MORE MAMMOGRAM INFO

I received this letter in the mail. It is a form letter that the British Columbia Cancer Agency sends out after a dubious mammogram. I scanned it and removed personal specifics such as address and care provider from the letter. I am posting it because it has more detailed information on mammograms and breast cancer.

NOTE: Please click on the jpeg to see the letter's text.

I hope that this will give more assurance to women dreading a second procedure and a realistic perspective on diagnostic mammogram.


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WE MOURN

Whatever confronts me in my personal life, there cannot be the same devastation that is in Arkansas. A gunman shot and killed state Democratic Party chairman Bill Gwatney on Wednesday.

Police shot and killed murderer Timothy Dale Johnson after a high-speed chase. Earlier, Johnson had painted obscene graffiti on the Target store where he worked.

Officers later found a Post-It note with the chairman's name and keys from one of Gwatney's car dealerships at the killer's home.

This is the second attack on those of the liberal persuasion in less than two months. Underlying the attacks are work-related fears, anxieties, and paranoias. The American economy is stressed to its limits and so are those who are unemployed or underemployed. I know the strain of not being sure when the next paycheque will arrive or if my writing career will ever get past piecemeal stage. I've gone through ill health and no money. Health I hopefully retain at this point but there were times in the past where it has been touch and go. Life is sometimes difficult.

However, there is no reason to hurt or kill out of the pain and fear of a down-turned economy. The victims of wage rage are, in a shooter's mind, symbols of the financial devastation in America. These deaths don't touch the core of what is wrong in the United States. The fatalities won't change the mismanagement of the real estate market, nor the human and monetary cost of the Iraq war, or the country's failing infrastructure. Only each person's constructive and patient work will create a difference to solve these problems.

We are all neighbours in the same tough situation. We stick together or fall individually apart.

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GETTING ANOTHER DAMN...

...MAMMOGRAM. This time it is a diagnostic test because the tech found a shadow on the film which is "abnormal, of low suspicion."

No, the preceding quote does not represent my state of mind unless you're a John Bircher conservative or Fundie Christian who stumbles across my blog. Crazy liberals. I'm fine (really!) but was at first a little panicked when I initially talked to the person who called me while I was on the way out to breakfast with my family. She said that there was "an area of concern" which left me confused because that usually refers to my brain. I had some time with my family, then returned home and called the clinic again. It seems that they aren't ready, yet, to strap me to a gurney and start pit mining in my chest. The diagnostic mammogram is a precautionary measure because of my family history of breast cancer.

There are two types of mammogram, screening and diagnostic. The initial x-rays are a general sweep of the chest area to see if a lump exists. If there is something awry then a secondary diagnostic with more focused x-rays or ultrasound is necessary to ensure that the object warrants surgery.

I have a diagnostic follow-up on Monday, August 18th. Yes, I am a bit scared and afraid to go to the appointment. I want to crawl under the bed with my teddy bear and a blankie. However, ignorance is more harmful than knowledge. That's why I'm not a John Bircher or Fundie Evangelical.

Don't be afraid to find out a hard and painful truth. I know my life, and the lives of other women who are terrified with the spectre of cancer can be saved with taking just one extra step.

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GOT THE DAMN....

....MAMMOGRAM

I get the results in about a week.

Yes, it was kind of like pressed flowers but the tech, bless her, was as careful as could be when she had to squish my baby feeders in two x-ray plates. Fortunately, as I have written elsewhere, my greatest assets are between my ears and not my shoulders or I would be in hurt city and lugging an ice pack out of the clinic. Take that you wanna be porn stars, fashion models, and trophy wives (including my ex-brother-in-law's new hootchy who went the sandbag route for her buried treasures). I was only uncomfortable but I will never feel your pain.

That's all there is until I know more. For now, ta-tas!

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BAD PUPPY, NO SPEECH

John Edwards, with the revelation about an affair with Rielle Hunter, should not speak at the Democratic National Convention.

He lied about not having the affair to the media. He hurt his wife who was later diagnosed with breast cancer. John Edwards is not fit for any public office. Mr. Edwards should take the honourable route and recuse himself from participation in the Democratic Party. He is a liability who should hang his sorry, cheating tail between his legs (and not someone else's) and stay away from the DNC.



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THE FACE OF THE RIGHT

A gunman killed two people on Sunday in a Knoxville Tennessee Unitarian church. He wounded several others.

