Regrets, I have a few

Last month, I wrote about feeling a little sick to my stomach at one of my radiation sessions and attempting to alert the radiation technician by scribbling the word "nauseous" in the blank margin of my newspaper.

When I held up the newspaper and pointed at what I wrote, the radiation technician looked confused. I figured he was having trouble reading my handwriting.

It turns out that he may have been confused at what I was trying to tell him, or simply appalled at my ignorance.

I've been using the English language for at least 50 years but it wasn't until last Friday that I learned the true definition of the word "nauseous."

I'm probably the guy who is least qualified to tell you the meaning of the word, so I'll let Norman Drabble from the funny pages present that lesson.



Norman may be the dumbest guy in the Drabble household, but it turns out that Professor Drabble is correct. "Nauseated" is the word that I should have scribbled on my newspaper and held up to the radiation technician's face.

The only thing that could make me feel worse would be if it had been the Drabbles' next-door neighbor from across the newspaper gutter, Cathy, who showed me up rather than Norman.

I'd like to blame my error on my medical condition. As far as I know, however, cancer has not spread to my brain, and there is no reason to believe that it will.

No, I really believed that "nauseous" was the proper word to deploy in that situation in the treatment room. It's how I have been using the word all my life.

Ideally, I would prefer to quietly edit my blog and cover up my linguistic crime, like I have done with some past boners and boo-boos here.

But I know that 15 readers of TP have signed up as "followers" and I am afraid that some of you might start misusing the word "nauseous," too.

One of my friends can tell you that I recently insisted that "pantomine" was a legitimate word. So if you're looking to follow someone who knows how to speak and write English, maybe Gore Vidal is writing a blog these days.

Luckily, no license is required to blog, else I would be racking up points and at risk of having that privilege revoked. There is no telling what I might come up with next.

Take anything you read here with a grain of Gestalt.

Splitting hairs

Feral cats have been tripping the alarm sensors in the parking lot at my workplace at night, and our facilities manager is trying to find a good home for them so she can get a good night's sleep.

My officemates may suspect that the feral cats have moved on from the parking lot and now are prowling the suite that we share.

Three weeks of radiation therapy under my belt, and I am now experiencing the Full Monty of its side effects. I'm shedding hair from my scalp even faster than Arnold Schwarzenegger and Bobby Jindal are losing allies in the GOP.

Anyone stepping into my office and looking at the floor around my chair might think that they entered a Supercuts by mistake.

I was warned about hair loss before I gave my cancer docs the green light to hunt down my malignant cells with ionizing rays. And right there on Page 12 of "Your Guide to Radiation Therapy," it says "If your head is being treated you may suffer from a temporary loss of some or all of your hair (called alopecia)."

Only my head is being treated with radiation, so seeing more of my forehead when I look in the mirror is not a surprise to me.

The radiation therapy guide offers reassuring words –"your hair will usually start growing back after you have finished your treatments"– even as it raises the specter of doom. The book tells me that on rare occasions, the hair loss can be permanent.

The way I see it, that's alarmist rhetoric straight from Karl Rove's playbook.

No one should ever suffer permanent hair loss. I can preclude that outcome just by scooping up the individual strands after they fall and preserving them in a large plastic tub.

My hair loss will be permanent only if I forget what I did with the tub. And eventually I'll have enough of a hair crop to weave a nice sweater.

As for the bald patches left on my scalp, somewhere in my closet I have a Chia Pet kit with unused chia seeds. I know that tactic has the whiff of desperation, but it's worth a shot.

And even if chia seeds fail to stimulate hair growth, I still can spare myself from Uncle Festerhood in my autumn years.

My radiation therapy guide says that if I lose hair "a hat, turban, scarf or wig may help you feel better." It goes on to state that "these items are usually considered tax-deductible medical expenses."

I'm more of a fez guy, so maybe I should visit Little Turkey and stock up on some in bright spring colors.

Even if a fez doesn't make me feel better, seeing a fez deduction on my 2009 tax return might give Timothy Geither a good laugh.

Gee, that face is familiar

Early last month, the optometrist down the block from my office threw up a large sign in his storefront window promoting free eye exams.

The sign shows a smiling, middle-aged couple relaxing at what looks like a beach. The guy is wearing a beige sweater, powder blue shirt and a pair of eyeglasses, and the woman is sporting a white turtleneck sweater.

