T-26 (26 treatment days to go).  Feeling very good this morning, good nights sleep, especially after the blood counts yesterday all look perfect after 2 full weeks of chemo and radiation treatments!

2010 Central Texas Airshow (Temple)

A bit concerned about mask position accuracy with the hair loss: so we’re concerned with mm positional accuracy for the radiation equipment; I’ve lost most of the hair on my right temple area, but I missed my usual haircut last week and since we skipped an additional week after making the mask, waiting for the incision to heal, there’s significant hair growth on my left side the back of my head.  I measured with a micrometer this morning and can easily take a 1 inch swath and compress it down to only 0.6mm, so with 0.6mm on the right and pretty much 0mm on the left, I would think we potentially have a 1mm shift of my head inside the mask.  Frankly, the mask doesn’t completely restrict my movement, at least side to side; I try to always shift around in it into a similar position for each treatment; it does press very firmly my forehead down onto the table (leaves marks on my forehead after a 10minute treatment), little room for movement there, but I’m sure I’ve grown an addition 1/2 mm in thickness back there. 

So I’m thinking we need to shave the head and recalibrate.  I’ll discuss with my radiation oncologist today. 

But what does an Engineer know about medicine!

Even squirrels get bugged:

Y’all have a great day!

Randy.

Met with Dr. Chadha and my blood counts are all normal (platelets, hemoglobin, red and white counts)!!! He is very pleased with my status/progress!  It is still perhaps a bit early regarding temodar toleration, but this is good news, or again I’m taking it that way!  My hair is falling out due to the radiation in the targeted areas where it is applied but of course that is expected.  So I’m optimistic and now we’re hopeful that the temodar and radiation combo are doing their attack and destroy mission (ie, that I’ll respond well).  Long day, so I’m tired now (radiation first, then time for lunch (we had less than an hour today so we did Azul Tequila again; really like this place and want to come for dinner), then back for our meeting with Dr. Chadha, then a couple of stops on the way home - and the heat and the radiation and the chemo just don’t mix very well - wipes me out.  But I’m supercharged about blood counts!

Randy.

As I noted below, the hair has started falling out around the treatment area; knew it was coming, but a bit of reality/gut check! Had a great day yesterday, compared to Sunday afternoon/evening, whew! Just can’t over-do it. 27 Treatments to go (I did write a C program, BTW, that computes this for me each morning (I can’t embed it automatically in the blog (or I don’t know how) like I could the macro in MS word).

Today I’ll get my weekly blood work and meet with my medical (chemo) oncologist (Dr. Chadha, just love this guys thorough, truly concerned/interested attitude - he spends all the time with us we need) after radiation treatment today; a couple of minor issues to discuss, but all in all, I’m not complaining - I could be way worse off at this point!

Had this image printed on the inside back cover of Texas Highways Magazine a couple of years ago:

_________________________________________________________________

Intended to mention a couple of weeks back (I hope I haven’t started re-blogging stuff I’ve already done); my team at work got an IBM invention disclosure rated “File” on the project I was last working on at the time of my brain tumor surgery; this means IBM will be filing a U.S. patent on our work - nice job guys!! This does a couple things for me: it makes me proud of what I’ve been working on, it legitimizes our work to a degree and at least casts it in the realm of innovative/leading edge work, and feels good to being doing it as a part of a team (there’s nothing like surrounding yourself with smart people - some of it inevitably rubs off on you).

The other thing it does for me, I have to do 15 hours of technical education each year to maintain my Texas Professional Engineer License, and U.S. Patents issued count for 15 hours (they assume that if you’re work is worthy of a patent, then you must be maintaining some degree of competence in your field, and I would tend to agree for the most part); I have enough in the queue to have gotten my points the past few years. And lastly, I’ll achieve my 7th IBM patent plateau level which is really cool from an IBM career accomplishment perspective (and a chunk of change, that I’ve already spent (if my kids are reading, don’t count your chickens before they hatch (it might be 6 months before this patent actually files), but in my case I’m going to make myself a loan and enjoy it while I can if you know what I mean!). [Sorry for being ostentatious but I am proud of this accomplishment and you never know when something you do might be the last thing you ever do, so maybe it’s a good idea to try to make sure that everything you do is worthy of being the last thing that you might ever do?].

Had to precariously park on the side of the road early one morning to catch this image.

Y’all have a great day!!!

Thanks,

Randy.

