Dang! I've been remiss in keeping up my end of the bargain! Letting you know how I'm doing. Well --- well, is how it's going right now. Last round of chemo didn't take me into the chemo hole as far as usual but it took longer to come out! Last Monday, went to my (round four of six) chemo doc and he told me my white blood count was not high enough for me have it. Mixed emotions. Sooner I get all this chemo over the sooner I find out "where I am" in the grand scheme of things, but I was tired on Monday and we have a full week of work (Thank You Lord) so it really worked out well. Am eating three times a day, not much, but some. Lynda could not be better! Need to add another cancer pal, for prayer. Melissa C, along with Jimmy D and Gary C. Love you all! God is Good!

Coming off 5FU chemo is always a challenge but I'm here to report that for me it seems to get a little easier after every one. I've done 4 and still have 2 to go. However I will tell you that every inch of your skin, from the neck up, is either "sore" or sensitive. That includes my tounge, my lips and my throat. So, you just don't say much, eat much, cough or spit. But, hey, I walked a half mile the last two days so that tells me my engery level is up and I'll take all the good signs.
Pray for care givers. I swear that's tougher than any thing I've gone or going thru. God is Good

Who would have ever thought I would have posted 100 entries on my Blog? Not me, for sure!
Just finished, today, my fourth chemo on this last batch. Only two more sessions to go, Lord be willing!
Lost a great and long time friend this week. Donald Moreland from Levelland. I don't remember we not be knocking heads, all my life. In church together, R. A.'s, shuck, we were probably baptistized at the same time. Lung cancer got him. He had never smoked and neither did his wife or his parents. Some things you can't figure. Don lived a blessed life. Surrender his life to Christ early on, taught school a coupla years and then got into what the Lord had planned for him all along, church work. If only we all could say when we pass, "We did what the Lord wanted." Well, Don did.
You all have been praying, also, for Jimmy D and Gary C. Want to report that they are both doing well. Not cancer free but able to do the things that six months ago they couldn't. I'm feeling well, right now, but the next five days are supposed to "rag" on me. Time will tell. Still eating, some, 3 times a day. Not enough to pull my feeding tube but food is tasting better.
Love you all and Lynda is doing great!

Not only did I survive the 5 days of being down (coming out of chemo) I've felt better the last 5 days than I've felt in I don't know when. How can you feel "down" when you wake up and smell the flowers, in fall? How can you not celebrate when you get to see or talk to your some of your kids and grandkids everyday? When you can get and receive a hug from your wife? When your friends or people you work for call and ask you to solve problems for you?
Let me tell you about my last four days. Friday afternoon Lynda and I jumped on an airplane and went to Albuquerque. Saturday morning, at 6 AM found us waiting for the pilot to blow our balloon up and by 8 away we went in a hot air balloon. Angie, my #2 daughter had purchased Lynda and I a ride. (It was for Lynda's birthday and I got to go along!) Angie went, also. What a thrill skimming across the skies and being able to watch about 500 other balloons launch. You can't describe it, other that fantastic. We did clip a barb wire fence when we landed because our pilot ran out of gas, but who cares, we made it safely. Satuday night we went to a "pre party" that my sister and her husband put on to celebrate the coming marriage of their son. And then Sunday we attended the wedding. What a celebration. Then Sunday evening, back home. The only "hiccup" in the weekend was that the suitcase caring my "formula" for my feeding tube decided it didn't want to come with us on the same flight. But, thank God, it jumped on the next one and we avoided a crisis. The Lord knows what He's doing, don't you know!
Today, Tuesday, I start my fourth round (in this second phase) of chemo. Already looking forward to those days after my "5 in" and my "5 out" days. I know I'm going to feel even better after this round and will only have 2 more rounds to go. Oh, I forgot to mention that yesterday I had oatmeal for breakfast and then for lunch I went to a Mexican food restruant and ordered an enchilada. Opened it up, ate all the chili and the taco meat and none of it came up last night. Milestone! Wish me blessings (I've got all the luck I can stand)! Keep my pals Jimmie D and Gary C in your prayers. Lynda is still my Rock and will be forever. The Lord is Great. Love you all.

The eternal optimist in me, everytime, figures that the chemo is going to be better. Not! The five days "going in" is really no big deal (once you get past the fact that you have to carry chemo around with you for 96 hours), but the five days "coming out" are a bitch, to put it mildly. You don't want to move. Your lips crack. Your throat is so sore that you get something to write on rather than talk. And, did I mention you don't want to move?
Well, I'm passed that today so it's on to something more fun. Working and playing.
I know you knew that I went to my granddaughter's wedding and was asked to say the "family blessing." I have been asked to "publish" it, so here it comes.

