I’m currently reading Here Comes Everybody, written by James Fearnley, the accordionist of the Pogues. It starts out with a little of his background before the band formed, how he met Shane MacGowan, and how the band went from tiny gigs in run-down London pubs to breaking out and being an international hit. Fun fact: Before the Pogues broke, Fearnley was asked to play guitar in Culture Club. (previously, previously)

Date posted: September 28, 2017 | Filed under books, music | Leave a Comment »

Word is getting out. I’m pretty weird about sharing personal details with the general public (which is why this weblog has been dry for the past 16 years) but people are hearing on the grapevine that Something Is Wrong and we’ve been getting notes and beer and food left quietly on the doorstep from friends–something that’s extremely appreciated and humbling.

My friend Brian had his house burn down a few months ago, and afterward he talked to me about how people he barely knew were coming out of nowhere with offers of help, clothes, food, support, and money. He and his wife were overwhelmed and he said that it was hard to accept aid and comfort from people; he didn’t know how to do it and felt awkward about welcoming that generosity into his life. I can understand that, being a fiercely independent person–I want to do things for myself, and I hate asking for help.

This situation calls for a completely different mindset, because we’re going to have to lean on everyone we know to get through the next four months. I’m no better at asking for help than I was yesterday, but I’ve got a small pile of letters on my desk from friends offering support that will get a return letter of thanks to try and show my appreciation for that kindness.

* * *

That being said, it’s still abstract to me. I’m still thinking like I’ve got another 45 years left, when I’m supposed to be thinking in terms of 5 years. I’ve purposefully stayed away from reading about it on the internet, because the internet is built to scare the shit out of you, and I’d rather listen to the doctors I’m entrusting with my care, who have medical training and experience to answer my questions, not horror stories and half-truths. Because I’ve always operated as if I was going to live to 90, I’m having to refactor every long-term plan I’ve been working on: career, fatherhood, travel, retirement. They are now set to a ticking clock that I can’t see, and the sound just got a lot louder in the back of my head.

* * *

I’ve been pretty lousy about writing here in the past couple of months, but I realize now I’ve got to make up for some spare time. There’s a new category called cancer that will be the catch-all for disease-related ramblings, but I’m going to try to focus more on focused writing at least once a day. We’ll see how it goes.

Date posted: September 28, 2017 | Filed under cancer | Leave a Comment »

My list of daily links has gotten pretty stale over the last couple of years. I’m outgrowing some of the standard destinations that used to get me through the day; some aggregators have dried up, been bought, or gone out of business. The original inspiration for this website were the other weblogs I saw written by live humans who found things interesting and wrote about them; most of those people have jumped to Twitter and let their weblogs go dark.

I used a site called moreofit to search for websites similar to those I still frequent, and I’d say that about 10% of the suggestions are still updated regularly. Many of the suggestions are ones I followed back in the day, and a fair number of them trailed off between 2010-2012 as their authors moved on to different things (went corporate, left web design, bought a farm, or just disappeared). I did find, in that 10%, a couple of old favorites and some new suggestions. But it isn’t the same, and that’s sad. The commoditization of the internet is pretty much complete, and the do-it-yourself ideology, the idealistic, electric feeling of having one’s own place to post pictures or write about feels or show off code is gone. There’s Twitter, Facebook, or an app for that.

I think it would be interesting to try and organize a meetup of people who still have weblogs and talk to them about why they still write on their own site, if they write as much on social media, how they view their weblog now vs. when they first started it, and if they ever see themselves giving it up.

(1. Because social media is depressing. 2. Instagram only. 3. I view it almost the same now as I did then; I will admit that it’s harder to post every day but it’s still something I look forward to. 4. Doubtful; it’s served as my mobile memory since 2001 and I can’t imagine giving up the habit now.)

I did find, through clicking, a new theme for WordPress which could be the base for a modernization of idiotking here, too.

Date posted: September 25, 2017 | Filed under geek, life | Leave a Comment »

There’s really nothing comforting you can say about having cancer, but these cards, at least, are funny:

Please let me be the first to punch the next person who says everything happens for a reason.

Date posted: September 23, 2017 | Filed under cancer, shortlinks | Leave a Comment »

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After a long day this is the face of a busy tired happy girl.