PS: my brother Roddy (yes, we are the brothers 3-R’s (Randy, Rory and Roddy)), a partner in a Civil Engineering Firm in Houston, checked with one of his Highway Engineers and confirmed my assumptions about the TxDot toll scanning equipment I photographed and posted below in a previous blog entry - I know you all got as excited about that post as I was :) Except, the coming and going photos they take I assumed was for redundancy, but it’s because tractor trailer rigs often have different plates on the front of the cab than are on the trailer they’re pulling (I did not know that), so they snap images of both, and also there is a ground loop wire sensor underneath it all that I’ve never noticed that they use to count wheels/axles, you can see the black outline rectangle in the foreground here (the lower left edge line is where the wire goes over to the controller to connect the loop to the equipment):

I’m sure you all will sleep easier tonight now that you know this!!! I will, seriously, I learned something today - Thanks Roddy!

And I re-grabbed this Austin skyline over Zilker again yesterday; don’t know why I like it so much - mabye one day I’ll be able to set up for it with the right light and do it justice, or that’s the plan anyway:

Slow to correlate, but I think I over extended Sunday and maybe didn’t hydrate enough in our record tieing 112oF heat (which I only sampled briefly).

Monday was a more normal day, drove for treatment, lunch, home, nap and then a “normal” evening, no dart gun passing out in my tracks. Slept good (well using the restoril and I’m up at 4am). And they say the fatigue only gets worse from here on out so I guess I just need to sit still, as hard as that is :(

OK, knew this was coming … head was itching and out starts coming the hair, only on the side of the radiation treatment.  Wish I’d shaved the head now … but the Dr said don’t now because it may affect the fit of the mask and therefore the positional accuracy.  But it seems like hair growth on the other side, and I’m due for a haircut, would have a similar impact?  Anyway, guess I’ll break out the do-rag, or maybe not, just be the mangy scoundrel that I am!

Hey, lots of it is grey so good riddance!

Two of six weeks done (33% complete)!  Great weekend right up until yesterday afternoon: talk about step function, dart gun, energy fell through the floor, took (more like fell into) a 45 minute, deep sleep nap; at one moment I was talking directly to Jan, and the next, I was asleep.  Strange.  Headache too most of the night.  But, got up early (4:30am), took all my meds, ate a good breakfast, feeling better now, ready to start this weeks treatments!  Climbing on the back of the bull, ready to open the chute, let’s get this show on the road!

I hope everyone is doing ok and I wish everyone all the best!  Thanks again for all the notes, cards, emails, it really makes my day and is very much appreciated!

Thanks,

Randy.

After watching a PBS special on them, I’m visualizing (during radiation and when taking Temodar) this creature aggressively searching, chasing, fiercely attacking and destroying and voraciously devouring individual cancer cells like they were food critically required to survive a harsh winter.

This stuff may save my life, but it’s scary - script says don’t inhale capsule powder and wash your hands thoroughly after touching the capsules (can irritate the skin and mucous membranes); so take it orally, but don’t touch it!

Currently taking 160mg - this may be? altered based on white blood cell count.

Got “hit by a dart” at 7pm and crashed for an hour! Back up now: may need restoril help later.

Thanks,

Randy

Hope everyone is doing excellent!  Had a good, relaxing day yesterday, a break from driving to South Austin.  Celebrated Jan’s Mom’s (Martha’s) birthday; oh my goodness, Jan made her homemade lasagne and “Troy Aikman (cherry chocolate) cake”, unbelievably awesome!!!

being prepared here:

and we (Martha, Rach, George and me) all got the benefit, amazingly scrumptious  - again, not losing weight, per my doctors orders! 

Much to my wife’s chagrin, I usually commandeer the dining room and table as my indoor photography studio (should use one of the “empty nest” bedrooms but can’t bring ourselves to do that (they kids routinely  come and stay with us)).  I did these yesterday morning (still playing with the new macro lens) right before cleaning it all up for our birthday dinner (it’s a good thing though, forces me to cleanup and reorganize), otherwise it would look like my lab/office, and you don’t want to see that if you’re a clean/neat freak!).

and a mystery macro:

(the others, in case anyone is interested, (several of folks have asked in emails) - spoiler alert, including the above: mystery_macros (lame I know, but it gives me something to do :)

Also, I was attempting to explain to a friend in an email this morning, I’ve had lots of folks that have asked to get together for lunch, I’m sorry if I haven’t been receptive.  Let me try to explain:

