With Friends Like These......

Ok, gotta sleep. Leaving tomorrow for Escalante for some canyoneering in Egypt 2. I thought I had a friend coming with me but it looks like I'm flying solo. Beeatch sent me an EMAIL (after I had called several times and sent texts over the past two days) at 4 today saying she was sick, had been since Tuesday and wasn't feeling well enough to travel. Why don't I cut her slack? Because 1)I first spoke with her on Tuesday about going and she jumped all over it. Not once did she mention she was coming down with something, 2) I made the plans around her schedule, 3) I spoke with her Thursday and still no mention of illness; 4) she never contacted me between then and today despite my many attempts to reach her; 5) when I *67'd her tonight at 10:30, she answered, sounded just fine and there was a party going on in the background. When she heard my voice, she hung up without saying a word and 6) I immediately texted her about how lame that was and she never responded. Chicken shit.
Funny, she spent about a half an hour bitching about how one of her good friends told her he couldn't hang out with her 4yo anymore because she was too irritating. He stopped calling, bailed on plans they had, blah blah blah. She was extremely hurt and angry. You would think when something like that happens to you, you don't turn around and be a total turd to someone else.
God I hate my 'friends'. Another one bites the dust. Why can't people just say no in the first place and stop f*&king around with other people's valuable time and energy? I could have planned this trip for a different time and with different people. You don't bail on a roadtrip the day before you're supposed to leave. It's just completely uncool. I had a cold on Wednesday too but it's not stopping me from hitting Escalante on Sunday. If you're truly sick at the time someone calls and invites you somewhere you TELL THEM THAT so that they can plan accordingly. If you don't want to go, you say that immediately. YOU DO NOT WAIT UNTIL THE LAST MINUTE WHEN THERE'S ZERO TIME LEFT FOR THE OTHER PERSON TO FIND ANOTHER COMPANION. That's just plain obnoxious and grounds for a baseball bat to the head. Ugh. Ok, I'm going to sleep now. Toodles!!

Where the Wild Things Are- FILM REVIEW

Saw "Where The Wild Things Are" tonight. Sage loved it and actually sat in my lap the whole time without squirming. My little 3 year old is growing up! As cool as the scenery and the monster puppets were, though, there's not much to engage adults. The boy is a brat with no insight or chutzpah to communicate with the Things and help them understand how to get along and be happy. Max tries to order them around but he's often stumped and silenced when the Things call him out. Finally when he does confess that he's not a Viking King he has absolutely NOTHING to say for himself; no way to elonquently explain why it doesn't matter that he's not a real king. What impresses the most are the Things themselves. The actors (especially James Gandolfini) do a phenomenal job of bringing their beings to life-especially when the 1963 book never explores their characters. This film adaptation by Spike Jonz attempts to put some meat on the bones of a nine-sentence children's story about a neglected little boy who gets sent to his room without supper and finds himself in a far-off land where he finally gets to be the boss and the one showered with attention- even if it is by a bunch of large creatures who thump the ground and roar.
The monster-play in this movie script drags on and on and there's no cool moral that ought to hit your rugrats over the head with. Still, I did shed a tear when Max said good bye to the Wild Things. I hate good byes. If you've got little ones, take them to see it. They'll have nothing to fear.

Three Down; Three To Go

I'll make this one a shorty seeing as how it's five minutes to 2 a.m. and I have to get up at 7 a.m. to do this breast cancer strides walk. Hope talked me into it. I'm not one for getting up this early unless there are killer yard sales or there're two feet of fresh snow at the resorts. The mountains in Utah aren't open yet (that'll come in Nov.) and it's too cold for garage sales. I think it was guilt that motivates me. After Hope's piece on Fox13 (see link in my FB posts), I received a few emails calling me an 'inspiration'. Huh? I'm just doing what I'm told and trying to ignore the fact that I have a life-threatening disease. I finished round three of chemo a week ago and am just fine thank you! Halfway through treatment now. Was a tad queasy last Saturday but that had more to do with lack of sleep and then doing nothing but sit around the house all day. By Monday, I was climbing and jumping on my Stair Master. The past two days have been spent researching the possiblity of doing radiation concurrent with chemo instead of waiting until chemo was done before starting 6 weeks of radiation (which, btw, would mean really f*^king up Christmas and January). I figured since I was handling chemo so well, I could take the extra punch. None of the doctors in Utah seem to be up on this little time saver so I've had to Google like mad and contact cancer hospitals outside of the state. And here I thought the Huntsman Center was state of the art! After my research it seems that not only is CMF/radiation together viable but it may increase the longterm survival rate by 10 %. Plus, it keeps me from dragging my treatment into the next health insurance calendar year. Any sane person wouldn't think twice. The side effects? They tell me my boob might not look as nice. Anyone out there can attest or deny this claim?The stuff I've read so far says there's no difference in looks at the 3 year point. You might be wondering how the twins are holding up at this point. Still small and perky. You can barely tell I had surgery. The scar blends in and there's no divet from the chunk of tumor they removed. Thank you, Dr. Neumeyer! Ryan can even squeeze them now and there's no pain or difference in touch between left and right. If it weren't for my head I could be 'normal' again. My head though constantly takes me on walks where I wonder if there will ever be a time in the future that I can say to someone, "I had cancer" instead of "I have cancer". It's a strange thing to feel like this disease will stick with you longer than family.