Our gracious Heavenly Father,
Thank you for the many blessing that you have already given Erin and Lynn. And, thank you for all the blessings that are being prayed down on then right now.
Lord, tonight, I would ask that you endow their lives with and extra layer of discernment.
First, to know when to share in word or deed, the love of your Son to those You place in their lives.
Second, wisdom to know "when to think before you speak." To understand that sometimes a word in anger or perceived hurt can cause pain that can take years to heal.
Third, that when they have children that they speak to them as one, tempered with Your teachings.
And last, that when they are blessed with grandchildren, they realize, along with their children, that these are their true stars in their crowns.
In Your Son's precious and Holy Name,
Amen

The Scan is Back and the news is good. The surgeon, (who is 50 and does triathlons --- and I sure put my faith in people who like to take care of their own bodies!), told me today that we are "a go" if I want to do surgery to "route around the twist." Now, even better news. I'm now able to get down soups and such, again, and this time without regurgitating them back up. Lynda and I look at it this way. The Lord, just may, be using the chemo to "untwist the twist" so we are putting the surgeon "on hold."
We lost a week of chemo and now this week I am doing my 96 hour 5FU. The "skip" did allow me to be at the top of my game for the Lawn Chair Drill Team performance last weekend (more on that later) and it will allow me to go to my nephew's wedding in Santa Fe on Oct. 3. Lynda and I will join Gary and Angie for one day at the Albuquerque Balloon Festival. Will send pictures. The only down side of doing the 5FU this week that I will hauling around Friday and Saturday at our big parts move --- but Lynda and spent all of yesterday reviewing all that's to be done so now she will working with Ed and I'll be the kibitzer from the sidelines. Hey, I can handle that.
The deal last Saturday night was the awards banquet for our Chamber of Commerce. (And, our LCDT performance was the opening act, not only for the gala but for the grand opening of the new Hurst Convention Center.) Our Chamber represents three cities, Hurst, Euless and Bedford. I have been a director two times. Once in the 90's and then I was asked again late 2008 and then as you know, I broke my leg January 2009 and then found out I had cancer June of the same year. My participation has been limited, to say the least. Well, to my great surprise, I was awarded the last award.
I was so stunned that I didn't listen as to why. It must have been for "Lifetime Achievement." I was humbled and honored. Lynda and laughed (and cried) that they decided to do it while I was still around.
The Lord has been beside us thru this whole journey but this week we were able to scrap away all the stuff that we had allowed to come between He and us and feel so much more of his love. And you know, His love, also, comes to us thru your prayers and we feel them every day. Love you all.

To "clean up" some thoughts that I skipped over earlier.
I did remark earlier in August that when I did the first round (of the second round) of chemo, it knocked me down pretty good. So, the doc cut the doseage by 20% on the second round and, boy, did I think it was a piece of cake. Sailed thru it with flying colors just wondering when we could do this again! (Not really.) And, then the second day after chemo finished, the sun rose and I didn't want to. Then, the third and fourth day you could have used me for a rug. "Hey," I said to my self, "this dang stuff is working!" Fifth day began to come back. First thing you do in those circumstances is start looking at your schedule. So with what's coming up, --- a trip to NM, a lawn chair drill team performance and a big parts move for a BMW dealership --- how am I going to feel when each of these come up? At this point I made it by last weekend in New Mexico with flying colors and was looking forward to starting chemo yesterday so that I would finish Aug. 11, LCDT performance, and then would have "bounced back" by the August 17, 18 and 19 parts move. Well, after my CT Scan at 8 AM I ventured over to my chemo doc. "Pal," sez Doc Turner, "your white blood count is down so you get only 1/2 (the not so bad part) of your chemo today. Come back next Tuesday and let's see how you are doing and by that time Tommy (my general surgeon) will have read you scan. We would not want to be in chemo mode if wants to operate." So now, here I sit. Gonna be in great shape for the fun weekend but may be down and out for the working weekend. Lynda sez, yesterday, "OK, let's you bring me up to date on all that's going on in this move and I'll be you next weekend if you start chemo on Tuesday." What a girl. What would I do without her. Not to mention, in the last six months, our son in law, Ed, has worked his butt off keeping us at home (for the most part) and helping taking care of our business.
So, that's where we are, again. Waiting, but, hey! I'm still here to wait around. As a friend Jan Rowe told me today, we see such a small part of the big picture that it's hard to determine "why." So, we just accept that we are living the Lord's purpose and smell the roses along the way.
Oh yeah, one other thing on our schedule. A wedding, my nephew Daniel, October 3, in Santa Fe. Did I ever mention how important "short term" goals are? They keep you from feeling sorry for yourself and make you plan for life as it happens, not dwell on what you can't do. Love you all.