shake it

It was actually sunny and warmish today.

More snow fell here on the weekend and it felt like winter would never depart but today, well today there was hope in the air.  Hope that spring is actually around the corner, even if there is still a significant amount of snow and ice on the ground around here.

Mark went back to work today, and got through the whole day.  He's feeling much better this week than last.  He still needs to be careful when he twists or transitions from a sitting position to a standing position but overall, we can both see a huge improvement over last week. 

When we got home tonight, we actually sat out in the sun porch (which is still wrapped in plastic) with the dogs.  It felt wonderful to see the sunshine and watch stuff starting to drip.  Birds are actually returning to the neighbourhood too! You forget how much fun they are and how much you missed them until they come back.

With any kind of luck, Mark's week will be uneventful.  He has his consultation appointment at the cancer clinic this week.  We've been looking forward to learning more about what that process will be, how long, etc.  He's done so well with the surgery, I have to expect that he'll do well with the chemo too, and we will soon be able to put all of this behind us and focus on regular, boring life.

Stuff like cleaning up the debris from the December ice storm, digging up the gardens we're getting ride of and selling our income property.   Just to name a few... boring will be good after all of this health stuff.

best news ever

Not a hernia.

Not an infection.

Not a popped staple.

According to his doctor, he has a pulled muscle.  He can go back to work but he's going to have to be very careful and not lift anything heavy. 

I was so relieved that I almost cried.  In my mind, we were going to be sent to emerge... you know, worst case scenarios are always the first place I go. So happy right now... yay!

Valiant Effort

Yesterday was supposed to be Mark's first full day back to work.

It didn't really work out like that.  He spent the morning with a man, learning about our septic system.  See, we've been living with our septic system for just over a year now but really, we're city folk who are trying to figure out things that you never have to concern yourself with, when you are attached to a sewer.  In any event, it was time well spent, probably should have happened last year but, the main thing is we now know a lot more about tanks and fields and Waterloo Bio Filters than we did before.

The septic meeting ate up his morning but he got into work for the afternoon and put in a few hours.  Overall, he was pooped at the end of the day but enjoyed being back at work.

Today was to have been his first full day at work.  It seems that he has injured himself, getting into a car this morning.  That stitch he was talking about last week became VERY painful when he had to try to get into a car he doesn't normally drive (he's a taxi driver).  The pain took his breath away and he actually had to go home.  He was pretty disappointed about not being able to work but honestly, I'm so glad he just went home to deal with his pain instead of trying to soldier through.

Fortunately, he has an appointment tomorrow with his GP so she'll be able to tell us if he has a hernia, or a popped staple, or an infection... whatever it is, I hope he doesn't have to go back for another surgery.  Right now, he's feeling better, he's taken some tylenol and kept his feet up all day.  He agreed to stay home from work until he sees his doctor tomorrow.  Thank goodness for that!

No work for YOU!!

Mark has officially been doing too much and not resting enough according to his surgeon!

Apparently he's healing nicely but shouldn't be thinking about returning to work this week.  He's been told he can go back next week, cautiously.  The doctor advised him to take it easy and slowly work into a full schedule.  Normally, he likes to see folks off work for 6 week before they go back.

I know that he's been doing too much because he's complained of a light stitch in his side, around the area of his incision. It's not the incision itself, Mark described it like a poke.  The pain doesn't last long but I don't that any pain in that area is great at this point.

So, for now, for the rest of this week anyway, he's being a good patient, following doctor's orders and waiting for next week to arrive.  I think he's going a little stir crazy to be honest!

Post-Op Day 6 - Finally Home

After what felt like forever, but in actual fact was just a few days, Mark was sprung from the hospital.  The following update was sent out to our family and friends today.  We're really really really happy that he's home!

Hello everyone,

Apologies for the lack of an update over the weekend.  Mark did get home.  It was a bit like pulling teeth, dealing with all of the red-tape at the hospital, trying to get signatures and whatnot on the weekend, on a long weekend no less, to get him out the door.  Once we got out though, I thought he was going to cry from the fresh air.  It's so darned hot on the floor.  I understand to a certain degree that they need to keep things warm for the patients but everyone was complaining about it, it was a bit too much.