Texas Oncology is crazy busy, they have folks scheduled and cycling in and out of there like clockwork, to the minute; they queue us in the waiting room, then they bring us back and queue us out in front of the accelerator rooms (all the chairs are full usually), and they have people back-to-back on those machines, constantly!  I believe we have our time scheduled for all next week; trouble is, they do run both ahead and behind, as much as 1 1/2 hours so far(usually not); and we meet afterwards on Tues and I believe Wed next week with the medical and then the radiation oncologists after the radiation treatment and those waits are total unknowns, 5 to 40 minutes so far over the past 2 weeks.  Then there’s me, I have tremendous energy, feel like I could entertain a whole group of people, and then it’s seriously like getting shot with a dart gun, my energy step-functions to zero without any warning, and often a headache sets in; so that’s why I’m being reclusive, if it seems that way.  Not trying to avoid anyone.  And when I get home, I’m usually wiped out.  And then when that state hits, I have zero tolerance for any detailed, discussion, planning anything, etc, etc (I usually handle by leaving the room and going to lay down and the family all understands).  Strange, but I can’t help it.  They tell me it will get worse as the chemo builds.  And then there’s the Vicodin and steroids to top it off.  So sorry if I’m appearing to avoid folks.  I just hope I’m being as kind/tolerant as possible to Jan, who doesn’t deserve any crap from me (I’m doing my best I hope).  This whole process seems to have been a slow awakening, but now I might be diving back down (I hope not, but the doctors are warning me).

Thanks for tuning in, have a great day!

Randy.

Happy Birthday Martha!

Argh! not sure what I did, going in/out of the hot/cold, or the radiation or hydration, but had a bad headache all afternoon/evening.  Had it under control I thought at one point, so we went to see “Our Idiot Brother”, with Paul Rudd (sounded interesting, maybe even appropriate/applicable to some of the questions I’ve been contemplating, after listening to his interview on Letterman); but, not so much!!!  Or again, don’t listen to a brain surgery patient’s movie reviews; bizarre, all over the place, but somewhat entertaining I suppose.  BUT, almost every single scene had a super-blown, incredibly bright window/etc in the background, I wore my sunglasses for about 30 minutes during the movie, seriously; and the headache got worse.  So forget my critque I would say.  Anyway, more norco and sleep cured it.

Feel better this morning.  Looking forward to a relaxing, non-South Austin travel day!

On the almost rain day (Thursday?) I grabbed this image of the Austin skyline over (sort-of) Zilker park, again a unique opportunity for me (in the passenger seat); I do not recommend making landscape images from a moving vehicle, or certainly not through auto window glass, but it is somewhat of a challenge and keeps me occupied; headed North on MoPac at 70MPH, you get this view/angle for about 3 seconds (could probably just go to the service road on the other side and setup for this shot):

I did test the Canon servo-mode focus, where you press the shutter half-way and it locks onto your target, then it tracks that target, continuously refocusing as required and it works quite well as the subject moves quickly closer or farther (at least in drive-by shooting mode!).

Thanks,

Randy.

There’s so much we don’t understand: the zoo animals sensed the earthquake.  I watched an interesting Nature on Hawaii’s Kilauea volcano (I have pictures (or video maybe) of a skylight (red lava through a hole in the crust) from our helicopter tour when we took the kids); one scientist placed super sensitive microphones nearby and then sped up the recordings to an audible human range and could detect certain activity from sounds in the lave tubes that he correlated to volcanic activity (very eery, whale-song like sounds).  Maybe the animals hear/sense sub-sonic frequencies we can’t hear?

Treatment was pretty routine today - glad we get the weekend break (still do the temodar though); stopped at Galaxy Cafe for lunch on the way back today had a celebrity siting: Eric Johnson was having lunch across from us (hope I didn’t intrude - don’t think so):

We saw Rick Barnes (UT Basketball headcoach) there once!

Loved the Bleu Cheese Bacon Burger with sweet potatoe fries!!!

Have a great weekend!

Randy.

Had a very good day yesterday; thank-you all for your very nice emails and inspiring comments! I think the Restoril sleep aid is working - I’ve gotten 2 good nights sleep!  I’m also learning how important it is to hydrate (of course especially in this heat, but also all these meds, including the temodar.  Glad I photographed the Passion Flower when I first got up yesterday, because it soon closed up tight:

Thanks again to the wonderful staff and Doctors at Texas Oncology South, Jason, the Lindsay’s, Toni, everyone, such a pleasure to see and be cared for by each day (such positive and optimistic attitudes)!  You guys are great!

