Tomorrow the days begin to get longer.  Today was damp and very mild.  I worked this morning, went down to the gym and put in 24 minutes on the elliptical (20 minutes workout, four minutes cooldown; it’s programmed that way).  It was almost like being on my old schedule.  I came back upstairs and showered and dressed.

I had a lunch date at 1:15 with a friend from the neighborhood.  On my way out I ran into one of our building staff and one of our neighbors, both of whom wanted to know whether I was still doing well.  As we spoke, another neighbor came in, so I told her what the story was, too.  I’m afraid I shocked her, but then again, I’m pleased that I shocked her; I really don’t look sick.

I was not late at the restaurant, but my friend was already waiting.  I’d spoken to her before I set up this diary, and she wasn’t aware of it, so I gave her the URL.  We went to a little Thai restaurant with an inexpensive prix fixe lunch, which I managed to finish– even the ice cream.  I was very proud of myself, but I don’t know how much dinner I’ll be able to eat.

After lunch, with some trepidation, I stopped at the post office to mail a couple of items that needed special postage.  I was in great luck.  There was no line at all, and it took me longer at the light to cross the street than the entire time I spent on the transaction.  When I got home there was a parcel waiting for me with an unfamiliar return address.  It turned out to be a package of assorted chocolate, from the sister of my California chocolate-sending friend.  (Coincidence?  I think not.)  I didn’t recognize her married name until I read her card.  I was so full from lunch that I couldn’t imagine eating them.  I’ll be working my way through them all, bit by precious bit.

I got back to work for a while, and then realized it was probably a reasonably good time to try calling an old friend, my computer science mentor, to whom I hadn’t spoken in years.  He was, as has always been his wont, late for something, so we didn’t talk for long, but it was good to be back in touch, and we’ll try again tomorrow.

So it’s been a very good day.

It was a beach day for my sweetie, so we were up and active early.  (Not that we ever lie around until an hour that sane people would consider “late”, but when he’s off on his excursion by seven, it pushes everything back just a little.)

I spent the morning working and doing minor chores– paying a bill, making a lunch date with a friend who lives in the neighborhood, sorting through some papers and clothing. Yesterday the Amazon order that included the Follies disk arrived, so I put that (and, while I was at it, Candide, and A Little Night Music) onto my iPhone.  I also checked on a leather repair place I’ve been meaning to look into for weeks before I had to leave for the office.

I listened to Follies on the ride down, but it was pretty frustrating, competing, as it was, with ambient noises that included holiday serenaders.  At the office I got some more chores done, although I’m still pretty much twiddling my thumbs on the project I’d most like to be focused on.

So today was a day full of little things, but I feel that I’ve accomplished something.  That’s a good feeling.

It’s been another busy day.  I worked online, did a brief workout.  (Other folks were using the ellipticals, so I used the treadmill, putting on a steep incline to exercise my right ankle– the one that’s been week since Halloween.  That was pretty boring, so I moved to strenghth and stretching.  I increased my pushups and crunches, and used some heavier free weights today.

I had email from the online pharmacy saying that at least one of my prescriptions was due for a refill.  That isn’t the case, but there’s still the anti-nausea drug pending.  I called and spent a while (but not hugely long) time on hold while they checked it out.  Turns out they needed my regular medicare information rather than the drug plan information.  I gave that to them and I think we’re good to go, with (the rep said) no out-of-pocket cost to me.

The package delivery service provided a yummy parcel of maple-y treats from friends in Vermont who are clearly trying to fatten me up.  Much more interesting than the expected parcel of stuff I ordered from Amazon.

My sweetie is off to his Gilda’s Club meeting.  I missed my weekend soak, so after I’ve had supper I think I’ll indulge myself.

I had a fairly busy day. I started by looking around online and doing the usual morning chores.  Then I decided to bake.