Mark's much more comfortable being home, and of course, is so happy to be back with the dogs.  He missed them terribly, particularly Gracie.  She's been shadowing him ever since he walked through the door.

We can tell already that the recovery from this stay in the hospital is going to be different from the last time.  Physically, he's feeling pretty beaten up.  I blame those horrible beds.  They aren't made for anyone who is taller than 5'10" so he has blisters on his feet from where they rubbed on the headboard. We both need to stop comparing where he is now to where he was on Day 6 from the colon cancer surgery.  Earlier today we were discussing how, on a scale of 1 to 10, the colon cancer surgery was about a 3 and this liver operation is probably a 7.  He's got a massive incision with 24 staples.  The actual incision is looking good but he's got to be very careful whenever he is moving, getting up and down, etc. I don't think he'll be jumping around or going too far unaccompanied for a while yet.

As luck would have it, I woke up yesterday with the beginnings of the mother of all head colds.  I suppose it was unavoidable, given the pace of the past week or two and everything else.  Hoping to be able to sleep tonight.  Did not get much sleep last night.  It's funny how breathing makes sleeping so much easier huh??

So that's it for now.  Not sure when he'll be up for phone calls but I think he's back on his email as of today.  Thanks again, everyone, for your support over the past week.  We still have a long road to go but I think the worst part of it is over.

Much love,

 Peggy & Mark

Day 3 Post-Op

He's hanging in there, taking one day at a time.  Hospital's are really no fun, at all, but we're trying to make the best of it.  Here's another update, which was sent out to friends and family earlier this evening.

Hello everyone,

Thought I'd take a moment and give you all a little progress report on Mark.

Today is day 3, post-op, and they turned off the morphine on his epidural at 8:30 a.m.. He's starting to experience some pain around the incision area but it does seem to be healing very well.  This afternoon, they started him on oral pain relief and that's what he'll have when he gets home.  Right now, the focus is on how his blood is clotting.  They want to be sure that he's clotting well enough for the epidural to be removed (there is some concern that if it pierced a blood vessel, he may have some bleeding in his back when it's removed and everyone would like to avoid that).

We're not running laps around the floor like during his last surgery.  I think yesterday, he probably overdid it a bit and the reality is, this was a much bigger operation than the colon cancer op.  He is moving well, getting up and down unassisted and, thankfully, is sleeping well.  Of course, hospital beds are notoriously uncomfortable and the temperature on the floor is absolutely tropical so he's very keen to get home.

I guess that's really it for now.  Slowly, slowly but at least in the right direction.   Thanks again, sincerely, for all of the love and good wishes you've been sending our way.  It's meant a lot to both of us.

lots and lots of love,

 Peggy and Mark

Wednesday Update - movin' on up!

A room with a view!
Originally uploaded by Julep67

Day two went really well. Everything seems to be going better than anticipated. I don't know if we had low expectations going in so any progress seems amazing but we're super happy about stuff so far.

Again, here is the update I have sent out to our friends and family tonight:

Good evening everyone,

Just wanted to send you all another quick update on Mark. He's doing so great today.

When I got down to the hospital today, his nurse in the step down unit told us that he would be moving up (yeah, we're moving on up...) to a regular room. One of the surgeon's residents was in to see Mark in the morning and he was doing better than they expected. His labs were all great and when I arrived, he was sitting up in a chair. He'd been able to get some water to drink too which was a massive help.

The stepdown unit had been a bit of a three-ring circus last night apparently so he didn't get any sleep at all. There was one guy in there who seemed pretty out of it and he hollered out loud the entire time I was there. Apparently, this went on all of last night too. When my mum and I were there last night, he was throwing up and this morning, when I was there, he was eating a chocolate bar someone had given him and he was throwing that up too!! Mark heard him on the phone trying to get someone to bring McDonald's into him. Dude, you're in step down. You've obviously got some serious crap going on with you, shut up and put the junk food away!! You'll barf less and possibly get out of there quicker.

