October 2005

- Monday October 31, 2005 -
Payday and also Halloween. We had close to 70 rugrats, varmints, and assorted creatures come trick-or-treating. The little ones are usually cute, the older ones not always.

- Sunday October 30, 2005 -
An uneventful weekend. Ran a few errands, stayed home most of the weekend. And that is a good thing.

- Friday October 28, 2005 -
Today we went on a bus trip with about 30 people to Apple Hill. We stopped at three or four apple-related places and had some great treats (fritters, dumplings, pie). We even brought a pie home. They told me that nothing had any calories but they may have been pulling my leg. So to speak. Anyway, there was also wine-tasting at some wineries in the area. The wineries were: Jodar - decent if not great; LavaCap - neither of us liked much there, we didn't even buy a bottle!; Boa Vista - bad, avoid this wine; Ursa, Illuminaire, and Auriga - three wineries that were quite good. Skip the others and go straight to these, their tasting rooms are all within about 75 feet or each other. Mmmmmm.

- Wednesday October 26, 2005 -
This was a telework day, when I was able to work from home. It is so nice, fewer distrations, a close refrigerator, and even more casual dress. Many times I get more done here than I do at the office, with all the interuptions and distractions there. And then this evening, Petra had another glass class.

- Tuesday October 25, 2005 -
Petra has the fourth of her initial four glass classes tonight. She has signed up for a couple other two-session classes. She brought home a cool object d'art that she made out of fusing glass. See, she DOES do crafts!

Want to know more about the human costs of the Iraq war? Here is an interesting, short article. Give it a read.

- Monday October 24, 2005 -
Back to work. Ack! In the evening we had dinner with friends Karl and Betty at a Thai restaurant in South Natomas that we had not been to before. The food was pretty good but needed a bit more kick.

The US death count in Iraq is now over 2000. What a senseless waste. We invaded their country without being asked, searching for weapons of mass destruction that did not exist. And now over 2000 of our young people have died and countless more maimed for life. And that doesn't count the innocent civilians in Iraq who were just in the wrong place at the wrong time. Most of the US people now say it was a huge mistake, but will our leaders admit it? Noooo, they will just keep sending more people to their deaths, because George Bush says he doesn't make mistakes. It's time to swallow the pride and admit it: We were wrong to invade their country and we need to get out of it, the sooner the better.

- Sunday October 23, 2005 -
Home from Santa Cruz. The trip was short but the trip was good.

- Saturday October 22, 2005 -
Today was the event. It was the ninth annual bowling benefit for the Santa Cruz group WomenCARE, a cancer advocacy and resource group. You can read more about it here. Petra, me, friends Larry and Robin, and also Robin's sister participated in this fun bowling event. Robin even got a trophy for lowest score. Yay! Go Robin, go Robin! We all had a great time and an estimated $70-80,000 was raised in this event.

- Friday October 21, 2005 -
Class ended today. It was a debacle, by the way. But after that, we loaded up the car and zipped down the three hours to Santa Cruz. We were heading there for a charity even tomorrow that we are participating in, but of course it was a good excuse to hang out with friends Larry and Robin too. Robin's sister and her husband were in Sata Cruz for the event too and we all went out for a late dinner at a Thai restaurant near where Larry and Robin live in SC. Then back to their place for a bit of wine and talk until the wee hours.

- Thursday October 20, 2005 -
We had a nice leisurely dinner with friends Karl and Betty at 524 Mexican Food. Mmmm.

- Wednesday October 19, 2005 -
We went to the Save Ourselves (web site) breast cancer open meeting. Guest speaker was Deborah Johnson, a plastic surgeon who is known for her work on reconstructive surgery for breast cancer patients. It was very informative.

- Tuesday October 18, 2005 -
Petra had her glass class tonight, while I went out to dinner with friends Larry (in town for a day or two), John, and John's girlfriend Joanne. We went to Thai Basil, a great restaurant in midtown. It was very enjoyable and the food was tasty as always.

And the Kings lost a preseason game.

- Monday October 17, 2005 -
A day without radiation is a beautiful thing. As for career news, not much, but I am in a training class all this week. I am trying to learn a little bit of PHP, a web programming language.

- Sunday October 16, 2005 -
I could finally eat food again and was starting to feel better (and hungry) so we grabbed a quick lunch at Daphne's Greek Cafe and then ran a couple errands. We will go out to celebrate one of these days too, but we had other things to do today. Petra even went to Michaels for a free beading session, getting in touch with her artistic side. Then in the evening we went to the second Sacramento Kings preseason home game. They won bigtime today and looked a whole lot better. Sure, they played a weaker team but still there was unmistakable improvement.

- Saturday October 15, 2005 -
We stayed in all day and spent about twelve hours each working on the new web site. It is coming along nicely. No radiation either! Now go to: Knock Out Breast Cancer. Like it? Tell me here.

- Friday October 14, 2005 -
Today was Petra's last day of radiation! YAY!! We are both so happy and relieved. It has been many months, almost the whole year, since the diagnosis in January, the surgery after that, the chemotherapy that lasted months, and then the twenty-eight days of radiation. I don't know how Petra got through it so strong and motivated, I don't think I could have done it. Of course, the radiation area is quite large and has to heal now. Heal and peel actually, if that is not too much information. The radiation oncologist said the next couple weeks would probably not be that pleasant.