Jim D. Adkisson hid a .12 gauge shotgun in a guitar case and pulled it out to shoot during a rehearsal of the musical Annie. The killer cited, in a four-page letter, his hatred of liberals. He wrote that liberals were destroying the country and had prevented him from obtaining employment.In a search of Adkisson's home, there were several right-wing books, including Michael Savage’s book Liberalism is a Mental Disorder. Adkission killed 60-year-old Greg McKendry and 61-year-old Linda Kraeger who was visiting from another UU congregation. Eight people were wounded.

The sludge rises in this case. Underneath its hoity-toity facade, the conservative movement is made of those who are undereducated, illiterate, and just plain stupid. The conservatives attract the scholastic inept. An intelligent person would read budget analysis and realize that the right-wing Bush administration has cut off help to those disenfranchised. I am, as a liberal, an excellent researcher. When I marched against the invasion of Iraq, for example, before the war it was not because of a lack of patriotism or such sentimental rot but because I read the U.S. Army War College analysis of the possible consequences which would be costly both in terms of human life and finances.
Conservatives should confess that, as an ideology, their beliefs are a destructive menace to a strong America and a safe world.

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STEVE, WE LOVE YOU BUT...

is there a succession plan at Apple Inc.? In a recent eWeek article there was some concern about Mr. Jobs' health, specifically that he was looking awfully thin and pale at his last appearance. There was also mention that there was no second in command.

As a conscientious CEO, it is necessary for Mr. Jobs to have a clear hierarchy to succeed him should he again fall ill with cancer. According to news reports, there is no re-occurrence. Or it need not be sickness. Accidents in life do happen. An industry leader must show wise example to his or her employees by being prepared for known probabilities such as one's mortality.

Thus written, I hope Mr. Jobs enjoys good health and a long, creative life. Radio Free Canada sends him a wish to rest, and take a hot cup of virtual tea.

UPDATE: Mr. Jobs does not have cancer according to news reports. He has nutritional issues related to the surgery that excised the tumour.

Stay cool, we luv you mon.


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GOD ONLY KNOWS

being gay is natural. Homosexual and bisexual behaviour characterizes not only mammals other than humans but also birds and insects. In a recent article in the Scientific American, bisexuality ranges from beetles to bonobos.

However, try to inform this to the eejits that make up the dissenters to the Anglican Church's policy of ordaining a gay American bishop and female bishops. Several African, Asian, and other know-nothing congregations have threatened to leave the Anglican Church because homosexuality is "against the Bible". In the meantime the Right Reverend Gene Robinson, whose appointment caused the kerfuffle, is showing up at the once in a decade Lambeth conference in Canterbury despite the Archbishop of Canterbury Rowan Williams' demand that Rev.Robinson not attend. Hmmm.... I wonder if Rev. Robisnon will bring the mister, having married his partner in June 2008. The Right Reverend John Bryson Chane (former blues drummer...daddy-o), of the Washington Cathedral in Washington D.C. no less, has threatened to bring his own constituents to crash the proceedings with as many gays and lesbians as he can find. Perhaps they will rename this the Lambda conference.

It seems to me that the protesters to gays in the Anglican Church can take what's left of their marbles and leave. They'll be gone but the over 1500 species that dance on both sides of the ballroom, from our cousin apes to the smallest church mouse, will still be at the party.

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IF I HAD A MILLION DOLLARS

I'd buy you a brain. Bare Naked Ladies front man Steven Page has been arrested for drugs in New York city, specifically cocaine and marijuana possession.

This is very stupid. BNL has been committed to several charities including those for the environment and for AIDS causes. Steven Page's arrest embarrasses the band which is a Canadian icon and an environmental ambassadorship.

Shame. Canada, and the world, is watching Mr. Page to see if he has a valid reason for his innocence or remorse for his guilt.


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DISNEY PACKS HEAT

Walt Disney World in Florida has shot down a proposal to have their employees bring handguns in their car. The National Rifle Association in Florida has passed a law in that state allowing people to take guns and secure them in their cars. The Magic Kingdom has fired a security guard, Edwin Sotomayor, for bringing a gun to work and leaving it in his car to protest the zero tolerance policy that Disney has mandated for its employees.

I think the CEOs of Disney are well within their rights to ban guns from theme park and administrative properties. Guns are a huge insurance liability and a potential source of immense tragedy. The nightmare scenario is of an employee who forgets to lock the car or of a car that is jacked and used to commit a crime either on the employer's property or at another location. Too, one never knows when an employee will go "postal" and seek to harm tourists or fellow employees. Businesses, especially in the entertainment industry, need to protect their clients and their workers. A ban on guns brought to work and left in a parked car is a sensible response for workplace safety.

