Day Minus One

The surprise call came at 8am: pack your bags and come on down! I called my folks with the news that I am being admitted today, and the stem cell transplant "countdown" starts today. (My poor parents must feel like they're on one of those elastic paddle-balls: go HOME, come BACK, go HOME, come BACK. They live about 150 miles away, and this was, I think, their third trip here in two weeks.)

Hoodie Mary Ann graciously agreed to drive me here, just as she graciously went and got me a thermometer last night when I couldn't find mine. If I lived two lifetimes, I couldn't begin to pay back Gracie's humans for all their favors and kindnesses. (And I was mighty impressed when she slung that suitcase-the-size-of-an-ocean-liner around as if it were a lunchbox.)

I got to my room right away; I was completely unprepared for The Parade of Visitors to take almost three hours. I was impressed that when the physician's assistant (PA) decided another chest x-ray was needed, suddenly a portable chest x-ray machine was wheeled into the room! A nutritionist, a respiratory therapist, the oncologist on duty, several visits from the nurse, I can't even remember who else, but suddenly it was after two and again, no lunchee. And of course, the first nurse's visit gave Portitia (the port or catheter) a workout as she drained me almost dry for the obligatory tests.

I was finally able to get some chow just as the folks arrived. After some of that Sitting Around Waiting (which we've all mastered), we gave ourselves a tour of this gorgeous new facility -- it opened just three weeks ago -- and I discovered a computer in the Family Lounge. Good thing, since I can't seem to send email from the ol' laptop. (That will work for now, but in a couple weeks, I may not be well enough to leave the room and then I'll be madly bummed.)

The mega-dose of chemo was almost a non-event, as I'd been told to expect. Aside from great care with disposable scrubs, gloves, and masks, it was just a brief hook-up to Portitia, and then it was over. Scrubs, gloves and masks were whisked away as though they were radioactive. And that was pretty much "Day Minus One." Day One, tomorrow, is the actual transplant.

Okay, the very best part of the whole day is that I'm watching Project Runway on Bravo. It's a silly, un-real, faux reality show with lots of histrionics: atrocious fashions and vicious backbiting and cheesy, old fashioned melodrama. But I haven't seen this show in 2+ years, since I lost my "free" (as in, something other than legal) cable, so it's novel again. And I just realized that this is a PR "marathon," probably from last season. It's like eight desserts!

Forget the fashions – I think it's hilarious that all the models look like they can't wait to bite the head off a snake, and all the boy designers look like they're vying for Silliest Hair Ever. Every one of them looks like he lost a bet.

That's my dirty secret, folks. I don't read romance novels, I don't watch soap operas, I don't eat fried foods... but I loves me some ticky-tacky Project Runway.