But, that aside, naturally we wanted to celebrate! Holy schmoly did we want to celebrate. We had originally thought we would go out for dinner and drinks but whoever runs this show put a kink in our plans. I went to the doctor in the morning and was put on a 48 hour 'clear liquid diet'. Yeah. You read it right. I asked if tequila qualified since it is clear. The answer, sadly, was no, it did not. Water, Apple juice, tea. That's some real celebratin' food. Not! So we didn't go out. I also got 10 days of antibiotics and was told no alcohol or I would get a headache that "you won't soon forget". Argh! Shoot me now!

But it turned out ok. We spent the rest of the day working on our new web site, Knock Out Breast Cancer. And that made Petra happy so everything turned out ok.

- Thursday October 13, 2005 -
Radiation day 27. And much less important is that I haven't felt that great this week either. Maybe I will go to the doctor tmorrow.

- Wednessday October 12, 2005 -
Radiation day 26. The madness continues. It had been a long time, I wish this was over.

- Tuesday October 11, 2005 -
Radiation day 25. Enough about that for now. Petra had her glass class in the evening and that made things good for her. I went with friend Karl to the first Sacramento Kings pre-season game. Some of the players showed potential but overall the team looked pretty weak. I think to some degree that is to be expected with so many new additions to the team, they really neen a little time to work together. We'll see what happens in the next few games. And today was the first of two days that I attended a training class for work, on Cascading Style Sheets. Don't know what that is? It has to do with web sites. Sheesh, what a geek, huh?

- Monday October 10, 2005 -
Today was radiation day 24. Petra continues to get burned, and has about had enough. But she is tough and will stick it out. The area of radiation is large and the skin is getting extra-crispy and not in a good way. I'll be so glad when it is over. But not nearly as glad as she will be.

Better news was that today was a holiday, Columbus Day, so there was no work. I know, he didn't really discover America and I don't think he was that nice to the natives that he did meet, but as my great, great grandaddy always said, never argue with a holiday. We had a very nice dinner with friends Karl and Betty at El Novillero, a great mexican food place you should be eating at. Careful with that Margarita, Betty.

- Saturday October 8, 2005 -
We went up the Amador County area, to Villa Toscano Winery, to pick up a case of 2002 Shenandoah Valley Zinfandel wine that was on sale, and one of our futures purchases was also ready. That would be the 2004 Barbera, so we picked that up too. The free dinner for it is next month. We spent the afternoon up in the area. We actually went mainly because we are in the Montevina wine club and our shipment was ready so we decided what the heck, let's go get it. Well, as sometimes (always) happens, we bought a few extra bottles there (Cucina Mista) and then hit some other wineries too. All in all, we went to Montevina, Villa Toscano, Shenandoah, Amador Foothill, Wilderotter, and Stonehouse. Whew! It's not easy having fun! Shouldn't be thirsty for a while...

In the evening we went to Fandemonium, the event that signals the beginning of another Sacramento Kings NBA season. It was mildly entertaining and luckily was free. Let's hope the Kings go all the way this year!

- Friday October 7, 2005 -
Radiation day 23. Only next week to go, and the side effects continue to increase. Same as yesterday but a bit more. At least there will be two days off (without treatment) now, since they don't zap her on the weekends.

Later in the day we stopped by to visit my parents (family). Tomorrow is my Mom's birthday and she hasn't been feeling up to par, so we dropped by to wish her a Happy Birthday (a day early) and bring a small gift. It was a nice visit.

- Thursday October 6, 2005 -
Radiation day 22. It is really starting to get old for Petra. More discomfort and redness, some pain. Six more to go. We had a nice diversion in the evening, though. I won tickets to a free advance screening of the movie 'In Her Shoes' (web site) with Cameron Diaz, Toni Collette, and Shirley McClaine. Was it a chick-flick? Yeah, probably, but it was well done and with interesting characters and the acting was very good. I enjoyed it and I'll bet you would too. Three stars out of four. Maybe more depending on how much you like this sort of thing, it was a notch above the typical chick-flick.

- Wednesday October 5, 2005 -
Radiation day 21. Three-fourths done! Also, we had another person come out to give an estimate for a closet remodel. The excitement never stops!

- Tuesday October 4, 2005 -
Radiation day 20. I finished my XML training class for work. And Petra went to the first of four sessions for a class she signed up for to learn about working with glass. She's been kind of tired but this cancer thing makes you realize that time could be limited and you better do what you want while you can.

- Monday October 3, 2005 -
Back to work. I am in a training class for two days so it is not bad at all. On the other hand, for Petra it is radiation day 19. Only nine more to go.

- Sunday October 2, 2005 -
Larry and I went to see Tim Burton's Corpse Bride (web site), the cool new stop-motion animation film. It's along the lines of his Nightmare Before Christmas, which I really liked. And this one did not disappoint. It's hard to imagine the work that must have gone into this, but it is great. The music and songs by Danny Elfman (formerly Oingo Boingo) were wonderful and the whole look of the film kept it intersting the whole time. Recommended if you like something unique, clever, and fresh. Petra and Robin decided to catch a different film, Just Like Heaven (web site) starring Reese Witherspoon. They said it was really good too. Laughed, cried, and a happy ending to boot.

- Saturday October 1, 2005 -
RegDay! (web site, done by us). We spent the day at Border working the tables. We passed out fliers, support group information, reunion instructions and information, etc. If you are looking for a relative this is one way to possibly find them. In between people, we shopped and talked. Thanks to those of you who were able to post a flier or mention RegDay to someone. It will happen again next year but in the meantime there is a lot of useful information on the web site.

Petra, Robin, Larry, and I went out for a light, late dinner at Tapa The World and then a huge, disgustingly good dessert from Rick's Dessert Diner (we brought that home).


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