Adventures in air travel

Posted: June 25, 2012 | Author: | Filed under: Uncategorized | Tags: , , , , , , | 15 Comments

If our annual reunion weekend of my Duke girlfriends had a theme each year, this one might be “Making a Silk Purse from a Sow’s Ear.” But seeing as I have a mini sow at home, who is such a valued member of our family that the idea of using her ear, or any other body part, for a purse is utterly repulsive, we’ll go with another cliche. Perhaps “Making Lemonade from All the Lemons We’ve Been Given.”

In the 8 years we’ve been gathering each June for a long weekend of catching up, we’ve never been rained out. Until now. Thanks to Tropical Storm Debby, we spent maybe an hour and a half on the beach this trip. Total. One evening walk and one brief session on the lounge chairs. The beach umbrellas were dutifully erected by charming young beach attendants but served as a shield from rain more than sun. As Winnie the Pooh would say, “Oh, bother.”
Instead of lounging lazily at the edge of the surf, being bronzed by the sun, we resorted to Plan B: curling up in front of the TV to watch seasons 1 and 2 of Downton Abbey. Thank goodness for quality entertainment from across the pond! None of us in our little group are big TV watchers, but we all were mesmerized by the Crawleys, et al and their upstairs-downstairs life.
We still managed to get ourselves to our favorite Captiva Island restaurant, The Bubble Room, for dinner and a piece of the orange crunch cake. It sounds like an odd combination: white cake with an almond-streusel filling tinged with orange zest and frosted with an orange buttercream. Trust me, it is beyond delicious. Great, just typing that description made me wish I had more now. Right now.
The beach washout wasn’t the end of our troubles, as the flights out yesterday were a mess. Half of our party was flying Delta to Atlanta and then points beyond, and were met with a mechanical issue that delayed them 5 hours and would require a stay in an Atlanta airport hotel. The other half of our party was on United to Houston direct, trying not to feel smug about heading home no stop. That smugness was rudely interrupted, however, as out takeoff was aborted because of faulty brakes.
The faulty brakes issue was not to be resolved because of a lack of a mechanic in the area, so it was off to the airport Hilton for us. Oh, bother.
We’re booked on the same flight today with fingers crossed. If all goes according to plan, we will land in Houston at the tail-end of rush hour and will face the 50-mile trek from the airport back to the ‘burbs, a full 24 hours after our originally scheduled homecoming Oh, bother again.
Meanwhile, we’re killing time in the hotel until they kick us out and will then kill time at the airport until our flight (hopefully) takes off. Oh, the joys of travel!

Back to reality

Posted: June 27, 2011 | Author: | Filed under: baseball, breast cancer | Tags: , , , , , , , , | 5 Comments

Home from my girls’ trip to SPI and have been flung back into the grind. No more lazy days on the balcony and beach, whiling the day away with a great book and fantastic company.

Because of the rigors of the grind, I’ve got a long list of things to do, so this will be short and sweet. I have a hard time focusing until my suitcase is unpacked and my house is in order, but first things first, I needed to get to the gym. Too many days had passed since I got my burn on, and while the girlfriends and I kept it healthy on our trip, enjoying the phenomenal produce and seafood from the Gulf, I also ate this:

Yes, a taco as big as my head. Bigger, actually. The handmade flour tortilla was 18 inches in diameter, and more likely than not fattened up with lard and lots of it.

We dined at Manuel’s in Port Isabel, just on the inland side of the causeway leading to South Padre. This place is legendary in a land chock-full of great Mexican food.

It’s a family-run place, a hole in the wall with friendly service, passionate employees, and a-ma-zing food. Abuela was in the back, rolling out the Texas-sized tortillas and gave me a mostly-toothless grin as I asked her if she minded me taking a photo of her work. 

I’m glad she said yes, because this stack of gigantic tortillas has to be seen to be believed.

I’m a bit of a guacamole purist, and Manuel’s is by far the best I’ve tasted. With apologies to my buddy Abundio at Escalante’s in Sugar Land, whose customized, tableside guac is my favorite, I must say the guac at Manuel’s had it beat, by a slim margin. And only because the avocados were grown right there, practically on site. The Rio Grande Valley is home to some of the best produce on Earth, and the avocados are good enough to make you weep with joy. As they say at the Goode Company restaurants in this neck of the woods, “You might give some serious thought to thanking your lucky stars that you’re in Texas.” Nowhere is this more true than at Manuel’s. They don’t even have a liquor license and I still believe that. I’m glad I got a photo of the guac before it was devoured (mainly by me).

Amateur and professional foodies alike have sung Manuel’s praises and given thanks for the authentic, yummy food made there. Texas Monthly bestowed a most-prestigious award upon Manuel’s when it was added to the bible of taco-eaters, The 63 Tacos You Must Try Before You Die list. Why 63? Why not? Because this is Texas, and we do things the way we please, pardner. If you don’t like it, scurry on back to one of the other states.

Manuel’s is particularly praised for its chilaquiles. If you’ve never sampled this little piece of heaven on a plate, get thee to a Mexican hole in the wall, pronto. Ask for extra queso fresco. You can thank me later. 