I’ve had a packet of yeast in the fridge for a long time, and I wasn’t sure it was still good, but I thought I’d try it.  I used to do a lot of yeast baking, but I haven’t done it regularly in years.  I’ve been thinking I’d like to try kneading the dough in my food processor to see how it goes, so I looked for a recipe that wouldn’t be too heavy for the machine.  (I don’t have a stand mixer.  I’d get one, but I have no place to keep it.)

I found a recipe for maple oatmeal bread that looked promising, and this morning I made that.  It’s delicious.  I’m likely to make it again (and give loaves away as gifts).  Making it was easy, but there was a fair amount of cleanup afterwards.

I got some administrative stuff out of the way and did some gift wrapping.  I had planned to take a nice, long soak in a lavender tub, but somehow I didn’t get around to it.  Maybe tomorrow, if I get my work and my home chores all out of the way.

I wasn’t terribly hungry today, but I didn’t have any problems eating, and I (dutifully) ate my normal meals and snacks, and I feel okay. In the morning I spoke to my brother and then to my sister.  Those calls always buoy me up enormously.

I did some work online and some chores (getting the gift envelopes ready for the building staff, doing some cleaning in the kitchen).  Tomorrow, if I have the energy, I’ll try to bake something.  I was restless this afternoon and almost did it then, but it was late enough by the time I was ready that the baking would have impinged on dinner preparation, so I postponed it.

I think it’s probably good that I got restless– a sign that I could have been doing more.  But I didn’t, and that’s okay too.

Today I finished my second infusion cycle.  It was an early (10am) appointment.  Dr. S was ready before they’d finished the finger prick blood draw.  His exam was just as good as last week.  I remembered to ask him about alcohol, and he said not the day before an infusion, but otherwise there was no problem; my liver function has been normal throughout.  It’s not that I drink much, or even that I miss it if I could have had a glass of wine but pass it up (as I’ve done a couple of times since I started treatment), but it certainly is good to have permission to indulge, if only because it’s that much closer to normal.

Across from the large infusion rooms is a room with a large glass door that they call the isolation room.  There are two infusion setups in there, and that’s where they put me this time.  When we went in, Dr. S was there, talking to the patient in the other chair.  She’s been in the unit for a year and now shows up every five weeks for what she describes as a maintenance dose; she has leukemia.  I couldn’t help envying the notion of maintenance.

When she was finished, the chair was occupied by a lymphoma patient.  He’s also been there longer than I; this is his seventh infusion and he goes every fifth week.  His drug has some unpleasant side effects, though:  He’ll feel sick for about a week and say he has a terrible taste in his mouth all the time.

This being the end of a cycle, they needed to do more blood work. For the first time, they used the port for that.  (Previously, they were trying to get a specimen to check for the experimental protocol, and that had to come from a vein.)  The blood wasn’t drawing well through the port,  and they had to use a couple of doses of heparin and move me around some to get it going.  That took about half an hour, so it prolonged the process, but once that was done everything went pretty well.  The reflexologist came by and massaged my hands with a very rick cream, and that helped pass the time.  We were home shortly after 1pm, and I had some food to augment the snack I’d had with me at the hospital.

I felt okay for long enough to check my mail and do a couple of easy chores, and then I decided to take it easy.  I napped and half-watched TV for a while.  I’m feeling tired and not very hungry, but not really sick.

I’m off next week.  I really must send a card to the staff on the unit.  They’re lovely people.

It feels a little like cheating– having folks come to visit from out of town because I’m sick when I feel this well.  Okay, I’m not complaining.  Let me keep cheating, please, for a long, long time.  Our Florida friends called when they were ready to join us, and showed up at about 10:30.  We didn’t do a lot today, mostly sat around and talked, but we did walk to lunch at a Turkish restaurant we like on Amsterdam.  That’s a little over half a mile away.We enjoyed our various lunches.  (I think the hit of the day was a pizza with sausage and fenugreek, but I could be wrong.)  And then we walked home and sat and talked some more.

Our friends had brought miracle fruit, and we indulged, chewing it and tasting lemon (surprisingly candy-ish) afterward.  And then we sat and shmoozed (or is it “schmoozed”?) some more, until it was time for them to leave for the airport.

