Things are just humming alongl nicely these days.  As I type this I'm finishing up chemo dose 44 of 52 - only 8 more to go!  Every week I get more and more excited about the prospect of not having any more chemo for a while.  Part of me is trying to keep me from getting too excited about it because these things don't always seem to work out quite like you hope, but I'm crossing my fingers!

Last week I had a visit with my cardiologists PA.  I just go in for a visit every 6 months to see what they have to say.  This most recent visit was pretty uneventful.  My PA asked how I was doing and reviewed some of my test results.  He told me that he wanted to seriously consider taking me off Coumadin for my next visit.  This was a pretty interesting turn of events - I had already resigned myself to having to stay on Coumadin forever.  I'm not too hopefully about this but it still gives me something to look forward to on my next visit.

On Saturday I went on a ride with some friends up the Alphine loop in American Fork.  Since I'm still working on building fitness I wasn't really expecting to be able to make it all the way to the top - which I didn't, but I really enjoyed the ride and I'm now determined to make it all the way to the top before the end of the year.  After the ride I spent some time at my friend's sister's house where they have a couple of pet geese.  They offered me a goose egg which I accepted and rode happily home.

On Sunday I decided to make myself an extra special sandwich out of that goose egg so I made an extra large jumbo fried egg sandwich.  That egg was ridiculously large!  It tasted pretty good not much different than a chicken egg really.

At church on Sunday I gave a talk for Mother's Day.  I was pretty nervous about it because I felt very underprepared - especially when I got up to speak and there was about 20-25 minutes left for my talk and I had only prepared about 10-15 minutes worth of material.  Fortunately all the extra time made me feel a little more relaxed since I knew that time was not an issue.  The talk went pretty well from my perspective and I didn't see too many people fall asleep or notice any extra crying so I think it must have been okay from the congregation's perspective too. 

BABYroom
So here is a sneak peak at the baby room / exercise room / guest room. It's still in development, but close enough to done that you can get a basic idea of how the room will turn out. [Thanks again to my mother and sister in law for the help with the baby bedding.]

I'm not sure if we will really do guests in the trundle bed, but for sure the queen bed that was in the room wouldn't still fit. This way we can still have company and have a bed for our little one when he gets a bit bigger.

So I should probably start off with an explanation of our past few weeks. Two weeks ago was rather uneventful, thus the silent treatment on the blog. Last week, however, was pretty busy.

Robert went to his monthly appointment with the onocologist. All his numbers seemed to be in line. We talked about his "elbow" and "knee" pain. She seemed interested but a bit skeptical that it might be related to his chemo despite the fact that it started the day after his chemo and was gone by the weekend, however she said to keep track of when it happened, his exercise, etc. This last week the same midweek pain and swelling in his elbow came, but was thankfully gone by the weekend. It will be interesting to see if anything stays as a trend. This week his elbow is fine, but his knees are bothering him. 

Robert instant messaged me from work today and said that he was determined that his sore knees were not from running.  I told him: "I have a hunch they are tied to scouting. They start hurting before scouts and taper off a few days afterwards." (Incidentally, scouts is 1-2 days after chemo). Robert thought he might have to try not going to scouts. Afterall... it's the only way to test our hypothesis. And who knows maybe his back will start feeling better too. ;) The truth is Robert is the loyal one. Even when other leaders are less than consistent, Robbie shows up. I'm going to give him permission to skip though, if I'm having the baby on scout night.

Robert also enjoyed a camp out at the lava tubes and hot pots in central Utah with his scouts. Although, he sticks by his theory that 12 year old boys are basically uncontrollable, with stories about scouts reporting: "I took a dump in the cave and dropped a rock on it. Then 2 boys came in right after I left. Ha. Ha." being par for the course.

After the campout Robert was exhausted, sunburnt, and his back was pretty sore, but I think all and all it was a great experience and they all had a good time. 