Late this afternoon, Mark was moved into his new room. It's really nice. He's close to the nurses station and it's a semi-private room. His roomie is an elderly gentleman who is very quiet. At least he was quiet this afternoon. I don't think though that he is used to having a roommate because took a pants-less stroll around the room while I was there. We just pretended not to notice and looked away, talking loudly about something silly. It was pretty difficult not to laugh out loud.

Speaking of that, I think Mark owes Moe Berg about $1.75 by now. Everytime he laughs, he has to press his incision area with a pillow and he says, "it's hard to laugh." We figure at 25 cents per "hard to laugh" we may have to send Moe upwards of $5 by the time Mark comes home.



Tomorrow, we plan to spend the day walking the floor. There were a couple of ladies up doing laps before I left and he's itching to get up and walking to kick their butts at the winter olympics version of who can do the most laps on the 6th floor!

Thanks again for all the wonderful messages and calls, you all ROCK!!!

Much much love,

Peggy and Mark

Surgery Day Update - with 40% More Liver than Originally Advertised

Mark is still in the OR #cancer #liverresection #kgh @kghconnect
Originally uploaded by Julep67

So the surgery happened as scheduled yesterday. The days and weeks leading upto it were stressful for both of us, in different ways. By this past weekend, I was a bit of a basket case. I was totally fine until someone would ask me how I was. Once asked, I'd fall apart. Charming.

Here is the update we sent out to anxious friends and family last night. So far, everything is going very well.

Hello again everyone,

Thanks so much to everyone for the tweets, FB messages, emails, txts and phone calls. It really meant a lot to us to have so much support from you today.

As many of you already know, Mark did have his surgery this morning. We were told to be down there for 6 a.m. He actually told me that he had a good sleep last night, me, I slept in 20 minutes blocks all night. By 7:30 a.m. we had seen both his surgeon, and his anesthesiologist (the one he requested, who was with him for his last 2 surgeries). We found out that the operation would take between 7 and 8 hours. This was a bit of a shock to both of us as we had thought it would be 4 to 6 hours. Until 8 a.m. rolled around and the nurse came to get Mark, I was holding my breath. I was really afraid that we could get cancelled.

My mum very kindly hung out with me at KGH all day. While we were there, waiting, we were able to visit an old family friend who is having an extended stay. It was nice to see him and have the distraction of thinking about someone else’s situation for a little while. We wandered around a bit, had lunch and leisurely made our way back to the waiting area, thinking we had at least 4 hours before we’d see anyone with an update. 10 minutes after we arrived in the waiting room (around 3 p.m. or so), Mark’s surgeon came into the room, wearing street clothes and a big smile on his face.

Mark’s op went really well. When they got in there, they discovered that the tumours (yes, he had 2 more small tumours develop since the December 16 MRI) were all in an area which allowed them to remove a “wedge” of liver instead of the large segment they had planned to remove. Because they were removing such a smaller piece, the risk in the short term of him having difficulty getting his liver function back to normal is decreased significantly. I asked the doctor for the percentage of liver removed (explaining to him that Mark was a “math guy” and would want to know) – he told me 20% was removed. Now, the recovery and everything else will still be the same but the overall result is much better. I asked about the chances of there being other tumours in the liver and the doc told me that they felt around the liver, and did an ultrasound and that any additional growths would be on a cellular level at this point. When I asked him if chemo would help to lessen that risk he told me yes and that Mark would probably do chemo in 2 months. Because Mark has never had chemo before, his prognosis is very good. I felt incredibly relieved to hear this.

Two hours later I was able to see Mark in the recovery room. He had a lot of equipment hooked up to him but was not uncomfortable. Recently he was diagnosed with some tendonitis in his shoulder and that was giving him grief (probably because of all of the snow shovelling he’s been doing recently!) but otherwise all was well. About 90 minutes later, he was moved to a monitored room. He’ll probably be there for 2 or 3 days which is good.

When I saw him in his room, he was wanting to sit up and drink some water. He was hot and uncomfortable. I figure that this is all a good sign. If you can complain, it can’t be all that bad, right? The nurses won’t be taking any crap off of him and I told him to do what he was told. By now, I’m hoping he’s asleep.

