Lent - Both Wednesday and Thursday were without posts. I'd decided for Lent that I would focus on a couple of things. On the "give up" front, I'd give up what web techies call "social networking" — what most people call Facebook, Twitter, etc. You've probably noticed that 99% of posts this past year are aggregated from Facebook updates. That was originally my main reason for using Facebook: I wanted a proxy to grab snippets from me throughout the day. From there I wrote a script to grab all of them for a day and post them as a summary of the day's events and highlights.
A funny thing happened on the way to the forum. Facebook popularity exploded. It reminds me of how unique I thought it was to name our daughter Abigail. Then Abigail became a top ten name. So much so that our Abby has a cousin also named Abigail Rose living in California. But I digress…
So beyond just being a way to post a sentence or two throughout the day, soon friends, family, former classmates, and other Catholics were linked to me. I could see their updates and they mine. While I kept doing my updates, I found myself more and more interested in what others were doing too.
Sometimes you'll hear a spiritual advisor say that when you give up something, you should apply it elsewhere. For instance, suppose you give up your morning coffee and give the money saved as alms to a charity. In my case I wanted to give up the time perusing Facebook watching others' lives and use it for studying the day's Scripture readings and doing some other Catholic spiritual reading.
Family - So what else has been going on this week? Illnesses. I have a lot of respect for doctors. So often they have to make judgement calls that are not clear cut. This week Michelle brought Timothy in because he had been under the weather for a few days. Wheezing, lethargic, running a temperature, coughing and congested. Is that a cold or a fever? I don't know. When Michelle was in with him, she'd asked if the doctor could swab her own throat and be tested for Strep. Michelle has had Strep a couple of times this decade and she thought she sensed the early symptoms. She came home without anything special for Timothy and without a Strep test.
It turned out that Timothy's health did make a comeback. That night though … Michelle slept terribly. She said it felt like she gargled shards of glass. She went in the next day, begged them to do the Strep swab test, and it did come back positive. So for ten days she is on a penicillin regime. We were relieved that it didn't have any interactions with her weekly chemotherapy.
Work - In other news the Qualcomm New England office moved this week. Yes, I'm back at the AMD building in Boxborough. Qualcomm leased most of the first floor of the AMD building. It had been empty for a few years. Over the past month contractors had been remodeling it. They did a fantastic job. I don't know if I have the adjectives to describe the site: calm, clean, professional, spacious, modern, classy, and well equipped come to mind. After doing what's known as "hoteling a cube" (it's an open cubicle with a laptop docking station for whoever is there that day) for the past seven months in an annex off of a historic New England mill, this is like payback for the temporary cramped quarters.
Death - We did get some sad news this afternoon. Today Michelle's grandfather on her mother's side (founder of the Frantones restaurant chain in southern California) passed away shortly after lunch our time. He lived a long life and did not have a long, protracted illness prior to his death. Because of Michelle's situation with chemotherapy, she will not be flying out to California.
Kids - Today the kids finished school and start their annual February break. Nine days at home! I'll be using the President's Day holiday that I worked last week and finally taking it off this upcoming Wednesday. That way I can entertain the kids while Michelle spends the day away at a chemotherapy session.
Television - Last week the girls and I wrapped up season one of "Chuck". Tonight we watched the premiere of season two. Excellent start for the season! And I understand the current season (season three) is even better. I'm looking forward to it. I'm also eager for "Flash Forward" to come back next month.
Michelle - I'll close with news of Michelle and her breast cancer. So far, so good. Phase A finished up before Christmas time. That was pretty tiring. A session could really wipe her out. In Phase B we opted to take it more slowly with weekly, lower dosage visits. This past week was treatment 7 of 12, with 5 left to go. That'll be another nice thing about Easter. By Easter there should be no more Taxol treatments. She'll get several weeks off and sadly have 28 daily treatments of targeted radiation therapy. I guess one might say that will make this Pentecost all the more joyful.