I was busy too. My parents came in town for my brother's graduation. I decided to take advantage of my Mom's presence and solicit her help with the baby room. She has been wonderful!!

She started helping even before she came--She took in the side hems of some blackout curtains I ordered to better fit the windows of the room. Then when she got here we worked for 2-3 days in between graduation events on crib sheets, a crib skirt and some ribbons for the baskets (Thanks also to my sister n' law Sally's help and my Aunt Bonita's sewing room). It took us a little longer than expected because apparently the pattern isn't a perfect fit for every crib. Although, nothing turns out exactly how you plan it out in your head, I think all and all I think it turned out well. Even though my mom did the majority of the work, it pretty much wiped me out to have such long days (sewing, normal home stuff, plus multiple baby/bridal showers and a graduation). I have a bit of a cold now. (Don't get too close to me -  Robbie.) I look forward to more energy in... a year from now or whenever the baby starts sleeping through the night. That happens, right??

Pictures of the baby room coming later, when I get a few more things done.

My first week as a forty-year-old was very eventful.  After a marvelous birthday party I woke up Tuesday morning with a sore elbow.  I thought it was strange but figured I must have slept on it wrong.  By Wednesday it was very painful and I was really wondering what was going on.  On Thursday despite it starting to feel a little better I decided (after some counseling from Carey) to make a quick visit to the local Instacare.  After the normal check-in procedure the doctor came in and within about 2 minutes diagnosed me with "Tennis Elbow" (yes, that's the technical term.)

I found this to be odd since I have no recollection of playing tennis or any other racket type game in the last five years or more.  He suggested that it has something to do with my job as a computer programmer but what he doesn't know is that I program exclusively with my toes so I can lean way back in my seat and put my hands behind my head.

So far the only reasonable explanation for getting tennis elbow is that at night I must be sleep-walking/driving to a local tennis court and sleep-playing tennis.  Also, apparently while playing tennis in my sleep I must also be sleep-left-handed since my left elbow is the one afflicted with this condition.

While the doctor was very nice in explaining what the problem was, I found it unsettling that in his initial declaration of my diagnosis, the doctor clearly stated that "No Amputation Required".  At first this was very reassuring, but later when he explained all the treatment options, he listed amputation as a possibility.  I called him on this and he freely admitted that he fibbed earlier - fortunately he did not recommend I schedule an appointment for amputation.  Instead, he gave me a fancy arm band and a prescription for an anti-inflammatory.  By Saturday, the elbow pain was just a memory.

I also finally did a little more work on my baby name generation algorithm and even made it accessible over the world wide web.  While not perfect, I think I've finally reached a point where the names it generates are at least worthy enough be being used in some second or third rate fictional novel.  That's not to say that it won't on occasion generate some real gems, you'll just have to wade through a lot of dross to get them.  Oh, one disclaimer, sometimes it will generate a non-name word - so if that happens to you... well, I told you so. 

Robert turned 40 on Monday and I think he was definitely dreading the mile post, but what to do, we just get older. Clearly he doesn't look "older".  In an effort to celebrate his youngness we were originally going to go to a place called "Jump on It" with lots of trampolines, but after MULTIPLE stories of back injuries and broken bones from friends and coworkers and given Robert's current back problems we changed the plan and went to the Nicklecade, one of Robert's favorites. You can see him sporting a few of his great prizes. He became particularly good at this space game that sent a rocket with every nickel you entered towards the center through a minefield of debris and other spacecraft. If your rocket made it through one of 2 center gates you got 40 tickets at once. The Rocket Genius even won on his very last nickel.

Conference weekend was a good time to see family. Robert went to Salt Lake to go to the Priesthood session with Adam. He got to see their up and coming house which currently has a nice wood frame. Amanda also gave us a sweet homemade gift for the new baby! I thought I'd share her handwork with you.