Every time I went for a walk and found myself standing at that corner where the optometrist is located, I stared at the couple and asked myself, "Where do I know you two from?"

I figured it out the first week that I began radiation treatments and chemotherapy.

One night, I spent time reading a 50-page brochure titled "Your Guide to Radiation Therapy,"which I picked up at Kaiser's Radiation and Oncology Department. After closing the booklet, I took another look at the woman featured on the cover.

It was the same woman in the sign at the optometrist's shop!

Not only did the cover of the radiation therapy brochure feature the same woman, she was wearing the same white turtleneck sweater, her hair was styled the same way, she was wearing the same jewelry, and the photo was taken with that same sandy shore in the background.

And inside the booklet, on Page 3, there was another photo of her, next to the same guy in the sign at the optometrist's shop.

When I first spotted this brochure, and laid my eyes on this woman and her companion, I thought that maybe someday I would run into them as I zip around Kaiser, accessing services for cancer patients.

Now I'm not so sure. I guess that there is a strong possibility that these folks are models cherry-picked from a digital image warehouse to splash onto the radiation brochure.

I wonder where I'll see them next?

Maybe Radiation Lady is hiding a tattoo beneath her turtleneck and I'll spot her at the newsstand on the cover of Biker Chick magazine.

Maybe she and Cancer Dude, in addition to monitoring their eyesight and keeping on top of their risk for cancer, also make sure they get enough fiber in their diet and I'll see them on a cereal box in the breakfast aisle at the grocery store.

Or maybe I'll spot Radiation Lady on the back of a dust jacket for a best-selling novel written by an author whose real mug is too homely to move books off shelves.

One thing is certain: Whatever they decide to shill next, Radiation Lady and Cancer Dude are both part of my life now.

At least until my cancer goes into remission and the optometrist down the street changes his marketing campaign.

The amphibian who went A.W.O.L.

We partied like it was 1972 on Tuesday in the Radiation Oncology Department at Kaiser.

I'm really digging my new role as drive-time DJ for the department. When I arrived for my 5 o'clock appointment on Tuesday, I handed the Rolling Stones' "Exile on Main Street" over to one of the radiation oncologists, along with a note asking to cue the album up on track 14.

He pumped up the volume more than usual, and we all enjoyed the Stones' ballad "Let it Loose," followed by the quartet of classics from Side 4 of the original album: "All Down the Line," "Stop Breaking Down," "Shine a Light" and "Soul Survivor." Then the CD started over, and the opening track "Rocks Off" closed out Tuesday's session.

While being zapped with radiation, I fantasized that I was laying on a couch at Nellcôte, a mansion in southern France rented by Stones guitarist Keith Richards when he and the Stones fled England to avoid harsh taxation. "Exile" was recorded at Nellcôte, and later mixed at Sunset Sound Studios, just a few miles west from where I'm being treated for cancer.

As I was buttoning up and getting ready to leave, the radiation oncologist said he had never heard "Exile" before, and asked me if he could take it home to burn a copy for himself.

Of course I said it was fine to burn a copy. Sorry, Mick and Keith.

In my excitement at spawning a new Stones fan, I forgot to deposit my stuffed toy frog inside my ThermaSplint mask, as I always do before leaving at the end of my session.

Kaiser's Radiation Oncology Department agreed to babysit my frog between my radiation sessions. They always have it waiting for me on the treatment bed when I arrive for my 5 o'clock appointment each day.

When I got to my car, I realized I didn't have my glasses, so I headed back to the Radiation Oncology Department. I found my glasses in the nurse's station with a note that said "Mr. Serchia's glasses" attached.

And then I headed home. My frog rode shotgun.

I arrived 25 minutes early for Wednesday's appointment, but it wasn't until 10 minutes after 5 that I finally heard my name.

When I made it back to the treatment room, the three radiation oncologists were huddled together.

They all looked solemn. One of them placed a hand on my shoulder and said, "Mr. Serchia, I'm afraid we have some bad news."

My eyes widened.

"We can't find your frog," he continued. "We looked everywhere but it hasn't turned up. We're so sorry."

I smiled, then raised my hand and showed them the frog, which I had been carrying wrapped inside my rolled-up newspaper.

The team of oncologists all released yelps of joy. I was pretty happy, too. After being told I needed a G-tube and a tracheotomy and then learning that I have cancer, I don't know that I was prepared to handle more "bad news."

At the end of Wednesday's session, the radiation oncologists made me promise to never take my frog home without letting them know.