My sister joked with me yesterday that she has to stop reading my blog before lunch - because I’m making her hungry!   Sorry, I hope it’s not coming across that I’m bragging about eating out all the time: Rachel and Phil love Austin and really enjoy introducing us to new restaurants they love or have recently discovered - and our old excuse, that it’s too far from Georgetown, doesn’t work now that we’re in South Austin everyday!  And I AM paying the price: I am NOT disappointing my Doctors, who want me to not lose weight during the treatments: I am not LOSING weight!!!  Yesteday, I wanted to oblige and boost my hemoglobin with a big juicy steak (sorry to the vegans), stopped at Austin Land and Cattle and they don’t serve lunch???  So we went to Bartletts’s (Houston’s) and yum, I had the awesome hardwood grilled, hand-cut, beef tenderloin, the macho size - it did it’s job! 

A couple of quotes I receieved yesterday (thanks Kim) that I really liked:

“We make a living by what we get, but we make a life by what we give.” - Winston Churchill

Life isn’t about waiting for the storm to pass; It’s about learning to dance in the rain.

A quick story: Elizabeth Cook (XM radio) was on Letterman and told the story of how her parents were less than encouraging regarding her going to college but the lunchroom ladies at her school, who rarely spoke (as they do), felt sorry for this skinny little girl and gave her a $500 college scholarship at some point (would this buy 2 books these days?) and so inspired her that she went to college and ended up graduating.  Often times the simpler things that we do to help others, even just a smile or common courtesy could make all the difference in the world to someone else and end up having a huge, positive impact on them!

I hope you all are well and living your life to it’s fullest: have a great weekend!  We’ll enjoy NOT driving to South Austin over the weekend!

Still not the image I was trying to make - but I’ll work on it!

Thanks,

Randy.

Anyone curious to see up close what you get scanned by when you drive thru TxTag tolls? 

Took my 100-400mm lens with me yesterday; should have used a bit higher ISO and higher shutter speed (as much as the car bounces around, etc):

My guess is the longer skinny (2) boxes with the dark/black square “lens” is the camera that snaps a photo of you vehicle/license plate, the larger, shorter (2) boxes with the lighter “lenses” are the flashes that you may have noticed, to get the exposure for the camera, and the larger white panels in the center are the RFID antennas that remotely power up you windshield RFID tag and read your specific vehicle data; one set of these, it appears both coming and going, for each lane.  For my jeep I actually have the RFID in a black box attached to the front license plate, because I have very little extra windshield area on my Rubicon!)  Any highway Engineers out there that can confirm my guesses?

Randy.

Hope everyone is doing ok!  

Day started off good, but I’m not sure what I missed: hydrating, eating as much as usual (driven by the steroids), but had my worst headache during treatment yesterday that I’ve had so far; doubled up on norco, then had lunch with the kids (Phil (drove over from his CAT conf at Horseshoe Bay), Rach, George, Jan and I) at Jack Allen’s Kitchen - very, very good (desert too (I blame the steroids again) -  and good for what ails you (cured my headache).  Treatment went as usual (this could get (if not already) boring - sorry); met with Dr Wu (radiation oncologist), switched to Restoril (from ambien); that seemed to work better last night for the insomnia.  Phil stopped by the house and we had a good, long visit before he headed back to Houston.  Feeling pretty good this morning!  Swung by Barton Springs Nursery and got a Passion Flower vine on the way home: working on a specific image I want to make, maybe I’ll have more energy this afternoon (energy seems to be on a slide); here’s what I made yesterday:

Photography is so appealing to me because, the technical side is just like Engineering: making trade-offs, a balancing act, you must find that perfect (and usually very constrained) intersection of shutter speed (image motion blur), aperture (image depth of field) and ISO (light sensitivity but noise/grain) to get the correct light exposure, then all combined with the very non-technical artistic side, the part I’m struggling with (the whole left brain/right brain thing I tried to write about earlier), light quality/quantity, direction, color, composition, lens selection (for coverage, depth compression), etc, etc, etc, so many interconnected variables.  Very, very challenging, and I can’t get it right, so I’ve stuck with it.  I guess I hope I don’t ever get it right (maybe some of you do), because then I’ll move on to something else!