I’m hoping too that I’ll get some sleep tonight. It’s good to be home after such a long day and the dogs seemed happy to see me although I could tell that they were wondering where Mark was.

Over the next few days, I’ll continue to provide updates about how he’s progressing. He doesn’t have any devices with him yet (although I’ll be taking his phone to him tomorrow) but I know he’d like to hear from you if you’d like to drop him a line (or send it to me and I’ll make sure he gets it). I'm sure that there is lots I've forgotten about today but I think I've got all the big pieces. I'm a little brain dead at the moment!

Thanks again, everyone, for all of your good thoughts and lovely messages. It was an enormous help to us today!!

much love,

Peggy and Mark

False Start - A Cancer Story, Part Two

In June of 2012, Mark had surgery to blast some horrible kidney stones.  The surgery was done at Kingston General Hospital so, when his cancer surgery was scheduled, we were familiar with the pre-surgery drill.  On surgery day, we knew exactly where to go and what to do.

The weekend leading up to his surgery was horrible.  We were beyond stressed out, worried about the actual surgery (possible complications include death, no fun), worried about what they may find once they did the operation.  The tension in the house was brutal.  Neither of us slept well the night before he was due to go under the knife.  When we arrived at the KGH and checked in, I sent out this little update:

Update 1 - mid-morning

We are at KGH - arrived for 10 am, suspect Mark will go in at noon but don't know for sure. Much busier today than when we were here for Kidney surgery.  I think this is cancer and heart surgery day, lots of quite young adults.  Lots of worried faces.

Will let you know when we are at the next stage of this trip / when he actually goes in to the OR.

As I was typing that message, Mark was putting on his compression socks and the nurse was putting an IV into his arm.  His bum had just hit the gurney when we found out that he was bumped for the day.  There had been a couple of bad accidents over the weekend and a bed shortage resulted.  Everyone in the admitting area was surprised and very sweet and apologetic but we were UP-SET.  Mark got dressed and we left.  I remember that I was just barely holding it together.  We walked outside and I called a taxi to take us home.  While we were waiting for the cab, we silently stood in the sunshine.  We were both in shock.  All of that stress and grief over the weekend, not to mention the lack of sleep, had us both in a haze. 

During the summer months, a small number of homeless people hang out, in the smoking area outside of the KGH main entrance.  I was not aware of this but cab-driver Mark pointed it out to me.  These folks had what he called “ a homeless tan” which, I guess, you get when you have to spend most of your days outside.  I think that it must be easier to ask for food or cigarettes by the hospital entrance because of the volume of folks coming and going all day. 

While we stood in the sunshine, trying to absorb what had just happened, one of these men approached us, made a comment about Mark’s hair (he has long hair and wears it in a single braid down his back).  I think that the man thought Mark was of aboriginal descent because of the braid.  He started to make a comment to Mark about his hair and the spirits or something and Mark turned to him and said, “No.  Walk away please.”  The guy didn’t stop; he continued to approach us, commenting on Mark’s hair, and trying to offer us “blessings.”  I lost it.  I started to cry.  I got really upset and asked the man to leave us alone.  He wouldn’t go, he kept insisting that he wasn’t bothering us.  He was bothering us though.  In his defense, he had no idea how fragile we were and probably couldn’t fathom that anyone wouldn’t want to be blessed by his god.  When he wouldn’t leave, I yelled at him this time.  I asked him to “fuck off and leave us alone.” It was not my proudest moment and it didn’t help that he started yelling back at me about how his god hates swearing and that I would probably burn in “hell.” Not threats that really mean anything to me but I didn’t need to be in a shouting match with a stranger all the same.  Fortunately, by this time, the cab was pulling up and we were home a few minutes later.

Once we arrived at the house, we both calmed down.  I called his surgeon’s office and the amazing EA there was able to get us a spot in surgery for the following day. 

Something about having the surgery cancelled and then this argument with the homeless man broke the tension we’d both been feeling.  I remember that we both slept like logs that night and felt better prepared to deal with whatever would happen in the days ahead. 