"Please don't ever scare us like that again, Mr. Serchia," one of them begged.

I placed my frog inside my ThermaSplint mask, and one of the radiation oncologists locked it in a cabinet.

He'll come back home eventually. First, we have another 20 sessions of radiation to survive.

Where's the beef?

Remember that Russian proverb that Ronald Reagan used to repeat whenever he talked about the Soviet Union?

Well, starting today, I'm going to follow the Gipper's lead and think "Trust but verify" to myself every time I step on a scale.

But I am tempted to leave out that part about trust.

I'm guessing that there are, say, 300 scales within all of Kaiser Permanente's facilities at its Los Angeles Medical Center. And if I were to step on each one of those scales to get weighed, I am convinced that they would yield 300 unique results.

Last week, I stepped on one of the scales in the Radiation Oncology Department, and a nurse recorded my weight as 129.9 pounds.

I was pretty shaken up. When I got out of the hospital last month, I weighed a smidgen over 130, and I was determined not to shed any more pounds.

I started making sure that I took the time to pour three square meals of Isosource into my G-tube each day, and sure enough I gradually added weight.

But when I saw that 129.9-pound reading last week, I felt like Sisyphus at the bottom of the hill. If I were a boxer, I thought to myself, I probably would be matched in the ring against Rose Kennedy.

And once you take my trach and G-tube into account, my actual weight is even less.

This week, the nurse in Radiation Oncology asked me to step on the scale again, and I did so with trepidation.

This time, the scale said that I weighed 138 pounds!

My eyeballs popped out of their sockets. 138 pounds?! There is no way that I could have packed on more than eight pounds in less than a week.

With names like Enterprise and Galactica, the treatment rooms in Kaiser's Radiation Oncology Department have a sci-fi theme. So does that mean that the scales are calibrated to produce weight readings on different planets of the solar system?

I can't think of any other explanation.

Doesn't the County of Los Angeles have a squad of inspectors whose job is to monitor the accuracy of gasoline pumps and scales at deli counters? The minute I get my voice back I'm getting my Supervisor on the phone because the County needs to add Kaiser Permanente's exam rooms to the Bureau of Weights and Measurements' beat.

I admit that I have always been a little weird when it comes to my weight. Any of my medical providers can tell you that my habit when getting weighed is to stand with my back to the scale, and to close my eyes and ears while the nurse records my weight.

But now that cancer has moseyed into my life and snuggled up to my AIDS, I need to get a handle on how my weight influences my health.

Even if my true weight is in the upper 130s, I know that's low for a guy my height.

My sister-in-law recently told me that I need more meat on my bones. The other day, a buddy who hadn't seen me for a week or so remarked that I looked "gaunt." And on Tuesday, one of my bosses at the office told me that I was looking mighty skinny these days.

I got the same treatment in radiation therapy on Tuesday when the Radiation Oncologist grabbed my shoulder in order to slide my body on the bed and get it better aligned with the machine.

"You need to put on some weight, Mr. Serchia," he said. "Maybe you should add more cheeseburgers to your diet."

My head was locked into the ThermaSplint mask so he couldn't see me roll my eyes. But I reached under my shirt, pulled out my G-tube and pointed to it.

"Well," the radiation oncologist said, "you can always toss a few Double-Doubles in a blender and pour them down the tube."

Double-doubles, of course, are off limits in my diet. I practice mealtime monogamy. The only thing I pour down the G-tube's hatch is nutrient-rich vanilla Isosource 1.5.

I guess I just gotta start pigging out on the stuff. In honor of Fat Tuesday, my doctor increased my Isosource allotment from six cans each day to nine.

That's a whopping 3,375 calories.

Sooner or later, it's bound to start sticking to my ribs.

A slice of pie

It was only last week that the conclusion of my round of 33 radiation treatments seemed as remote as the U.S. economy rebounding.

Then the radiation oncologists at Kaiser gave me the green light to bring my own CDs to play in the treatment room while getting radiation.

Now I'm fretting about the treatments zipping by too quickly. Twenty-two more sessions remain, and there's no way I'm gonna be able to cover all of the musical ground that I want to cover in such a short span of time.

I played a string of hits by Elvis Costello and the Attractions last Thursday, and early '70s Bob Dylan songs the following day.

The Dylan selections sparked a conversation between the two radiation oncologists about pop music in the '70s. While I sat immobile with my head locked inside my ThermaSplint mask, I heard one of them mention one of his favorite songs from that era, Don McLean's "American Pie."

