Potpourri #1: Wedding, Ulysses, Bendamustine

*** WEDDING (BODA) PLANS
Being miraculously temperamentally well-suited, Ivonne and I are getting married either at the end of this month or the beginning of August. In some sense it's so simple as to be laughable: in California, with two forms of ID and $50, you can do it almost as a drive-through. They should have a fast-food menu as well.

A traditional Mexican wedding walk in Vera Cruz

*** COMPLEX BLOG POST DELAYED
I was working on an elaborate metaphor between the visual and the temporal horizons, the purpose of which was to demonstrate the many instances in which unattainable goals need not be dropped from the End Game, when some jackass remarked that we are truly all in the same boat (not the Penelope) because we're all going to die and we don't know when. That converted much of my post to a stinging rebuttal, but the post then insisted on evolving into a critical analysis of Tennyson's astonishing poem Ulysses. That subject, a literary analysis, will probably come out separately. It's about how a old man chooses to fight his End Game.

More work and aspirin are needed to sort out these interrelated topics.

*** BENDAMUSTINE (TREANDA) POOR-RESPONSE
During the second cycle there was a brief response followed by a huge upward spike. After moments of alarm and despair, I realized we had been confusing any response with a good response. Have a look at my chart.

Here's the background: just prior to the first cycle, it was decided to go light on the dose (120mg) to see how low the CBC numbers would go before increasing to the recommended dose (160mg). The CBC nadir occurs about three weeks after the infusion. Because we saw what appeared to be a good response, we stayed at the lower dose for the second cycle, figuring that, with alklyating agents, there is a kind of trigger level above which you get a good response and below which you get no response. This time we got a minor response followed by another huge upward spike.

We had forgotten the earlier logic and almost quit. So, up went the dose to the documented optimal dose for cycle three. This cycle should be decisive. For safety, it is also time for another CT-Pet scan, just to make sure my skeleton looks as good as I look on the outside. It may become necessary to fight small battles with radiation, which I have not needed since 1998, to preserve the skeleton as long as possible, especially the spine.

Wish me luck.