One thing I do not recommend, however, is the menudo. Neither the band

nor the soup. Yuk.

Why the menudo is in a plastic tub inside a plastic bin rather than in a refrigerator is a mystery that I won’t be solving, because I won’t be anywhere near that tub. Or the bin. Maybe it’s because menudo smells so bad, it will contaminate anything and everything else in the fridge. And the county.  I’m going to think about the out-of-this world guacamole instead. And plan my next trip to Manuel’s.

Life’s a beach!

Posted: June 24, 2011 | Author: | Filed under: baseball, breast cancer | Tags: , , , , , , | 6 Comments

I’m on the 7th-floor balcony overlooking the beach at South Padre. The weather isn’t great, but the air is salty, the breeze is cool, the seagulls & pelicans are flying, and the sound of the ocean is magical. The most important part: I’M HERE! Cancer has no place on this balcony.

I’ve been here almost 24 hours and have yet to step on the beach, but no worries. Yesterday was consumed with airport transportation, procuring supplies, and waiting for the bridge to the island to re-open. While stuck in traffic, we noticed an older man riding a kitted-out scooter of sorts, bright yellow with “Granpa’s Hog” painted on the back. It has a lawnmower engine and he zips along pretty quickly. He had no traffic issues on the sidewalk. The best part: we saw him pull into the drive-through liquor store! Brilliant.

20110624-010842.jpg

Editor’s update: Nancy texted me the pic and I’ve inserted above.
[I have a photo but can’t download it from my phone and upload it to my iPad. Advanced technology also has no place on this balcony; the photo can wait.]

Last night, Payton’s All Star team had another stunning win in game 2 of the District Tournament. The 18-3 game included a 3-run homer and some stellar plays by the boys in red. Next game, tomorrow night. I’ll be there in spirit, but like Zac Brown, I hope to have my toes in the water, ass in the sand, not a care in the world, a cold beer in my hand. Life is good today, indeed.

Milestones

Posted: March 15, 2011 | Author: | Filed under: breast cancer | Tags: , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , | 8 Comments

I just realized that Sunday was 10 months exactly since my mastectomy. And tomorrow will be 2 weeks exactly since reconstruction. I’m trying hard not to think about the fact that exactly 3 weeks after the mastectomy came the infection, which landed me back in the hospital just as I was getting my life back, and ended up costing me 23 days of incarceration (hospitalization); 3 vacations (Duke girls’ trip to Lake Tahoe, to Tyler for Payton’s All Star team’s state championship, and our annual visit to Boston and Salisbury Beach); 3 more surgeries; 10 days of twice-daily IV antibiotic infusions at home; and introduction to and hatred of Sucky, the wound vacuum. All in one summer. I’m sure that nasty infection cost me more that what’s listed, but those are the highlights.

I’m trying, really trying, not to think that a catastrophe is coming. I’m trying not to wait for the other shoe to drop, for the bottom to fall out, and the walls to cave in on this recovery. It’s a fragile peace. Very fragile.

Two mantras run through my head: It’s Temporary, and Don’t Borrow Trouble.

The first comes from Jenny, my survivor-sister mentor who has walked this walk, and then some. Her kids were 7, 5, and 1 year old when she was diagnosed, and like me, her case was anything but textbook. Hers was way worse than mine, and we veterans do like to compare and contrast. But she not only survived, she thrived, and she’s a shining example for me every single day. Now that I’m getting closer to being “done” with this “cancer journey” I appreciate her example even more, because she’s my tour guide for L.A.C.: Life After Cancer.

The second mantra comes from guest blogger and night nurse Amy Hoover, and along with her charging me $10 for being difficult, she reminds me to avoid looking for the bogeyman. Ignore him, assume he’s moved on. I suspect all survivors have a little bit of pessimism in them, no matter how chipper they seem. Yes, I’m glad to have been one of the lucky ones, who found it early and can bask in the security of single-digit recurrence rates. And yes, I do try to look on the bright side, count my blessings, and walk on the sunny side of the street (as my mama used to say). In general, my side is blindingly bright, my blessings are innumerable, and I need SPF 70 for the powerful rays on my side of the street. But the thoughts are still there. Sometimes.

Sometimes thoughts of “what if?” fight their way to the surface and take giant gulps of pessimistic-filled air. Those gulps sustain those thoughts as they traverse my grey matter and circumvent the rational side of my brain that tells them to hush up, quiet down, and go away. The rational side of my brain fusses at those thoughts to beat it, get outta town, and quit plaguing me with doubt, worry, and fear. And usually, it works.

But sometimes, instead of celebrating the milestones and thinking about how far I’ve come, those thoughts prevail. Instead of holding my head high even though my back still isn’t completely straight from the giant incision on my belly, I cower a little. Just a little, because I absolutely despise cowering. But sometimes my irrational brain takes over and reminds me that there are no guarantees in life, and there certainly is no travel insurance on this “cancer journey.” I’m the poster child, after all, for doing everything right lifestyle-wise yet still being crapped upon by the giant cancer bird in the sky.

You know me, though, and I’m not about to let some giant bird or some niggling thoughts stop me from living my life. And living it out loud. Today I will celebrate being a 10-month survivor.