It was good to hear that Amanda is doing well, but I'll let her fill you in on the details on her own blog. We also got to see some of my siblings on Sunday, who came up to my house for the afternoon session and some dinner. It was good fun. Sometimes you just have to have an excuse to get together.

Baby Progress
I had 2 appointments scheduled today, including one was with the high risk doctor to get the 20 week ultrasound. She said Baby is looking good. He doesn't have any visible signs of Down Syndrome which she says means he has less than a 1% chance of having it. :) And for all intensive purposes seems to be developing well. He is back to just 2 days ahead of schedule in size and very cute. Robert happened to ask about 4D images, which essentially are the same as 3D images, the fourth dimension being time. The tech said that babies tend to look better in these multi-dimension images around week 27-28, because they are a little more fleshed out, but I thought he looked pretty cute even now. See for yourself:

Please enjoy the photographic evidence of my latest triumph against cancer.  On March 24th I completed my first ever Buffalo Run which happens to be the longest distance I've ever run.   The race takes place on the trails of Antelope Island.  I entered the 25k distance leaving the 50k, 50 mile, and 100 mile options for those crazier than me.  My friend Cameron (center in the picture) talked me into entering the race a few months ago despite my reluctance.  To prepare, I started stepping up my running to build my endurance but strangely enough, my body didn't respond like I thought it should.  I experienced a lot of knee problems during my training and as late as Thursday last week I was having serious thoughts about whether or not I should even attempt the run.  I think I've been having IT band issues and as anyone who's experienced this problem can tell you, it can be very painful.  After a two mile run on Wednesday morning my knees started feeling a bit sore and by Thursday I was having difficulty walking normally (OK, I wasn't walking normally at all) and a couple of guys at work laughed at me when I told them I was getting ready to run a 25k trail run on Saturday - apparently it didn't look like I was capable of completing such a feat.

By Saturday morning my knees were feeling better but I was bracing myself for the inevitable soreness that was sure to come.  For the past few weeks it seemed that every semi-serious run I attempted ended in extremely sore knees.  So to prepare for the race I loaded up on Ibuprofen (I hope my doctor doesn't read this) and hoped for the best.

I road to the race with Cameron and Cris and by the time we got through the gate and to the starting area of the race it had already started.  Cameron and I were both anticipating a painful experience so we didn't let the fact that the race had already started stress us out too much.  We started off at a fairly easy pace and did a lot of walking up the first hill during the first mile.  We really took it pretty easy initially because Cameron was already feeling the pain.  Surprisingly I wasn't feeling bad at all.  By the time we got about 2 miles in my knees started feeling like they were swelling up and going to be a problem but we just kept on trotting along and they mysteriously started feeling better after a while.

I won't go into all the (boring) details of the whole race but to sum it up I kept on running and walking my way through the whole 16 or so miles and finally finished.  My knee was never a factor in the run and I was so happy to complete the race and to see my wife there at the finish line cheering me on!

Even though I didn't turn in a blistering time or place in the top of my age group I feel more proud of my performance in this race than almost any other.  I don't really feel like I can even take much of the credit for this accomplishment since there have been so many people involved in my life that helped me across the finish line.  From my caring wife, supportive family and friends, wonderful medical personal, and the miraculous grace of God - I owe a lot to those who care so much for me to help my in my time of need.

Thank You!

Last night was the pinewood derby. Apparently, they've teched up the process since I went with my little brothers years ago and they had a much shorter track than now. It seems like it was only 8 feet or so back then. This one is much longer. 

The current system our pack uses tracks all the boys by name and keeps the 6 leaders on the leader board. It has lots of nuances programmed in, like it won't track times if one of the cars jumps the track so they get a chance to do an automatic do-over. The guy who ran the race has a car that looks like KITT from Knight Rider complete with the led lights in front that go back and forth. 

The boys loved the racing. None of ours won, although one of our kids that "graduated" this month came in second.

