Day 43 garden, shoes and a 5K

Today's highlight from Ellie's point of view is undoubtedly that she got to go to Payless Shoes and get two pairs of new shoes. We went thinking we'd see if there were any good back to school shoes and found two. I was feeling somewhat low energy so I sat down and let Ellie try on every pair of shoes in her size that she wanted. Usually I limit her to shoes we have some likelihood of buying and maybe one or two pairs of ridiculous high heels (what she really wants to try on), but I was feeling low energy so I let her try on whatever she wanted. It was odd; she only tried on about four pairs of crazy shoes and then went to practical shoes. She scoured the 8's, found a pair, then the 7 1/2's and found another pair, then looked back at the 8's and found the second pair in an 8 so it will last a little longer. She got a pair of suede boots with fringe around the ankles and a pair of suede slip ons. I would probably have agreed to the one half inch high heels (don't tell Ellie), but she didn't even ask. Dodged that bullet for another few months. The funny thing about the whole trip is that usually I am trying to get us in and out of there and am very much in charge of what we do, but today I was sort of tired and lazy and just sat around and let her do what she wanted. I am not convinced that it took a whole lot longer and, for sure, she was happier with the results. Hunh, a lesson from the leukemia, not that I really wanted one.

Another potential highlight of the day was that Terry, Tommie and I did the York Days 5K today. We walked it, but we did it. Tommie and I now have three of our SeaCoast RoadRace Series races done. We have three more to get our jackets. I think it is very cool that if everything goes well I will get a jacket while doing chemo. It will be my third jacket, and my proudest one. It was very fun. The race starts kind of early at 0800--in York, but walked along the ocean for probably half a mile which makes up for a lot. I would do it again.

My friend Clifton takes beautiful pictures of his garden in Michigan and sends me an almost daily picture of something gorgeous. He is the one who has provided the snap dragon pictures, for example. My garden is a bit wild this year because I planted it and then got leukemia and went off to 29 days of chemo jail, but I thought it might be fun to try taking pictures anyway.

Green cherry tomatoes and over-ripened peas on the trellis together. Behind the little brown building is actually the fire department, but it almost looks like a house with a reflection as though our backyard was on a lake.

I got a few that I liked and will share them over the next few days because hopefully nothing of any real medical interest will happen before chemo jail on Friday.

--- tiny update
I keep meaning to mention to everyone that there were  three articles I found of interest in recent NEJM's. In the July 26, 2012 issue is a really good CPC on a man in his 20's with abdominal pain and weight loss. I often don't particularly like them because they involve obscure diseases or aspects of more common diseases that are not particularly interesting to me. This one was neither. There was a nice article on opioid overdose (not something I really see, but all of use who prescribe opioids should probably understand the principles of overdose management and it turns out there is some new stuff since I last thought about it). Also a nice "perspective" type article by Perri Klass about "Zen and the Art of Pediatric Health Maintenance"--basically paying attention to the patient in front of you and how hard that can be to do at times in the July 12, 2012 NEJM. All come highly recommended by me.