The visit was wonderful for us, and they kept thanking us for our hospitality even though they stayed at a hotel in the neighborhood and we took all our meals out.  They made the trip, took the time off, put themselves out.  I do hope we were worth it.  I know it was good for my sweetie, as well as for me, to have them here.

We expect to see them in Florida next month, too.  We’ll take all we can get.  Thank you so much, guys, for coming to see us.

We didn’t sleep as late as we might have done, so I was sleepy today but otherwise feeling good.  Yesterday when I got home there was a message on the answering machine requesting that I call the mail-order pharmacy I deal with, and providing a reference number.  I called the number (figuring it was about the prescription for the anti-nausea medicine), and it was, but the representative I was speaking to couldn’t figure out what the status of the order was, nor could she reach anyone who could figure it out.  After spending the better part of half an hour on hold, I decided to give up and try again at a different time.

So I tried this morning.  There was just a little hold time, and it turned out that the drug had been submitted under Medicare Part B (medigap, for the uninitiated), but had been sent to the department that handles Medicare Part D (drug plan), so the order had been forwarded to the other department and was in process.  I have not been asked to authorize a charge to my credit card.  It’s all a bit strange, and I’m glad I don’t seem to be in a hurry for the drug.

That resolved, I did some more work and made myself presentable.  My sweetie volunteers at the American Museum of Natural History on Wednesdays.  We decided that he would leave vouchers for our friends and me, and we’d spend the afternoon at the museum, and that’s what we did.  The vouchers came with a selection of three features, so we saw one about tornados, one about frogs, and signed up for one on butterflies.  We didn’t get to the butterflies because my sweetie’s shift ended just as we’d have been going in, so we met him instead and all went home together.

We had dinner at the Indian restaurant just down the hill (that’s three meals for me there in the last few weeks!).  I brought leftovers home with me, but I still ate well.  We saw our friends to the subway (right there) as they’re off to see Follies.  We’ll get together with them again tomorrow.

So, I didn’t do a workout today, but I did walk to the museum and, once there, walked around a good bit.  I’m still feeling good, and that makes me happy.

Lucky 13.  It’s late (for me), so I’ll keep this very short.

I’ve felt good all day.  This morning I made out the usual December charity checks and paid a couple of bills while I was at it.  I had email from my niece in Arizona, and we’ll have a chance to get together for lunch when she’s home after Christmas.  I went into the office for a while, got back and cleared some more stuff out of the way.

Then our Florida friends showed up and we chatted with them before having dinner at a nearby Mexican restaurant.  I think I did pretty well, even if I did bring home half of my plate.  (I’d had chips and salsa, a little taste of appetizer, and a sample of everyone else’s meal.)

So that’s it for today.  Now I can happily wind down and go to sleep.

It’s been a lovely day.  I worked in the early morning (and folded and sorted the laundry, as usual).  Shortly before noon my college friend (with whom I had a noon lunch date) called to say she was crawling in traffic, but she was still here within a few minutes of twelve.  My sweetie was still around, and the three of us chatted briefly before we split (as he had no desire to listen to our girl talk).  We had lunch at the Indian restaurant down the hill (where I’d lunched with my San Francisco friend a couple of weeks ago).

Most of the talk was catching up on family stuff.  I knew her family years ago, and she showed me lots of pictures of children and grandchildren.  (She’s in the area helping one of her daughters, who’s working out of town this week.)  Being with her made me feel almost collegiate again.  It was great fun, and we hope to be able to get together when my sweetie and I are in Florida.

Then I got back to work, taking a brief break to spend time with my sweetie.  This evening he’s at a Gilda’s Club support group meeting, which I hope will be helpful to him.  He had an early dinner before I was ready to eat; I may be asleep by the time he gets back.  Tomorrow we have more Florida friends arriving, and we’re very eager to see them, too.  I have a list of local folk I’d like to see as well.  I haven’t had this busy a social calendar in years!