Dose Dense-Day 1… Dinner with the 25th Wedding Anniversary Couple and the Man with Multiple First Names (Wednesday August 29, 2012)

I was awake early Wednesday-maybe trepidation on facing that long dose dense day or excitement to be heading into the final round. When we finally headed into Boston, traffic was heavy once again, a clear signal that school was back in session and summer vacations were over. Lee took the blood samples and they came back encouraging, including the HMT red blood cells moving even further up from Monday. So it was full steam ahead on the chemo. This is the day where I get both Gemzar and Cisplatin along with lots of saline IV, some anti nausea IV and some steroid type drug. I lose track of it all. We finally got out around 5:15PM after another exhausting day. A picture of my normal pose during these chemo days is attached. Don’t I look like I’m having fun. But it was my last long day.

We decided to shorten our Thursday commute and stay in Wayland at our friends, Chris and Marylynn. The former was down at the US Open and the latter was in the Adirondacks where they are hosting us this weekend. Our old Dartmouth friend and his family, The Ittners were up from Atlanta checking their daughter Becky into BU. In contrast to the Lapres 4 hour drop off, they are up for 5 days getting their Becky settled. And she has a lot to settle into. Being an honors student and selected into the elite Theatre program, she got the top floor of a high rise dorm with one other roommate in a fairly expansive room and great views of Boston in several directions. We didn’t have the heart to tell this story to Kate. Anyway I decided to do something any normal “dose dense’ cancer patient would suggest after an 8 hour chemo day, go out to a nice Italian dinner. So we went to a great restaurant in Waltham, La Campinia. And we got the double benefit of another Dartmouth friend, Pete Leone and his wife Denise joining us. It was their 25^th wedding anniversary and since they previously had a special celebration, they gladly joined us. And we had a wonderful time and great discussion throughout the long night. And we figured out that between the three couples we had over 80 years of marriage amongst us-so we toasted Pete and Denise and then all of us. Picture below. Oh and the food included sliced duck breast, gnocchi in a basil garlic sauce, roasted salted branzino and some great pasta dishes.

Now let me elaborate a bit further on Mr. Ittner, the man with multiple first names and two t’s in his last name (don’t forget). As I understand his birth certificate says Frank Talbot Ittner. His parents called him Tal from early on to distinguish from Frank his father. Though teachers through early grade school called him Frank. Then in Middle School, someone changed it to Tal which carried through high school. He hoped to get back to Frank at college but Tal somehow persisted even though it was mis-pronounced and mis-spelled often. And then he joined the fraternity and we have that sophomoric tradition of labeling nicknames to people and this mild mannered person got Mad Dog as his name, which lasted the rest of his Dartmouth days and beyond for any of us addressing him. At some point we realized this wasn’t appropriate for post college and we shortened it to MD. So you can call him Frank, or you can call him Tal or Mad Dog or MD, just put two t’s in his last name. He has a wonderful wife of 30 years and accomplished banker, Maura, who I learned is also a faithful blog reader and it was great catching up with her. And I promised the man with multiple names lots of space in the blog since he complained early on of not getting mentioned in the litany of friends featured in the prior 69 postings. So there you have it- I introduce you to a great guy and a great friend. And on a serious note, Frank did just go through a bout of prostrate cancer and came through with flying colors. He has been a great resource to talk things through and he checked in with me regularly. I am most grateful and he gives me a success story to emulate. He also told me I am not a curmudgeon. Andy Rooney, in his opinion was the only real curmudgeon but if I begin to start blog rants with “Did you ever wonder why…?, then I might be on the path).