Dan's Sh*tty Website

Due to an unfortunate and greatly vexing series of events, involving blood, tears and scratching of paint by unknown human vermin, we've had to drive a rental car to Denver for one of Ruth's dollhouse shows. 

This rental is adequate to the task. Not anywhere near the league of our beloved Subaru, but it gets us places, has AC, iPod input and cruise control. What more does one really need in a car after all?

Well, I'll answer my own rhetorically pointless question: In-dash GPS.

A little bit ago I heard a small slightly worried voice call "Daddy" from the basement. I didn't respond immediately, but the calling became more and more insistent until I had to investigate. I found Sophia, my 2 3/4 year old daughter in our library pointing urgently at a plastic container. Being the clueless father that I am, I said "yes, there's nuts and bolts in there," and proceeded into Ruth's workroom to gain more insight into why Sophia was so enamored of the container.

Ruth recently got a Dora the Explorer pillow kit to make together with Sophia. Sophia, being terribly enamored of both Dora and sewing, could barely contain herself. In fact she couldn't. Ruth was busy for a while and told Sophia that they'd do the kit in a little while, which for a two you old may as well be when hell freezes over. So Sophia ever so discreetly goes to the table, opens the pillow kit, finds the sewing scissors (even though they were quite well hidden) and proceeds to start cutting out the Dora pillow.

We sent a couple days this week up at our cabin helping my dad clear some felled trees. It was good to get out and do some physical work again, I've spent too much time this summer messing around with and recuperating from my surgery. But apparently going much of the summer without hardly putting on my work boots has allowed my feet to soften. I have one good sized blister and one pretty good sore spot on the other foot, but it was worth it.

I was just reading one of Wil Wheaton's blog postings (You may ask yourself, "well, how did I get here?"), and I realized something. Wil, along with most or all of the people whom I am fans of have a deep sense of gratitude. There are many famous actors and writers that I couldn't care less about. People who I will happily watch their movies or read their books, but I won't follow on Twitter or stand in line to shake their hand.

FaceBook has gotten big lately. I mean really, really big. So big, that it strains credulity that there might be people who choose not to connect with all their friends, loved ones, friends of loved ones, enemies, frenemies, and that one person you met on vacation and friended but don't really know but are too nice to unfriend. How can people not want to join this amazing thing?

As I write this is is roughly a week and a half since I had my adrenalectomy to remove a tumor. The surgery was mostly a success, in that it accomplished the task of removing my adrenal gland. However, it turns out that there was nothing wrong with it and the tumor was only adjacent to it rather than growing out of it, but a person can live a normal life with only one gland, so it's okay that it's gone. The tumor itself was significantly more complex and slightly larger than appeared on the Contrast CT. It also grew along the vena cava to below the vein that feeds the kidney.

Just a quick post to say that I have surgery tomorrow to remove my adrenal tumor. It isn't a particularly dangerous surgery, and it seems pretty unlikely that the tumor is cancerous. There is a fair chance that it's what's known as a Conn's Tumor, and if so it will explain all of the strange symptoms I've had for some years now, but had been attributing to asthma (and the meds to treat it). I should just be in the hospital overnight, though it sounds like there will be a fair amount of accompanying pain. I'm sure I'm macho enough to handle that no problem.

It is always a little uncomfortable for me when I talk to someone and they say that they read my blog. I'm not too comfortable with people praising my work, though fortunately, that is seldom an issue. Instead it is that all of my worthwhile stories and anecdotes end up either here or on Twitter (http://twitter.com/aristeos). What little wit I can muster I pour into my posts (yes folks, this is the best I can do), so I'm forced to try to come up with some new and interesting topic that I haven't blogged yet.

Living on the plains of North Central Montana, like anyplace, has its ups and downs. There are the winters, the hot dry summers, and the wind (you know, it makes the mountains sound like folks were up there dyin'). However there is one good thing we've got, one of my favorites. Something that most places have and likely take for granted. But sometimes things that are commonplace in one area become near miraculous in another. Frogs. I know, every place that has water has the slimy little guys, but that's the thing, we don't have water, not regularly at least.