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"GET THE DAMN...

....MAMMOGRAM...."

Molly Ivins

I am. My maternal grandmother died of breast cancer when my mother was age six. My mother had breast cancer but survived. Breast cancer worldwide, each year, claims 548,000 lives. Women aged 40 to 79 are encouraged to have a mammogram every two years.

There are all sorts of excuses to avoid the exam with the main complaint that having one's knockers pressed between two x-ray plates is as much fun and just as painful as watching Auntie Myrtle's slide show of her precious Fifi dog's teeth cleaning. Well, a mammogram is the only time I am glad that I will never grace the centrefold of Playboy unless someone does a few rounds of heavy duty Photoshop. I like being in line with my 3 to 4 size jeans. However, there is no cover for any shape or cup to forgo this vital test.

The date for my mammogram is August 6, 2008. I'll post the results. Until then, ta tas!

This has been a Radio Free Canada public service announcement.

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VERDICT

The building remains intact. I arrived to the townhouse this evening heavily sedated with a grande Calm tea from Starbucks and my blood sugar somewhere around my toes. I was a little woozy. Shouldn't have had the caffeine rush of Ceylon and China tea blend with a twist of Madagascar vanilla at breakfast. Phantasms of architectural ruin haunted me during the day with thoughts of the wall crumbled and my kitchen in ruins.

I feared for my Corelle dishes which the company now does not manufacture. They are a beige colour with petite blue flowers circling the edge. Very lovely. The white Pottery Barn dishes that I own I could have set quite cheerfully in the slab's path. The set was a gift from my relative and that, with the Fiesta ware of searing red and orange (again Pottery Barn) which was another gift from same relative, could have been "an unfortunate accident" if I had the cojones to do away with the lot. Oops.

There is not anything more depressing than brightly tinted dinnerware for a night-owl with sombre literary preferences. Our choice of dinnerware show the personality differences between my relative and me. She is urban professional to the tips of her manicured fingernails and likes the hues of sunny climes. I, in contrast, am a struggling neo-Victorian gothic writer whose favourite ankle length dress is a dark Aesthetic indigo sprinkled with early Spring morning blue forget-me-nots or a pair of army green khaki pants from Value Village where I shop not due to any lack of funds but it is the only place on the island I can find thus far that carries a size 3 or 4 trousers. They're comfortable in their slim fit and so am I.

I am also very, very much less frenetic in my imagination than I was before my arrival to the townhouse.

My fears were not realized. The plates are without damage. The house is what it is , simply a way-stop. I did not stay for the excision of the concrete with the consideration it would be better not to have my youngest in the line of danger. The only scars that remain are exposed boards where the concrete had a precarious hitch. There are no prises for the contest and I am an extremely less anxious writer.

I suppose I should offer some consolation prises. These are:

1. My unfailing devotion and eternal friendship. You can't cash it at a bank but it's there forever.

2. A promise not to blog Britney Spears or Paris Hilton or whatever media created bimbo next arrives on the tabloid scene.

3. A promise to blog off the liberal mainstream. I don't know about you, but I think everyone has heard about "climate change".

4. A friendly Public Service Announcement from yours dearly at least once a year.

5. To keep my sense of humour even when I read and comment on the most difficult subjects.

WHAT'S HAPPENING IN MY LIFE

This is a slab of concrete that fell from a wall at my rented townhouse. This was a privacy partition
that dropped off the wall a few feet from where we live. There is one close to us that hasn't fallen yet and we can't use our front door to go in or out for fear of dislodging the nearby slab which weighs about 1000 pounds. The owners were warned a year ago that this was a problem but did nothing.

Luckily, no one was hurt. The man that lives near the dropped slab usually sits outside on his porch. The load hit and flipped over the fence. It rained and our neighbour was inside.

Okay, here's the deal. The staff at the complex is coming today at 11:30 a.m. Pacific Standard Time. This big baby is on a wall held by nothing but a few nails. They are taking this off with a crane that they will situate on the roof. Winners who bet on the wall, the roof, or the fence going out will have a chance to be the guest columnist for one of my blogs free. There's a 30% chance the concrete slab will take out some building structure.