Mystery macro (can you guess what it is?):

Life is like a game of cards. The hand that is dealt you represents determinism; the way you play it is free will. Jawaharal Nehru 

We (Jan, George and the architecture student (Rachel)) caught the Julius Schulman documentary (world renowned architectural photographer) when it came out (at the Arbor - the director spoke to the audience immediately after, very interesting); I’ve since DVR’ed it and re watched it many times (I’d love to get into architectural photography - I love most of Mr. Schulman’s work, especially the black & white.  However, one thing discussed in that movie that I’ve fixated on recently (paraphrasing) ‘Julius spent most of his professional life working with other self-absorbed geniuses like Richard Neutra, …’.  OK, now I know I’m not that creative nor really anywhere near that class/category of artist/genious/professional, but is it a trait of creative people that they must be self-centered, self-absorbed, me, me, me, or not concerned/compassionate about other people?  I love creating, learning, inventing (re-inventing really, don’t know if I’ve ever really invented anything), exploring with a passion, but I don’t want to be that self-absorbed, self-centered guy in my “new” life that I’m forging given my recent “opportunity” to re-examine my life; I want to more directly help people, like I’ve been helped during all this.  So what to do?  When I make it through this, I don’t want to fade back into the old routine (I’m starting to think that (fading back) may be impossible, but I’m not sure).  Any words of wisdom or experience would be greatly appreciated!

And have I said, and if I have I’ll say it again many times, my wife Jan is a life saver and taking such wonderful care of me, and I’m eternally grateful (I’ll spend the rest of my life repaying her, with at the very least back rubs immediately/whenever she needs them) - I love you Jan!  I’m sorry that I’m hi-jacking her from helping out Martha (her Mom) as much as she’s used to and would like to be doing, just going to their usual lunch.  If I can get off the Vicodin, I could probably start driving myself to the treatments … maybe I’ll get there.

Thanks and y’all have a wonderful day!

Randy.

T-33.  Good but long day yesterday.  Good blood work (see below).  Treatment and radiation oncologist appt today.  Maybe the ambien is starting to help with insomnia; the steroids are causing it, but are required to reduce brain swelling, which radiation induces as well, which bring on the headaches.  We’ve about got the meds balanced I believe.

I’m awed, amazed, inspired, and humbled by all the patients that we see each day with a wide variety of issues, some in severe pain, that almost all have smiles on their faces or will shoot one your way, offer you their seat, strike up a conversation with a compassionate, sincere interest in what you have to say.  I want to help and to be more like these people - they are truly happy for every extra 5 minutes of life that they have. This is a life changing event for me, one way or the other, and I better be learning how to live, no, I think I am, and I’m starting to practice now!

Y’all have a great day!

Thanks,

Randy.

Long day today, but some good news (or we’re taking it that way anyway): my blood work showed all counts higher (which is good) than last week (including white blood cells that are at risk during temodar chemo); not sure how that happens, but after one week of treatments, this hopefully indicates a higher probability of tolerating and responding to the treatment!!  Still a long road ahead but I’ll take those numbers (as opposed to down)!

Texas Oncology South was absolutely crazy today, starting with cars circling the parking lot like sharks, looking for places to park; unbelievable number of folks cycling though on a daily basis, starting to recognize “the regulars”; the receptionist joked “it was two-for Tuesday” - love it, you gotta be able to laugh about this!  The staff is absolutely fantastic!

Since I haven’t had any nausea, using the Zofran before the temodar, my main side-effect may only be the extreme fatigue, as well as a few other potentials.  So we’ll take it day by day and hope for the best.

So Jan took me to ToysRUs for “being good” at the Dr today (isnt’ she awesome?) and I got some HexBug nano robotic bugs to play with; I submitted an IBM disclosure a couple of years ago with this idea, that got rejected/closed, entitled something like “vibration induced locomotion”, after I noticed my old cell phone, when stood up on it’s end and a call came in, it would spin in circles on it’s end; IBM isn’t in the toy business I guess (I wish).  That’s exactly what these things do, pretty amazing, coupled with some interesting center of gravity design.  Here’s a short video; the only thing they’re missing is intercommunication and remote influence (and a few other ideas I had that I successfully prototyped).  Childish of me you say … oh I hope so! 

We met with my medical oncologist’s P.A. today; she was great, spent an hour with us (almost too much for me) but answered lots of questions.  We alternate between her and Dr. Chadha (medical oncologist) every other week.

T-33 tomorrow and we meet with my radiation oncologist, Dr Wu; I have questions about radiation protocol sequence based on new xrays (that I think I sensed; hard to know, pinned under that mask). 