Over the weekend, I spotted a copy of "American Pie" marked at $3.99 at Amoeba Music, so I picked it up.

When I walked into the treatment room on Monday, the radiation oncologist asked "Bring any tunes in today, Mr. Serchia?"


I gave him my routine thumb's up and raised the "American Pie" CD.

He was delighted to pop the CD into the player. He said he used to own the 45 rpm single of "American Pie" –which split the eight-minute song into two halves– and it had been many years since he last heard it.

Just before leaving the room to begin my radiation session, he turned up the volume on the CD player and pressed play. Don McLean's melancholic voice drowned out the whirring and clacking of the radiation machine.

A long, long time ago
I can still remember
How that music used to make me smile.
And I knew if I had my chance
That I could make those people dance
And maybe they'd be happy for a while.

But February made me shiver
With every paper I'd deliver.
Bad news on the doorstep;
I couldn't take one more step.

I can't remember if I cried
When I read about his widowed bride,
But something touched me deep inside
The day the music died.

After that mournful prologue about the deaths of Buddy Holly, Ritchie Valens and the Big Bopper in a 1959 plane crash, "American Pie" shifts into a jaunty mode. It was unavoidable on the radio in late 1971 and early 1972, and it still sounded pretty good to me as I laid on the treatment bed getting zapped with radiation.

The session went by quickly. After it ended, I buttoned up my shirt, dropped my frog into my ThermaSplint mask and handed it to the radiologist, and gave him a thumb's up.

When I placed the CD back into the tray and closed the cover, I realized that Don McLean was making that same thumb's up gesture.

Your Get-Out-of-Watching-the-Oscars Pass

You all need a break from hearing about my woes, so this weekend the C-word is taboo on my blog.

Instead, I want to perform a public service by releasing you all from any obligation you may feel about watching Sunday's Oscar® broadcast.

You can fulfill your Oscar® duty just by scrolling through my 13 predictions for the show.

Trust me, you'll feel better about yourself on Monday morning if you spend a few minutes on this blog and go out bowling tomorrow night instead of watching TV.

• Peter Gabriel will busk on the sidewalk outside the Kodak Theatre so he can have it his way and play his Oscar®-nominated song "Down to Earth" in its entirety.
  
  
• Gabriel's sidewalk audience will start drifting away at the one-minute, five-second point of the song anyhow.
  
  
• The visual effects wizards from "The Curious Case of Benjamin Button" will demonstrate their computer skills by digitally "aging" everyone in the Kodak audience as the show progresses, making Sunday's broadcast feel even longer than it already is.
  
  
• Due to a production team error, the tear-jerking montage of luminaries who died in 2008 will accidentally include a living plumber named Lou M. Arie, making him famous for a day or two.
  
  
• Newspapers will dedicate endless column inches reporting that the size of the Oscar audience took another nose-dive this year, which kind of makes you understand why newspaper readership is shrinking just as fast.
  
  
• After watching Hugh Jackman flub a few of his lines in the opening of the show, an exasperated Bruce Vilanch will cut out the middle man and perform as host of the show himself.
  
  
• Mickey Rourke will attempt to snag $1 million for charity by plugging herbal-health remedy Airborne when he accepts his award, but he'll pull a Chief Justice John Roberts and get the script wrong.
  
  
• Kate Winslet will deliver the Airborne line flawlessly, but the price she pays will be getting bodyslammed by Mickey Rourke.
  
  
• Oscar® show producers Bill Condon and Laurence Mark will yank host Bruce Vilanch off stage and replace him with Flight 1549 Captain "Sulley" Sullenberger, who lands the broadcast safely under the five-hour mark, and earns him an invitation to host next year's show, too.
  
  
• Progressive-minded people worldwide will look the other way as the Academy perpetuates gender bias by presenting separate acting awards for men and women.
  
  
• The sole female nominee in the original screenplay category will call for a Best Original Screenplay by a Woman award.
  
  
• Robert Downey Jr., energized by being nominated for performing in black-face in "Tropic Thunder," will announce that his film "The Soloist" is being yanked from release schedules again so that it can be remade with Downey playing both lead roles: the white journalist and the homeless black musician.
  
  
• Questions about the credibility of the Academy® will be raised when former Illinois Gov. Rod Blagojevich is enlisted to present the Best Actress Oscar® and announces Angelina Jolie as the winner.