WHAT CONDITION MY CONDITION WAS IN

Yikes. I'd heard that the effects of chemo were cumulative. Sure are. This third experience was the toughest one yet. The first week I felt better by the end of the last day of meds. The second week I felt better the day after the end of meds. Two days following the end this time and I'm still achy and beat.

I preached from a stool yesterday, and didn't feel like expending energy singing, either. By the end of service I felt a bit better and we went to a light lunch. I spent the afternoon in bed because I just couldn't face laps in the pool. Today I got up expecting to resume my "normal" abbreviated schedule. But after going out to breakfast I decided to skip errands and go back to bed. I did finally get back in the pool this afternoon for a short thirty-minutes.

Beyond the aches and exhaustion, the worst part is my dead taste buds. Apparently, since chemo attacks fast-growing cells taste buds are a prime target. Everything tastes like... John Nance Gardner's description of the value of the office of the Vice President: "a pitcher of warm spit." Oh, well; three down, three to go. Nothing for it, but to make the best of it and see it through.  ...Actually, I was beginning to feel a bit guilty at how easy it had been to this point.

Well. as Super Chicken says to his sidekick Fred; "You knew the job was dangerous when you took it."