Aaaah!!
Kill me quickly...

My brother looks so good in eyeliner. Darn it, he looks better than I do. Hmmm...

Maybe death would not be preferable.
Have to think on this.
He's going to a boyscout Hallowe'en party tonight, with all my guys and dads...
I wish him luck. Mum says he looks like a drag queen. Which, as soon as he's out of boyscouts, might work.

Okaaaay...
MORE reactionary platelets, after they pre- and post-meded the heck out of me.
WILL THEY NEVER LEARN????
My parent's insurance company is paying through the teeth (not that I give a darn about the fuchening insurance companies). I think I deserve to at least GET SOMETHING OUT OF THIS!

Whoo, okay, breeeeathe...

Meanwhile, back at the ranch:

Nutropenic

Anemic

Corybantic? (That's just a great word)

I am full of ick.

We get a whole hour back!

...Why I am so excited about this, I couldn't tell you. Heck, it's probably something wacked out, but being excited about the sun going around the earth is exciting, right?

But it's October, there's hot cocoa on the stove, and life ought to be enjoyed.
Please, for me, don't think about the fact that tomorrow's Monday. Be happy! I am...

Well.

I feel good.

On the low end of the scale, there was the Hospital Mother Bear Story, which had a happy end, because hysterics are good for you. And crying detoxes.
(If you don't know what I'm talking about, visit Caringbridge.com and look for me.)

High end, I just got Hungry Eyes, which isn't very high I guess, but it's one of those songs that just makes me feel happy. Like Trees.

And I also stabbed myself with a Heperin needle, which is not nearly as exciting as it sounds, because it was only on my thumb and it had just come out of the wrapper and it was completely sanitary. It was just deep enough to draw blood and hurt and make me feel dumb.

Life does have it's high points...

Yay! An other week in the Hospital, where not only will two people live in a room the size of a Hamster's cage, not only will I be taking a pill the approximate size and shape of one of the Dakotas (Lord knows, I don't care, I guess they can't tell me from a horse, which is not the most reassuring ting in the world), not only will I be hooked up to several bleeping monitors day and night, but hey! I'm also going to be feeling VERY CRAPPY for most of my stay! Rejoice with me, peoples!!

Fixing me is obviously their top priority right now, not making me better.

Okay.
Breathing deeply (still).

Twelve Hours.

Twelvehours.

TWELVE HOURS!!! AT DUKE!!!

1. Blood Draw
2. Blood
3. Washed platelets
4. Ferises (if that's really how you spell it, getting my stem cells taken out of me now, so they can be put back in to me later)
5. Unwashed platelets (for which the pre-medicated the heck out of me)
6. Lupron shot

Home awaited us. Of course, little did we know that it would await us at 9:30 PM.
8-8 at Duke.

God, I feel like an unpaid employee.

The Chemo Diet! Look at the weight AND inches I've lost! I'm so sure it'll work for you!

How many ways can you spell EVIL??? (That was a rhetorical question, by the way).

Ooh, but on the up side, I'm very un-Nutropenic now! Minions! Be happy for me!

Okay, picture this: over my temple, a black widow, with a spider web blosoming out from it.

In face paints, naturally.

Please. Did you honestly think I'd get a tattoo? Been there, people. SO not getting a tattoo anywhere NEAR my face.
My spine was bad enough.

But the platelets went over a dream today. Literally. I slept right through it. Benadryl, benadryl, how do I love thee? Let me count the ways...

Okay, so maybe it isn't so great. I mean, I thought Tylenol was THE BEST until mum told me all about that stuff it does to you liver. Or maybe it's your kidneys... Whatever.

...And, after an OTHER reaction yesterday ( and not to the blood, to the PLATELETS, which they decided I needed after I could not hold the ones I received on Monday), it has been decided that I will not only be receiving massive doses of benadryl (Stuff of Gods, man), but also "washed" platelets.
I have decided I really do not need to know what exactly these are, knowing generally will suffice.
In the mean time, I will be happy to chew out any nurse who comes within a mile of me with unwashed platelets.

Ha.

So yesterday, I got a platelets transfusion and had an Anafalactic Reaction. I mean, I felt like I couldn't breathe when I was lying down, my nose got all stuffy, my ears felt like they were filling up, I got this rash on the back of my head, and my throat felt like it was burning. Oh, and mum says that my lips were puffing up and my eyes got rather red.
So I got benadryl, which nocked me out till a few hours after I got back from Duke.

Now all this anaflactic stuff would be terrifying if I knew what it was. I mean seriously. Terrifying. There were three doctors, two nurses and my mum in my room, watching me eat (it was, like, one or so, so I reserve that right).

And Duke will once again be graced with my presence today. I'll be getting a red cell infusion for FOUR HOURS today, so...

Fun.

Alright, so I am now growing this very dark, low hairline, that dad says makes me look like Eddie Munster (but mum thinks it makes me look more like Curious George).
And my eyebrows are coming in darkdarkdark, which gives me hope that my hair will grow back black. Or, at the very least, dark brown like my dad's was before he shaved it.
My hair was very thick and BLACK when I was born, but it lightened considerably, and I am rather disappointed.

Oh, and I saw Monty Python and the Holy Grail! I can see why that movie has such an ENOURMOUS cult following, but really, I kind of like And Now for Something Completely Different better.

Okay, I am typing in hospital gloves and they are making my hands very sweaty and they are also waaaay too big for me so I can not see the keys sometimes and that is annoying.