Robert's been trying to take it easy so that his "tendonitis" (or whatever is bothering his knee) won't be too sore before the race. He's been biking and other non-stress exercises. Yesterday he tried running just 2 miles and he was really frustrated by how much his knee hurt. I tried to explain these type of issues happen to all athletes even without his health problems, but he's wishing he could be in the same shape he used to be in pre-cancer. I wish I could give that to him, but I am happy he lives a somewhat normal life that allows him to do what he does.

We got our new microwave. So far so good. I think it even looks better with our other kitchen appliances than the last one did. It's bigger on the inside too. It's interesting, the turn table turns inside the door, which is about an inch or so thick, up till the glass area on the door, making a little shelf for the turn table to overlap.

I came home from Visiting Teaching to a funny smell in the apartment and this sign on the microwave.

Apparently, our microwave decided that  7 years was a long happy life. This is actually not the first appliance to have problems this weekend. Sometime Friday evening our water heater/ home heater (the condos here are also heated by the water heater) decided to play dead. Luckily the water heater doesn't actually need to be replaced yet. We tried replacing a part on our own, but apparently this particular water heater doesn't take parts from Home Depot or Lowe's. . .just parts from certified plumbers. But we did get it replaced by a repair man who also fixed a few other small problems and we're up and going again. I guess we'll need to find a new over-the-range microwave next week. Luckily we have a little credit at a local furniture store, so hopefully we can use it towards the microwave.

Robert has been taking it somewhat easy again this week with his training, because the pain in his knee, which he deems to be some sort of tendinitis, is not playing nice. Hopefully, his rest will pay off since the race is this coming Saturday!

We had a busy week last week and the weekend really ended with a bang!  At the beginning of the week I had been planning on going on a camp out to the lava tubes down south of Fillmore UT but when our troop met on Wednesday to plan things, there were a number of boys that couldn't go this weekend and so they rallied the troops to move the camp out to next month.  In its place, we decided to finish up the swimming merit badge on Saturday which we were supposed to have done a few weeks ago but due to my having the stomach flu we had to cancel.  While it was a little disappointing to not go to the lava tubes this weekend, I think this will work out better since we'll have more daylight to get there, and more boys to attend.

The Saturday morning swimming merit badge was pretty fun but also exhausting.  We only had three boys show up and since none of the other adult leaders were able to make it, I enlisted my beautiful wife to help us maintain our two-deep leadership.  She was a real trooper riding with the rowdy boys and sitting patiently at the pool.  She even helped some with the boys try to learn how to use their clothes (jeans and button-down shirt) as flotation devices.  For a special treat I pulled out some old swim caps I've collected over the years from my triathlons and let them have them for our section on competitive swimming.  One of the boys got pretty excited at the prospect of looking just like Michael Phelps!

After spending 4 hours with the scouts teaching them the swimming merit badge we trundled off to look at some cars.  Carey wanted to check out the small SUV offerings at the local Doug Smith autoplex and the salesman obliged by showing us the various options they had on the lot (KIA's, Suzuki's, and Subaru's).  While walking to see the Kia Sportage, Carey spotted the Kia 'Soul' and took a liking to it.  While not having all-wheel-drive or a leather interior, she liked the 'box' look and low cost of the car and decided that we should investigate further.  After a test drive and some discussion about upgrading the cloth interior to leather we decided to follow the Hamsters and let the salesman sell us his 'Soul'.  The one we got has the upgraded engine, and fancy UVO infotainment package complete with sweet color-changing rings around the door speakers. 

I was pretty impressed with the Soul.  I really wasn't expecting much but it was roomier on the interior than I was expecting, had some pep when accelerating and generally looked pretty cool.  True, we're not hip-hop hamsters but I think we'll enjoy this car and for sure little baby Daniels will absolutely love is this swagger-box. 

Robert and I both had doctor's visits this week. Mine went well with no excitement. We heard the heartbeat again and things seem to be going well.