Jim-bo (pictures censored) & Annie

Well Jim-bo got a Christmas present. He was placed with his girls a week early. He is one happy camper! The cows have eaten down all of the hay fields on this side of the farm and so have been moved to the last of the hay fields. We typically begin feeding hay in the middle of January so we are right on track.

Bill is still busy taking care of his beautiful wife Annie. Her operation went well and she is getting around OK. But I have not seen her on the tractor over the past few weeks! Don and family are doing well with Don in dialysis 3 times a week it is truly a labor of love. Mike and Jan have had family in for the holidays. I met Jan's son Chad and he is OK...knows all the old bluegrass guys. And Santa brought Mike a new HDTV. Peggy and Ray are still volunteering and spending a lot of non-farm time with family. Too bad about Peggy's "skins" this year ... go Ravens!!!!! Smith and Theresa got a new roof for Christmas. And of course the Higgins family is very busy with kids activities while Darcy is overloaded with work at work. Dorothy and Peggy and the boys have become a real part of the farm family ... it's nice to have health care workers right here to bug me :-) And the holiday entrance decorations are GREAT! The dogs still meet daily in the orchard for their daily romp. The garden has been put to sleep for the winter and we all are expecting great things from Irene (she actually knows what she is doing).

So things are looking good for the Farmcolony community for the coming year.

Christmas and Anniversary

After five days in the hospital I came home just in time for our 40Th anniversary on Saturday. We had a quiet day with my brother and his wife. Christmas came this morning and everyone did well. Santa is a good guy!

I go back for the second round of IL-2 on January 3.

The first round: I only could tolerate 4 doses because of my blood pressure dropping so low. I did not really have many of the dreaded side effects but did gain 30 pounds of fluid and have a rash on my head and face. The shivers started exactly two hours after the dose was administered but the nurses were quick with the Demerol which stopped that problem quickly. The biggest problem was sleeping on my back so the blood pressure cuff would work.

The doc plans on a little different protocol on Jan 3 that may allow more doses.

What's Happen'

Well, I went back to the doc yesterday and I am really healthy based upon all the tests that they have done. So looks like I start the Interlukin-2 on Monday. This stuff is so toxic that they will keep me in the hospital infusing it every 8 hours until I can no longer tolerate it. I then come home for a week (40 th anniversary and Christmas) and go back to doc on 3 January for evaluation and then back in hospital for another round of the same. I then wait 3 months for another PET scan and if the tumors are unchanged or smaller I do the above dance again. I am really looking forward to getting this done and moving on! So I guess I can't wait until the last minute to do my holiday shopping this year ;-)

Grapes and Water

Well, instead of building guitars I have been working on the kitchen. I put in tile and a pot filler behind the new range and hood. It's got a tuscan flavor with grapes etc. The lady who built this house was French so we tried to stay with that theme.



The medallion and trim are made of some kind of metalized material



Ahd the pot filler works great. Doesn't everyone NEED one of these. Two valves since there is no drain in the range ;-)

The nasty stuff

Went to the new doc today and the good news is that the "thing" on my spine looks like a ruptured disc. The problem is that there is still melanoma in my lymph system. At this point it is growing so fast that operating would not be a good option. So I gave 10 pounds of blood for tests and will do a brain mri, nuc stress test, bone scan, and pulmonary function test this week to make sure that I can do the chemo(interleukin-2). If all is ok I will go into hospital for a week and get  the infusion and then home for a week and then back in hospital for another week and then wait a few weeks and get scanned again and if it is working go back for another round of the same. This is the only insurance approved treatment for what I have. The success rate is about 10% but the doc says that it tends to be long term solution (when it works). There is another drug that has a higher success rate but they don't know how long it lasts. It is still experimental and the insurance probably won't pay for it. But there are some clinical trials available if the insurance won't pay. So if the interleukin doesn't work we'll try that as well.

The side effects of the interleukin are pretty nasty "like having the worst flu plus". So we will do it and see what happens.

I'll keep you posted.