The major events of November were selling the Comanche, a partial response to the current chemo, and Thanksgiving.

The buyer from Iowa flew out to Spokane on the 9th, handed me a check, and departed the next day with a local instructor familiar with the Comanche. He seemed like a pretty nice, competent guy. But it's kind of like your daughter getting married: no one can really measure up to your expectations. Anyway, it's out of my hands now. I haven't really experienced serious "withdrawal" so far. Maybe in part because this time of year my flying is pretty limited by the weather anyway. I have to admit to some relief at the elimination of the associated responsibilities. Another thing that helped me work through the experience was writing a long essay on my whole flying "career". This was solicited by Doug Brown, an aviation writer I've corresponded with over the years. He intends to use some of the material in an article in "Flight Training" magazine in February or March!

The decreased swelling of the right leg was sustained between the courses of chemo. The response was confirmed by almost a 30% drop in the IgA by mid month. I tried to make the most of my time off chemo but was disappointed to find that the altered taste lingered, and the residual anemia made me weak, tired, and cold intolerant. Even with temperatures in the 30's I need multiple layers. Definitely not the "old Phil". My friend Burne came over from Seattle when he had a few days off around the Nov 11th holiday. Things started off good with a wine tasting Wednesday evening and bicycling around town Thursday morning, but I ended up in our local hospital Thursday evening with shaking chills, fever (103.5F), very low white blood cell count and diarrhea. My temp was down to normal by the next day with IV fluids and antibiotics and they discharged me. Two weeks later I received a call from the local Health Department informing me that I had had Salmonella, i.e. Typhoid Fever! How the hec I contracted that is a mystery! The next round of chemo started on the 16th. I tolerated it reasonably well though low blood counts (bone marrow toxicity) continued to be a significant problem. The doctors have decreased the doses on some of the drugs, they give me shots to boost my white and red blood cells, and they gave me two units of blood last week when the anemia was down to 23.5. That gave me a boost!
I flew down to LA to see Dr Berenson, the Myeloma specialist this last Wednesday.(Cousins Nate and Ralyn not only put me up and fed me, but drove me to my appointment and back and forth to the airport!) My IgA on Monday was up slightly from mid November. He wants me to stay on the same 6 drug regimen AND add a 7th drug, Revlimid, which I was on before, just this last Spring. It was ineffective then and made my neuropathy worse. But he claims it may be effective when combined with these other drugs. I brought a list of 24 current studies of new drugs for recurrent/refractory Myeloma, and he dismissed them all as unlikely to be of help for me?!? I am currently headed to Boston with Mary Catherine to visit my parents. I have an appointment on Wednesday December 9th to see Dr Anderson the Myeloma expert at the Dana Farber Cancer Institute. Hopefully he'll have more to offer.

We delayed our Thanksgiving dinner to Saturday so as to include our niece Stephanie who flew out from New York City on Friday. We had a full table: Natty and his friend Allyson, Sarah and Ethan, Mary Catherine's sister Peggy and niece Celina, and our neighbors Phil and Sandy. Leading up to Thanksgiving my college roommate Ric and his wife Donna came through on their way from Seattle to his brother Jon's in Whitefish Montana. This weekend Patty and Peter zipped in from Berkeley. We sampled brews at our local Laughing Dog Brewery, dined with friends, and went to a concert of some great local talent.

I recently went through our bookcase to weed out books that weren't worth keeping and found a few I had never read including some Hemingway classics. Liked "Farewell to Arms" pretty well. Also this month read: "Cutting for Stone" a good medical novel that takes place in Addis Adaba (Ethiopia), and the "Guernsey Literary and Potato Peel Pie Society" - a delightful novel about the German occupation of the Channel Islands in WWII. I am just finishing Jim Harrison's memoir. I love his style and insights and look forward to delving into his novels, begining with "Legends of the Fall" which I just picked up at the Library. We've continued to watch DVD's: "Tinmen", "Crimes and Misdemeanors", "Meet The family", and "Dogma". Our favorite movie was "On Golden Pond". Why more movies like that are not made is frustrating: great actors, a meaningful, realistic screenplay, beautiful photography, pleasantly humorous.

Nine days out from my last chemo I'm feeling unusually good today and looking forward to enjoying this trip to Boston.

Phil