Date posted: September 23, 2017 | Filed under finn, photo | Leave a Comment »

I’ve seen a lot of waiting rooms in the last month. Big ones, small ones, with hard plastic chairs and comfy faux-leather recliners. They all have the same five magazines, though. People, Us Weekly, Sports Illustrated, Men’s Health, and Sport Fisherman’s Monthly. Some of them have TVs, which are almost always tuned to HGTV, showing reruns of House Hunters or Flip or Flop. These programs are designed to be as vanilla and non-offensive as they possibly can be, even though they are depicting the real-world struggles of couples having to decide between which of three caribbean islands to purchase, or agonizing over whether to add the tennis court or the infinity pool to their mansion.

All of this is to distract you from the fact that they’re going to bring you in a room and tell you that some part of you is broken.

When we saw the three doctors before our vacation, we knew that things weren’t good, but two of them had told us that things looked benign. We asked them point blank whether we should go on vacation, and they said that we should, so we did. For a lot of reasons that made sense then, and still do now, it was the best choice, and I’m glad we had that time to relax and be together.

I got a call from Surgeon 2’s PA with some preliminary biopsy results last week: a leiomyosarcoma, which is a cancerous mass originating out of muscle tissue, and usually aggressive in nature. We saw him in person yesterday and got the first face-to-face confirmation of what I’m facing: surgery to remove the tumor, and under his breath, probably some of my bowel. This thing is big enough that it’s taking up most of my pelvis and the rest of my organs are shoved up under my ribcage, but my bowel is where it should be and somewhat compressed. He was positive and nonplussed, scheduling surgery for October 2 to go in and get it out. We thanked him and left, feeling cloudy on the details.

When we first got opinions we didn’t get to meet Surgeon 3, from Johns Hopkins. We’d been referred to the bone guy in his group, who came off like Debbie Downer, and we decided to go with the other two opinions because they came from soft-tissue experts. Today, we met first with an Oncological Radiologist in his practice, who sat us down and explained how Hopkins was thinking they wanted to shoot it with radiation for five weeks before attempting surgery, so that the chance of recurrence in the future would be smaller. So according to him, the timeline to surgery moved back to somewhere in late November. Then we went to meet with the surgeon.

Surgeon 3 is a warm, pleasant fellow, who immediately explained what their collective thinking has been, why they were recommending radiation first (and possibly chemotherapy to help) before cutting, and what that would mean for recovery. What I’m looking at–and this is preliminary–is surgery to remove the mass, some of my bowel (if the tumor is leaching into other tissue) and possibly some of my bladder. While those parts heal they’d do an ileostomy for a few weeks while my guts heal up before reconnecting the plumbing.

Holy Fuck.

He then answered our questions, in the clearest way possible, giving us the worst-case scenario because that’s what he’s supposed to do. I was stunned at this point, which is why I brought Jen with me to help navigate the details. When he answered the life expectancy question by saying five years is the standard measurement, I almost threw up on his pretty shoes.

I know they have to manage my expectations, and they have people who have gone ten and fifteen and twenty years after cancer. I know this is a rare and mean version of cancer that could come back anytime, especially given how big it is now. I know human bodies are imperfect machines that make no sense and do what they want when they want to.

I just want enough time with my girls to be here for the important stuff.

Date posted: September 21, 2017 | Filed under cancer | 1 Comment »

Here’s a current map with drone laws for every country (and even at the state level for the U.S.). Turns out all drone operations in Paraguay need to be authorized by the Air Force. Ooops.

Date posted: September 20, 2017 | Filed under photography, shortlinks | Leave a Comment »

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I shot this with an old Nikkor 50mm f/2 manual lens on the front lawn before Finn went up for bed. While it’s not the sharpest image, I love the look.

Date posted: September 17, 2017 | Filed under finn, photo | Leave a Comment »

Mode doodling. Initial reports from the doctor’s PA are not as promising as we’d hoped. We have an appointment on Wednesday to talk to him in person.

Date posted: September 15, 2017 | Filed under cancer | Leave a Comment »

We had a real nice turnout for our Maryland meetup last night, although Brian and I were the only ones to show up in a Scout. Erik and Brian came over from the Eastern Shore, and our two Brians came even though they don’t currently own IH. Bennett surprised Brian with a check from partial proceeds of the auction at Nationals this year, which was super cool of everybody there. We caught up over beers, told stories, and made tentative plans to get together in the fall.

→ This is a syndicated post from my Scout weblog. More info here.

Date posted: September 14, 2017 | Filed under friends, Scout | Comments Off on September Meetup