Hello Friends,

It's been a while since I've been on the site. Unfortunately, what began as a difficult season 18 months ago continues unabated. Two weeks ago, I was diagnosed with a 58-letter version of cancer. In the end, they got the tumor out of my leg with clear margins all the way around. So that's the good news. On the downside, they are wondering whether my compromised auto-immune system leads me vulnerable to these types of growths. And as this is a particularly aggressive form of cancer that can manifest anywhere in the body (it's not organ specific), that would be problematic. In the surgeon's words, "If that had shown up in your lung, you'd be a dead man." Nice and uplifting.

On top of that, the boys and I were rear-ended about 8 days ago. They appear to be fine, with only E complaining of neck pain. As for me, this fine young driver (who was driving on a suspended license) caused me to slam my head into the side door post (even though I was belted). Since than, I've been hospitalized for disassociative episodes where I experience a "break" with reality. It's as if the mother board is completely aware that the system is running a faulty program, but is incapable of shutting the program down. There's a more technical term for it, but it's eluding me at the moment.

All that to say, it's been a cruddy 2009 starting with my dad's health and now continuing with this. So please, don't interpret my lack of presence on this site as a loss of interest in our friendship. It's just been a spectacularly bad year thus far.

Blessings,
Scott