Thanks,
Randy.

T-34. (counting down, 34 treatment days to go!) 

NatGeo

Didn’t know that Mondays would be xrays again (same machine, different power); I see ghosts!  Different this time though: a light blue field with very intensely bright, tiny pin-points of blue light in a clearly man-made precise grid layout, again induced or perceived.  Strange sensation.  They say some see it, some don’t; surely they don’t mean some notice it and some don’t, ‘cause it hits me like a 2x4 to the head.  I noticed the radiation sequence was slightly different as well; will discuss with radiation oncologist on Thursday.  Meeting with the medical oncologist today after radiation (usual weekly discussion).  So far, no nausea or other major side effects, except perhaps for a general fog, but it’s hard to discern from steroid/norco effects to a degree, and of course the radically up/down fatigue, and perhaps it is increasing.

Screech owl in our backyard at dusk (a few years ago) (used a flashlight to find and focus on them, then a zoom flash to get the image:

Stopped at Azul Tequilla for lunch (exactly on our way home); very good, uniquely flavored cheese enchilada (my first time there); Rob Balon had reviewed Azul (we don’t spend much time in South Austin (being in Georgetown).

Met with our attorney yesterday afternoon and finalized some legal business (feels good to get that out of the way).

Good day all in all.  Very interesting email discussion with the family yesterday on life and living and being happy - hope I didn’t get anyone in trouble, keeping them from working! 

A couple of quotes I found yesterday that I like (or that hit home for me):

A man who dares to waste one hour of time has not discovered the value of life. Charles Darwin

 The price of anything is the amount of life you exchange for it.    Henry David Thoreau 

May you live all the days of your life.  Jonathan Swift

Have a great day!

Thanks,

Randy.

I made this image with dual, high speed flashes (lowest power, shortest flash duration (which I estimate (tried to measure) at 1/15,000th sec); interesting to me the wing is so translucent.

T-35.  So I got ahead of myself on the treatment day numbering: I have 6 weeks of treatment: 5 radiation treatments per week (or 30 total radiation treatments), but temodar (oral chemo) is 7 days/week, so I really have 6x7=42 treatment days.  So today (Monday 8/22) is treatment day 35 (T-35).

Had a good weekend with the kids here; I miss-used the ambien, supposed to take it when you lay down to do go sleep; staying up and talking and waiting for it to take effect doesn’t work.  So I didn’t get much sleep and Sunday (yesterday) was pretty out of it and had a headache and had to use the norco.  But a relaxing day, not having to drive and get radiation treatments.  Phil’s here this week (CAT conference at Horseshoe Bay).  Thanks Bob for calling, enjoyed talking.  I’m sorry, I last about 5 minutes in any discussion/conversation, pretty sure it’s the meds; my energy levels will feel great, like now, and they’ll step-function nose-dive to zero and I have to take a nap.  Strange.  Dealing with it as I can.

Found this image yesterday I did quite a while back and combined it with a project for Rachel yesterday; which do you prefer? (supposed to be humorous - perhaps not at all :(

Have a great day!

Thanks,

Randy.

PS: I couldn’t stand it: I ordered an MM-7 sterling engine: amazing, it runs off the heat generated from your hand (at normal room temp) from a 7 degree temperature delta.  I did a quick video of mine here.  I am playing with a generator for this engine: I wanted to try to flash an LED from the energy from the the heat from your hand; based on my prototype simulating this engine, this will be extremely challenging; I can get it to work off an ice pack, where it does about 150RPM, but running on the heat of your hand, it’s about 90RPM max and low inertia.  I can get 1v at 90 RPM (that I can invert to 3v and about 40uW that I can power a microcontroller and flash (very briefly) an LED, but don’t have the momentum I need at 90 RPM; maybe if I add lots of mass to the flywheel…