43ba60741cca260a42e69dfdfcc00ced47cfacffa5748ce9a9

One Year Later - A Cancer Story, Part One

I returned to work yesterday after a two week vacation.  We actually stayed home so technically, I suppose it was a “stay-cation” so to speak.  Originally, Mark had planned to take off the second week with me.  With very little arm twisting, I convinced him to take the whole two weeks off instead.  Business is very slow for him in August so he wouldn’t be missing much and, that first week was a short one due to the holiday.  Now that we’re both back to the grindstone, I know he is glad to have had a long, two-week break.

This is the first time since we’ve been together (14 years) that he has had an actual 2 week vacation.  Last year, he missed several weeks of work, but recovering from surgery isn’t exactly a holiday.

Speaking of that, it’s very hard to realize that at this time last year, Mark was in the hospital, waiting to be sent home after having a piece of his bowel removed.  It was a bit of a scary time for us.  We knew that the surgeon felt that the operation was a success but we didn’t know what the results of the biopsy would be for a few weeks.  His cancer could have spread to other organs or to his lymph nodes.  At that time, we just had to be patient. 

In honour of the anniversary of his surgery, I’m going to share some posts here which I have kept private until now.  They were emails I sent to our friends and family while Mark was in the hospital.  Over the next few days, I’ll be publishing them here as a series.

Early detection was the key to our good luck and I feel like it would be good karma to share our story on the outside chance that someone else is going through what we have already lived.

This first missive was sent out to some close friends on August 14, 2012:

On July 30th Mark was officially diagnosed with Colon Cancer.  We were 99% sure he had it after a colonoscopy on July 13 (the doctor doing the test basically told him he did and they sent the nurse navigator in to see us and they don't do that if it's just a polyp).  While he was having his pre-surgery tests for his Kidney Stone surgery, he was diagnosed as being slightly anemic.  When he did his fecal occult screening test, it came back wonky, hence the colonoscopy.  He had a CT scan the week of July 23 and it looks like all of his vital organs are clear.  The surgery he's having is a hemi-colectomy.  His tumor is in the ascending colon so they will basically take out the right side of his colon and reattach it.  He is having his surgery today and he'll be in the hospital for about 7 days (until they are sure that everything is healing correctly, he is eating normally and his bowels are working - apparently your stomach become paralyzed during this surgery so they have to make sure it's working again).  I'll be taking an extra week off to be home with him for at least the first week when he's home from the hospital.  It's pretty major surgery, he'll have an 8 inch incision so, as Mark said to the surgeon, his swimsuit modeling days are over!  As cancer goes, this is a good one to have.  When they remove the colon, they will biopsy the lymph nodes and if they are clear, he will not need to do chemo so we're hoping for that.  It seems like it was caught early so we're pretty optimistic.

Of course, Mark is all "sure, you're tired, but I HAVE CANCER" or to which I keep having to remind him, "Yeah, but you won't have cancer in a few days so shut up about it already!"  Fun and games with the cancer jokes!

We're keeping this one really close to the chest because we don't want everyone and their uncle talking about how so and so had it and they died or had five million terrible things happen to them.... also, he does not want it getting onto Facebook.  If it were to get back to his demented sister in law, she'd just be way too happy to hear that he had something like this.  asshat.  We have told my parents and Patrick (and swore them to secrecy) and some folks at work because I have no idea exactly if I'll be back to work on August 27 or beyond that.

So that’s what we’ll be doing this week.  I expect that he’ll be released around August 20, barring any complications and will be home from work for at least 3 to 4 weeks recovering.

I’ll probably drop you a line in a mass email later  today to let folks know how he made out with his surgery (he told a few of his friends finally – no one his family knows still, over the past couple of days) and will keep you posted.

still waiting

Roger Waters - The Wall - 2012
Originally uploaded by Julep67

We spent the past week and a bit preparing ourselves for Mark's surgery, which had been scheduled for today.

It's a pretty big op and we're a little bit emotional about it. Physically and emotionally, there is a lot of work to be done to get ready. At home, we had things to sort out, arrangements to make regarding work, pets, just general life stuff.