Where can I buy a few Commas?

And now I am back from Duke, and my Amazing Grandmother has sterilized EV-ER-Y THING. There is not a surface in this house that has not known the touch of a Lysol wipe.
Even the mouse has been sterilized. The keyboard was sterilized, while I was in the middle of writing a long email to one of my friends, and I think it was deleted.

No, actually I am positive it was deleted.

Being immuno-compromised is not in any way fun.

(On the plus side, this is the home keyboard and the home computer, and these keys do not stick or drive me completely BONKERS.)

...And now thanks to dad's pop-up blocker and sticky keyboard, I don't know if leterary is spelled with one or two t's! Just don't read that last post. In the long run, it will most likely do you no good and be hazardous to your health in the meantime.

And really, I don't see what dad's sticky keyboard has to do with it, except that the space bar sticking is really annoying me.

Well, what can I say? Chemo pretty much sucks. I know that isn't very literary of me, but my food intake and urine ouput are being monitered at the moment, and I am sorrry to gross you out, but I don't have time to waste being literary.

So, yeah...

Doing...okaaay.

I just had my dressing ripped off by one of my many nurses. At around 11, my own stem cells wll be implanted into my body, from whence they were harvested painstakigly several months previously. How is your morning going?

There, now you can't say that wasn't literary.

Ways I Am Like a Pregnant Woman:

1. Cravings.
2. Morning Sickness.
3. This nausea medication for pregnant women to prevent morning sickness.
4. Pregnancy tests with my blood (like I am so going to run out and have promiscuous sex in the middle of my cancer treatments, people).
5. An Ultrasound (but don't worry, it was one of my heart, so that's okay).

By brother is OUT IN THE WOODS AGAIN, so my other brother and my dad are out looking for him. At night. After Five. In the woods.
Not only did my darling go out without a walkie-talkie again, not only has he been out since lunch, but he also left his water bottle.
Is my brother a genius or what?

Well, okay, not completely irredeemable.
The photographer I told you about took a bunch of pictures of me for the Joan of Ark thing, and he and his wife were really nice, and the fact that he bought me a box of Godiva that I was FORBIDDEN to share more than once didn't hurt, either.

I have learned that professional photographers are crazy, though, just like professional actors. They all share a love of the human form, then ignore it completely when it's time to eat.

And did you know that you can cook Sushi in a dishwasher? You wrap the Sushi in question in foil so it doesn't get soggy, put on the top wrack of a loaded dishwasher, start it, and Voila! For instant Japanese, just add soapy water!

This day has rendered itself completely irredeemable.

So this place called Yanceyville (I think that's how you spell it) is about, oh, an hour and a half from where I live. It's kind of fun, if you have a reason for being there, but there's basically nothing. They have a couple schools, a Fire Department or two, a couple farms, and innumerable houses.
It's in the middle of nowhere, really.

So we know these people with a farm and stuff, and they are having their annual Plow Day, with pony rides, looks at farm equipment and cows (I love cows! I had a cow birthday once!), Free Food, and bunches of people.

We get there.

It is canceled.

Not really, just rain-checked, but still.

The weather is PERFECT, by the way.

They aren't even freaking outside. They won't even answer the freaking phone.
GOD.
One and a half hours. With current gas prices.

So then, just to see if there was any way to make our day just a tiny bit WORSE, we stop in at Ben and Jerry's, because we all need something sweet after such a horrendous morning (it isn't yet 11, and already the day sucks eggs).

Get this, though--B&J's doesn't open till noon.

May I ask what kind of joint does not open till noon? What sadistic creep dictated that Ben and Jerry's would not open till noon?! People need sustenance before then! I sure do, anyway.

So then we got to our downtown farmer's market to see if the Garlic people are there so we can get Chipolate Dip, and--surprise, surprise--the Garlic people have already packed up and left.

I would ask some one to shoot me, but my parents are paying waaaaaaay to much for doctors and stuff for me to die...

My eyes are so bleary right now, I can hardly read to save my life.
Now, you may wonder why I can see the letters on the keyboard and type and all that. I often do myself.
I guess I'm just special that way.

During dinner tonight, I was telling mom how I didn't mind the patented Guys Stubble on my head. "I honestly really truly without a doubt don't mind it," I said, "but fuchen, no amount of conditioner will soften it."
For some reason, this sent mum into gales of hysterical laughter, but I can't figure out why. Perhaps that wine was more potent than we realized.

And right after dinner, my youngest brother came down from his shower wearing a navy-blue bathrobe, a Darth Vader voice-changer mask (rather tilted), and carrying Yoda's lightsaber: Midget Darth Vader Home from cocktail Party.
"Loooke, baby, believe me, I am totally-HIC!-you father."

...Oh, yeah, and I'm also going to be Joan of Ark in a photo project in September. Apparently, the English shaved her head before leading her to the stake.
Did I forget to mention that?

And nobody wanted to take my picture before The Dreaded C Word. Maybe I'll just keep my head shaved when my hair starts growing back, I seem to be more popular as a model without it, although all my friends go about with permanently worried expressions...

On Monday, I received my first Flowers From Some One Who Will Not Reveal His/Her Name.
Having a life-threatening illness is definitely not without it's perks.

And I got to see all my guys (a.k.a. Boyscouts) Monday night, after I had my first choir thingymadohickey, and everything is very glowy.
You know, the irony of the world being glowy while I'm on Chemo's doorstep is sickening, but lo! even I shall endure...