Had an absolute fantastic day yesterday!  Rachel and Phil and Sammie came for brunch (Monument Cafe in Georgetown), we saw Bob Lily getting seated (Jan recognized him, lives in Georgetown I believe), he’s quite the photographer now it seems (I was too chicken to impose and talk him (my Dad really liked him as a Dallas Cowboy)), then we visited their locally sourced organic Market next door and purchased some goods, then I of course had to come home and get my nap.  We hung out and Phil repaired a blown sprinkler head for me (I hear Austin is issuing $250 fines now and I’m sure Georgetown is not far behind if not already there).  Jan and Sammie shopped the square in downtown Georgetown.  George had business at work (awesome company BTW).  Then I ramrodded the dinner decision (I have an even lower tolerance for no parking places and long lines (there’s very little food in Ausin, IMHO, that’s worth a 45minute+15minute to park/walk wait, sorry, at least in my current state (well maybe Houston’s (Bartletts’s) and parking is not an issue there) - brick oven at Jollyville and Braker, so thanks for tolerating me guys. Came home, no movies, just hung out and talked, Phil and I played some guitar (I tried, he actually played (wish I’d recorded, he does some awesome John Prine)), played Pentago, George seems to be the master, but yours truly with brain warp has not challenged him yet!  Very fun evening including some bizarre physical proportion measurement and analysis by Rachel (we should have taken notes!).  I tanked up on zofran at 9:30, then nuked up on temodar at 10pm, then the ambien but was having too much fun until everyone else got sleepy at 12am, then I slept good ‘til my usual 5am.  Feel more naps coming as usual today.

There do still seem to be tumblr server/network issues (reported by others on the web (not related to just my blog)).  I learned how to backup my tumbr blog to the iMac yesterday, and I posted that backup to randomphase here but it will lag by a day or two.

Have a great day!

Mystery macro (probably way too easy): know what it is?

Also I get a chance at some unique photo vantage points on our trips to Texas Oncology up/down MoPac, from the passenger seat (I’m still not driving - Vicodin and heavy machinery (and some might say lighter machinery like a camera) don’t mix):

Sammie, Phil and George (at Brick Oven):

and Rachel:

Thanks,

Randy.

Whew, yesterday was not much fun, I believe due to combinations of drugs that we need to manage better; feeling better this morning.  Pharmacy/Medco? refused to allow lunesta, so my Dr prescribed ambien instead to help with steroid induced insomnia; read the side-effects and freak out, but I slept pretty good, until 5:30am (woo-hoo), and didn’t sleep-drive (an actual listed side-effect), didn’t see Elvis, leprechauns

or St Pepper’s Lonely Hearts Club Band - (hallucinations are a side-effect in the pharmacy printout (wow, I’ll have to save some of these for when I’m well :)

So while chemical therapy continues on the weekends (oral temodar), no radiation, so we get a break from that!  So, made it through the first week and I still remember my wife and kids names!!! (Sue, Dave, and Lilian, right?)

Jan took me to “Top Notch” for lunch (only one original employee remains (I believe Galaxy Cafe owns Top Notch now), but they still use the exact same pit and technique and it was as awesome as always (one of the best in town, IMHO).

Yum!

I donated this image to the AAHPM for their 2009 conference brochure packet:

I believe there’s opportunity for something spectacularly amazing and wondrous with every new day: stay positive and don’t worry (worry just wastes good, otherwise useful imagination):

Have a Great Weekend everyone!  Thanks again for all your positive, encouraging, humorous, entertaining cards and emails!!!

Thanks,

Randy.

(A special thanks to Jan for tolerating and caring for me like no one else could)

The staff allowed me to setup my video camera today and I captured this video (I edited out the actual treatment windows, which are about 10-30 seconds long (where nothing visual happens), but it’s still pretty long (about 5 minutes an 40MB download): video

The equipment is Varian Clinac, I believe model 6EX, it’s not a proton accelerator (these are much, much larger), rather a photon (which I think means gamma or xrays) energy linear accelerator. 

Got my 5th treatment; none on the weekends (but still oral temodar); met with Dr Wu and we’re addressing my issues today with medication adjustments that will hopefully help.

Thanks,

Randy.

38th treatment day; yesterday and this morning, not feeling so great in the mornings; Dr Wu wrote a prescription for lunesta (for just 3 days) to try to recycle my sleep, but the pharmacy/Medco said no, the Dr. has to also justify it first, so maybe I’ll get that today.

Jan bought me some photo ops at Central Market yesterday:

Have a great weekend!

Thanks,

Randy.

I’ve noticed that Internet Explorer 6.0.29 and 8.0 do not show the entire blog.  Firefox 5.0 and Safari 5.0.5 seem to work fine.  And Bill H. says google chrome works too.

4th treatment today, fairly uneventful; at the exact same step in the positioning sequence, I see a light blue curtain sweep over from my left to right eye (again, this is not really there, it’s induced by the proton beam).  They agreed to let me setup my iPhone video, on a less busy day, to record the motions of the table and accelerator, so maybe I’ll have that video at some point, I’m curious myself (I can’t really see much through the mask).