We were both pretty relieved to arrive at the same day admitting area this morning and be taken on time. Mark got into his charming gown, new housecoat and awesome IV. He sat in a little cubby while the nurses too'd and fro'd and tried to find him a gurney. From the waiting area, I saw his surgeon come in. All good signs right?

Next thing I know, a nurse is calling my name. She approaches me and says, "have you been told yet that the surgery has been cancelled." Dumbfounded, angry, sad, wide-eyed and slack-jawed, I say, "uh, no!" She takes me to where Mark is. He's now getting dressed and has big bandages on his hands from the IV stuff.

We're both upset but we understand, things happen. There was no bed available for him to go to once he got out of surgery. That is a problem. I suspect that they were backed up with trauma cases from the weekend. We suck it up and go home. Well, we try to go home.

We get to the lobby and I phone for a cab. While we are standing outside, upset, shaken, a smidgen angry, on the verge of tears (me anyway - I think Mark was probably more composed that I was), waiting for our cab, safely in the 9 m no smoking area. An older man approaches us, commenting on Mark's hair (it's long, silvery white and worn in a braid down his back). I can tell he's going to aks if Mark is aboriginal (he's not, he's a lapsed jew) and wants to start some kind of crazy conversation with us. I notice that he has bright blue nail polish on his very dirty nails. Mark sees his light cigarette and notices his "homeless tan" (not my description, I guess it's something Mark's observed while driving his cab). We both tell him no, to step away from us with the cigarette. The man starts into some discussion of religion. We ask him again to leave and I point out that he's in the no smoking zone. He tells me to call a cop if I don't like it. I pull out my phone and get ready to dial when I realize that there are security guards right inside the door. I tell the man that I'll just go fetch a guard. The man RUNS to the other side of the painted line and says, "there, what are you going to do now?" We say, "Nothing, you're in the smoking zone now, leave us alone." He starts hollering at us that we are hate-filled, are going to hell. Which is hilarious considering we don't believe in hell. We're both pretty sure that dead is dead and there no where to go when your number is up. However, he keeps hollering "well that's where you're going." We shout back at him to just leave us alone and to f-off and get into our cab. He was still shouting at us as we drove away. Mark told me that he sees guys like that all the time. They hang around outside the hospital and bum smokes from patients who go out for a cigarette.

Normally, I would probably just ignored someone like that but we were both so upset and he just picked the wrong moment. When we got home, I was still shaking with anger and frustration but calmed down enough to call the surgeon's office to rebook.

I have to say, the surgeon's office is amazing. They have given us a spot for tomorrow, we're checking in at 6 a.m. and Mark should be having his op by 8 a.m.

We're early birds most of the time so that won't bother us too much and I have to say, the blue-nailed smoking dude probably won't be up to greet us when we arrive tomorrow. We're feeling really lucky to have this new slot assigned to us so quickly. it was a real relief because I know how long these things can take sometimes. We'll both be really glad when tomorrow is over and we start down a road that gets things back to something close to normal again.

front of the line service

Roger Waters - The Wall - 2012
Originally uploaded by Julep67

As I've mentioned here before, Mark had surgery in June, late June. He had been suffering with kidney stones for a while and finally they called his number and he got to go in and have those suckers blasted with lasers. It was a fairly simple procedure, no incisions, done by a surgeon who confided that he had kicked ass at Dragon Slayer in the 80's. Good stuff. Excellent result, Mark's had an awesome recovery. All is well.

So, we find out this week that he needs to have another surgery. Slightly more complicated surgery this time, to deal with a completely different issue. The issue was identified during his Kidney Stone diagnosis and some of the pre-surgical screening stuff he had to do.

Now, because he has been a surgical patient so recently, and us being thoughtful folks who don't want to cost the fragile health care system anymore money than we need to, we were hopeful that we could save the taxpayers some money and us some time, by avoiding the pre-surgical screening stuff.

When we met with the new surgeon (different issue, different doctor - both are AWESOME), he gave us a form to fill out and we figured that was the end of it. Mark gets a call on Wednesday that he is required to go in for another PSS. When he called back yesterday to talk to the folks in charge, he explained how he'd already had one and, had filled out a form. They were insistent that he go in and told him that it would only take 10 minutes because all they needed was a blood draw. Fine, he parks the cab and goes in.

