I'm feeling much better today. My stomach was still a little sensitive over the weekend and I was a little more tired than usual but this morning I woke up feeling good. The kids and I trekked to Iowa City this morning to visit Lynne and Nonalee and the kids. Emily had been pestering me for 2 weeks about the trip and every other word out of her mouth was "Iowa" and "We're going tomorrow right?" Mind you, she started this two weeks ago. Fortunately for her, the answer was eventually "Yes, we're leaving tomorrow." On the day of the trip, after running my errands, packing the car and getting the kids into the car, Emily started crying that she wanted to stay home because she was going to miss Cami, one of our cats. Go Figure! Em never could make up her mind. But she was a good girl with a few little minor meltdowns all weekend and SHE PASSED THE MOVIE TEST!! She actually sat through a movie in a movie theater. I'm proud of her! That is not something she could have done 3 months ago. The kids and I traditionally spend Super Bowl weekend doing our "Christmas". Travel is easy because no one is on the road, neither Lynne, Nonalee or I particularly care about the Super Bowl and have to ask eachother every year if we bothered to notice who was playing, businesses are empty and apparently, no one goes out to eat the day before Super Bowl either. We all went to the Ronneberg Restaurant in Amana, a restaurant that traditionally has lines and a completely full parking lot, and all 9 of us were seated immediately in our own private dining area BY THE BAR!! Anyone traveling to Iowa needs to go to Amana to eat. There is nothing like fresh German food served family style! Sauerkraut, German Potatoes, fresh Rye bread..mmmmmm Provided I eat mainly Vegetarian, I still consider myself a carnivore. I have no moral problem with meat. I am veggie for my health. I did have a few pieces of Schnitzel for old times sake and it did taste good! I'm half Czech and half Polish and have not met one single Vegetarian Polish/Czech person. Schnitzel is just in the blood and my grandmother makes the absolute best roast duck I have ever tasted. I have tried roast duck elsewhere but have not found anything close though Chef Paul's Bavarian House does a pretty good job. I digress. I hear the Steeler's won and the commercials were lame. Don't think I missed out on anything. Sorry to anyone in AZ who cared! The Cardinals are an IL transplant anyhow. Further proof that whatever ends up down there, came from up here first.

Alas! All good things come to an end and this morning it was back to work. My boss was irritated with me about something as usual and all is the way it was before. I had a nice long conversation this afternoon with another very frustrated Ma Bell employee who is a technical person like I am stuck in an admin job we don't particularly get excited about. He's another Libertarian! And I thought I was all alone out there...

Last night, I received my 6th invite to Facebook. Figuring it was a sign, I caved and registered but warned that the page would be lame until I have a new computer and some time to work on it.

Took my brivanib today and didn't experience the usual round of side effects. I didn't have my face down in my laptop around 2 ready to take a nap and no lightheadedness. I don't know if that is a good sign or just is. But, I'm not going to complain. My checkup scan is coming up in a couple weeks. After over 2 years of nothing but bad news with these scans, I am not looking forward to this one. I received bad news at my first post surgical scan, the scan at the one year anniversary of the surgery, the two year scan and the lung biopsy. I had one scan that showed stability and that was the only dot of good news I have gotten since May 5, 2006, the date of diagnosis. I'm not sure if I should convince myself to think positive or not get my hopes up and expect more bad news. My Oncologist was very positive about this drug. From what I'm reading on other blogs, they are reporting stability and partial responses. But there was one naysayer who had to mention that eventually these drugs stop working because she's seen it before and I should get my butt to a surgeon. Thanks a lot! I will settle for stability but am hoping and praying for Shrinkage. Shrinkage is a good thing for a cancer patient. :)