Thanks,

Randy.

I hope everyone is doing well.  I switched to phenergan (w/o headache side effect) from zofran (for nausea, which I have had none so far thankfully) and do not have a headache this morning, yeah!

Rachel joined us for lunch, after the treatment and Dr visit ran later than we anticipated:

T-40 (40 treatment days to go!)

Woo-hoo, almost slept until 5am, for a change!  Dull headache though most of the night and now, perhaps related to radiation, but perhaps a zofran (anti-nausea) side effect and but I can try using phenergan instead (which also may help with sleep).

Felt really out of it yesterday, foggy, but had to double up on hydrocondone for the headaches, so hopefully it’s that as opposed to radiation effects :)

Here’s a video (pc only) of timewarp clock project I did, that hopefully you’ll find humorous: timewarp

I didn’t know Neal’s dad was an F4 fighter pilot (awesome): here’s as close as I’ve ever gotten: airshows

T-41 days (6 weeks, 5 radiation treatments per week (30), but 7 temodar/week, so 42 total); nothing really different today, but felt exhausted after the treatment.  It may be less than 10 minutes and I’m done.  They have back to back treatments going on; folks are filing in and out of the accelerator room; they’re flexible with scheduling and rescheduling.  Very friendly folks; starting to get into a routine.  Feeling kinda foggy, hope it’s lack of sleep (due to apprehension after taking the temodar for the first time last night. 

In 2009, I converted my Canon digital rebel to Infrared (IR) (using instructions off the web), doing the surgery to remove the IR blocking filter from in front of the image sensor; quite a delicate operation (knew going in I might trash the camera); I successfully reassembled (getting it apart is easy, putting it back, not so much); then you use an IR pass filter on the lens (so only IR light gets to the sensor); the only problem then is that IR focuses at a different point and you have to manually tweak the focus ring for each shot; here are a couple of examples:

This is a pecan tree on the right:

Folks go back and recolorize these to make for some very beautiful images

Good Morning!

First treatment went good -   unlike Eddie (Randy Quaid), said what happened to him when his wife revved up the microwave in  “Christmas Vacation Quotes”, I had no noticeable side effects.  Never got queasy last night after starting the temodar (took Zofran anti-nausea first); attempting to wean down steroids again.  Feel a little out of sorts this morning, perhaps I should have waited before eating breakfast?  But better now.

 My medical (chemo) oncologist (Dr Chadha) continues to lift my spirits affirming that had I had significant tumor regrowth after the surgery (which they estimated grew at 1cm per month previously), that I would probably have had neurological symptoms, which I have not (and my surgery was 1 month ago today).  So that, in conjunction with my age, health, fitness, 100% successful resection, and highly functional mobile before/after surgery, improves my odds.

Did not “see” the brilliant blue flashes (like I did for the alignment image scans done with this same linear accelerator that sort of freaked me out), but I did “see” a light blue curtain/veil for one brief moment). 

Here’s the actual linear proton accelerator; you lay on the table (coming up/right from the lower left corner) with your head clamped down tightly to the table in your custom made mask; the table moves as well as the accelerator for accurate targeting:

Some related accelerator info/images if you’re interested:

First high voltage accelerator

Proton therapy  (the radiation oncology nurses do NOT stay in the room during treatment (they’re behind lead watching/listening to your remotely)

Linear accelerator  (this is a similar machine I believe – not necessarily the machine used on me) I’m pretty sure they’re using a proton (as opposed to electron) beam for my treatment; curious why you bend the beam 270^o counter-clockwise instead of 90^o clockwise, in this image? Capable of a 40x40cm proton beam pattern coverage area; the collimator assembly is a set of lead? “fingers” that are automatically adjusted, according to scans for each specific patient, to block the beam and apply a set pattern, at a programmed dosage (in my case it’s 2 Gy (amount of energy over a time interval)), I believe the energy level sets the tissue depth.

Is this pathetic or what?  My drug regimen and tracking chart (that Rachel made for me); this plus the above external beam radiation:

*** The attack has started!  Taking no prisoners!  ***

Thanks for all the thoughtful emails yesterday, I really appreciate,

Randy.

George setup this tumblr blog for me and I’m experimenting with switching (currently using word html and posting to randomphase).

The previous/original blog is here: RandyHeischBlog