One hour and ten minutes later, he walked out, fuming. I can't blame him. They did do the blood work but they also sat with him, went over his questionnaire (the woman who he met with had his form from Monday with her) again. Not only did she ask each question again, slowly, she circled his answers which had already been checked off.

Dumb.

Now, this is an excellent hospital with helpful, well trained, courteous staff. We're very happy about the level care he's been receiving in recent months and have no doubts about the level of care he'll continue to receive when he goes in for his surgery in a week and a bit. Honestly though, how much did it cost the system for him to have that meeting yesterday? Not to mention the wages he lost by being in there instead of out on the road. Maybe I'm just crabby from the heat but this really bugged me and I know it bothered Mark too. Ugh!

surviving

hartland covered bridge
Originally uploaded by Julep67

So we both went back to work yesterday. Kind of glad it's a short week.

Also glad that we survived our "vacation" last week. I use the quotes around the word because in my head, vacations are relaxing and last week was not relaxing. It was fun at times, frustrating at others, worrying and scary too.

After a whirlwind, 3-day period spent zooming up and down the 401 to see 2 Roger Waters shows, we landed back at home, pooped and happy. The shows were so fun but I had, stupidly, booked the furnace maintenance/inspector dudes to visit us at the crack of insanity on Tuesday morning. We had arrived home from Ottawa at 1:30 a.m., gone to sleep around 2:30 a.m. and were not thrilled to have to crawl out of our pit at 7:30 a.m. to await the 8 a.m. arrival of furnace guys.

I spent the morning outside with the dogs. The dogs, Sam in particular, hate it when strangers visit the house. He barks at them for what I believe are a number of reasons:

1. He’s informing us that we have allowed a stranger into our house and stranger = danger
2. He’s informing the stranger that no guff will be allowed in Sam’s watch. If that stranger gets out of line, watch out, cuz he will bark MORE at him!
3. Once it appears that the stranger is friendly and not going to cause any danger, Sam needs to tell him that he’ll protect the no-longer stranger but he needs to come here RIGHT NOW to be protected
4. When the time comes for the stranger to leave, Sam needs to let him know that it’s NOT SAFE outside and the stranger needs to stay with Sam. If he is out of Sam’s sight, Sam cannot protect him.

Simple huh? If the door to our basement was somewhere else, we could have probably been in one part or another of the house. Unfortunately, our basement door is smack in the middle of the house so the best we could would be to hide out in a bedroom and that would have been less fun than outside.

On Wednesday, Mark finally had his kidney stone surgery. We arrived at the hospital for 10 a.m., almost immediately saw the surgeon and Mark went into the OR at 11 a.m. I was told when he went in that the surgery would be about 2 hours. What they don’t tell you is that you need to factor in the time that it takes for the Anesthesiologist to get their stuff done. I later learned from a nurse that it’s normally around an hour. When the surgeon came to find me (while Mark was in recovery), he told me that the actual surgery was 2.5 hours. I’m not sure if this is a lot but the Doc told me that he used 6 laser fibers to blast the stones in Mark’s kidneys. Kinda glad that the Doctor also confided that he was a wiz at video games. I think that helped. Because Mark has sleep apnea, the Anesthesiologist and respirology folks insisted that Mark spend the night. Neither of us was happy about that but in the end, I think it was better than coming home the first night. When he did get home, he experienced some back pain (not to mention some pain peeing) for the first few days but that seems to have subsided (as well as the blood in his urine). He needs to go back to the clinic in a couple of weeks for a follow up but hopefully, after that is done, he’ll be done with the kidney stuff for a while. It’s been a really long haul, waiting for this to happen, we’re both pretty relieved that it’s over with.

So while last week wasn’t relaxing, it was productive and, at times, pretty fun. We have more time booked off in August which will see us having the roof on our house replaced and also getting a new chimney liner installed for our furnace.

The good times just keep on coming at our house!

PS Happy Birthday Hartland Covered Bridge! You are 111 years old today. I took this picture when you were still a very spry 101 years old. Hope you get some cake today to celebrate!