The rules are nothing smutty (keep it G to PG rated, please) and relevant to the topic on each blog. One is a political blog,Radio Free Canada and the other is a blog about the writing trade, The Writer's Home.

Furthermore, all considered prises are null and void if there is death or major injury to the workers, bystanders, writer of the contest, or any of her family or friends during the take down of the wall.

Place your bets in my in-box.

Anne

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WE REMEMBER

A memorial has been set up for four Mounties that were slain in the line of duty.
The

memorial in Mayerthorpe, Alberta for constables Brock Myrol, Peter Schiemann, Anthony Gordon and Leo Johnston has generated controversy from some family members that did not approve of the statues.

I respect the families that feel grief at the memorial. The government should have listened to all those concerned in the decision. However, it is also a time to honour once again those that have died in the line of duty in their capacities as police, firefighters, and emergency personnel.

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IT'S NOT THAT HARD, EH?

Google did not have a logo for Canada Day this year despite it being British Columbia's 150th birthday and Quebec's 400th (girlfriends. you don't look a day over sixty, just like her Maj the Queen).

Google, instead of creating an apology, had some whinging PR shill explain that it rotates logos.

How difficult would it be to make a logo? The graphic that you see on your screen took me about 25 minutes tops in GIMP. Cheese off, you hosers.

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YOM HULEDET SAME'ACH!

Taking time out of my still manic schedule of homeschooling, kids' birthday parties, gardening, Girl Guiding, kid's ear infections, classes in sustainable agriculture et cetera, looking for freelance work, and novel writing.

At least I don't have to deal with the Yorkshire brat. I saw the tartette briefly this weekend and it was all I could do to not grab an onion bulb from the fridge (we didn't have garlic) and turn the plastic chopsticks from the utensil drawer into impromptu crosses. She did not stay. The Goddess has little mercies.

Let me take a deep breath here and get to the point after a week with children and teens and teaching the arcane mysteries of double-digit addition and subtraction to an eight-year-old or discussing static electricity with an almost fifteen-year-old.

Just a pause to wish comedian Billy Crystal
Yom Huledet Same'ach! Happy 60th Birthday!


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THANK GOD, HE HAS HER....

Ellen Craswell, arch-conservative Washington State former legislator and failed gubernatorial candidate:(1932-2008).

Don't bang your butt on the way into the pearly gates.

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THE HERO FIELDS

Dith Pran

September 27,1942 - March 30,2008

This obituary was written at the request of
a journalist friend. I am thankful to the person in question for pointing out
the story.

Dith Pran was a photojournalist who

survived the cruel regime of Pol Pot. The movie The Killing Fields was about his experience. He was a brave soul
among horrible circumstances. Dith Pran died of pancreatic cancer at the age of
sixty-five.

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A TRUE BIRTH DEFECT

Secretary of State Condi Rice has said that slavery existed in America because of a moral birth defect.

Nonsense.


Slavery existed (and still exists) because people are greedy for power and money. The Bush administration knows about this particular ethical failing. There is no end, with over 4,000 soldiers dead in Iraq and thousands more Iraqis slaughtered, to the disaster created in Iraq in the Bush Administration's rush for oil.

I read the article about the Secretary of State with horror, and a lucky sense of irony. When I clicked through to the story, a banner ad appeared of a young girl with a cleft palate. I grabbed the picture with the Print Screen function of my computer. After excising the browser frame from the image, this is the talk back to Condi's lazy metaphor.


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TRIBUTE TO A WIZARD

"Wild men who caught and sang the sun in flight,
And learn, too late, they grieved it on its way,
Do not go gentle into that good night."

--- Dylan Thomas

My daughter and I watched a video about Terry Pratchett and his diagnosis of Alzheimer's.

The dialogue is as follows:

Eldest daughter: "Why couldn't this have happened to George Bush?"

Me: "You mean it hasn't?"

Eldest daughter: "Nice..."

High fives.

Terry Pratchett is not only fighting his own demons but the creatures of bureaucracy. The beloved novelist is challenging the United Kingdom National Health Service to provide Aricept for early Alzheimer's disease instead of its use in the more severe cases. Haven't these eejits heard of preventative medicine? I have relatives in the medical profession and they have always told me that treating a disease early is better than waiting for it to degenerate into something more cumbersome or lethal.

Okay, penny pincers are stupid. They want to go for the most "cost-effective" remedy even though the "inexpensive" solution will cost more later...

Take them down, Terry. We're cheerleading you.



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