day. Feel free to schedule your next Portland city tour with Jen & Vic Will Put You To Sleep Immediately In The Minivan And They Won’t Even Listen To Cool Music While They Drive Travel Company™.

I’ve gotten to hear some recently recorded demos by the band that Stephen’s bandmates have emailed him. That’s been pretty awesome, like a teeny preview that makes me all special ‘n stuff. There’s some other band news that may or may not be secret so I have to keep it under my Proud Auntie hat for now, but trust me… it’s way cool. Sunshine almost hyperventilated when she heard.

Oh, one more apology to my neighbors: Stephen got Jack an electric guitar and amp. That excessive noise you were complaining about all weekend? It was coming from our house. While the guitar came with free lessons courtesy of the rockstar, Jack is still at Lesson #1, which is The Chord Progression That Almost Lets You Play ‘Polly Wolly Doodle’ And Drives Mommy Coco For Cuckoo Poops. We hope to get through at least one more lesson before Stephen leaves tomorrow.