I’m still rather busy, with stuff about which I will be able to say more soon. So have a few links instead:
I love Lynn Viehl’s response to the recent kerfuffle about some local politico from Minnesota calling Neil Gaiman a “pencil-necked weasel”.
The Galactic Empire Times reports about Darth Vader announcing the death of Obi-Wan Kenobi, most wanted man in the galaxy. Any similarities to recent newsworthy events in our own galaxy are entirely coincidental. Found via Jay Lake.
Nick Mamatas discusses the issue of art versus craft at Booklife Now.
sending...
She seems to have deleted that post.
Actually it was deleted for her, I guess: http://www.heise.de/newsticker/meldung/Googles-Blog-Plattform-in-Turbulenzen-1242690.html
Yes, I noticed that Blogger seems to be having problems. Lots of Blogger-powered blogs are experiencing mysteriously vanishing posts and the like.
How’s your Mom doing by the way?
I saw her at Easter for a few days, a week after she came out of that follow-up rehab hospital near the Chiemsee (she’d been there for three weeks). She has adjusted much more to having lost her breast and I had the feeling her fears for her possible future were put into perspective by meeting so many people worse off than her. She also really liked most of the therapists at the hospital.
She still has twinges of pain when her new bra and the pseudo breast get near the scar where the drainage tube came out – I remember that being the case with my gall bladder removal, too.
She can’t raise her arm there as high as she used to, but she’s working on it.
In honor of my visit she started making a salad for grilling… I’m not sure if that was such a good idea. I occasionally remember to ask if I should assist her, but the balance between not wanting to give the impression I think she’s enfeebled and having a sense of when she would welcome assistance are tough for me to judge. I always did better with clear requests.
She even wanted me to come along shopping in Nurember, so we did that on Tuesday after Easter, but I think that was a bit too much so soon – she hardly tried on any clothes and we went back by train to Pleinfeld a few hours earlier than we would have done before.
Later she mentioned she might have tried on some trousers “but I didn’t want to make you impatient” – it is understood that I don’t like going shopping and never have, so after asking me to come along and maybe assist her, that’s a bit of a weak argument.
She is actively looking around for further physical therapy or self-help groups and stuff. She’s not so happy that the doctor in her local hospital doesn’t seem to have much of an idea of what’s on offer there, so we looked on the internet and found some places.
If all else fails, she can always go to Nuremberg again, that’s where they operated on her at the breast centre and they are MUCH better organised regarding after care. She’d just like it to be local, if possible.
Yes, breast cancer is nasty. There’ve been a couple of sufferers in my extended family. I also imagine that the breast prothesis must be difficult to adjust to. The one my aunt wears does not look very comfortable, though she’s used to it after almost thirty years. But she fully recovered and treatment options have gotten much better since then.
It’s also difficult for many older people to ask for help, when they’ve never needed it before. I’m pretty much used to having to go grocery shopping with my Mom once a week and clothes/etc… shopping a couple of times a year. She’s got persistent back trouble (“Bandscheiben”), so either my Dad or I have to go grocery shopping with her. And she prefers me, because my Dad keeps arguing about what to buy.
Anyway, I’ll be keeping my fingers crossed for your Mom.
Aaaaaaaaaand the link is back. Funny indeed ^^
I think there was an issue with Blogger, so that many people lost posts. Apparently, they’ve solved whatever the problem was now.