9 May 2021

 

     Eyelashes are starting to fall out.  Plus this headache will not go away.

     Still working on my full size text self portrait.  I am still working on the hair.  It is a very time consuming process.

4 May 2021

 

     I just returned from UW Health after nineteen days in the hospital.  I underwent CAR T-cell therapy, which went pretty smooth. 

     There are a load of side effects associated with the chimera cell infusion, with a rather high likelihood of encountering them.  I went side effect free, sans constipation, leaving me worried that I was not responding.  Last Thursday I was scheduled to discharge from the hospital, when I spiked a fever in the early morning hours.  Ergo, extending my stay.

     I do not think anyone has been as overjoyed as I was to spike a fever.  It told me those chimera cells were doing their thing against the nasty cancer cells.

     I told my nurse Joe, "Now we are having some excitement.".  He probably thinks I am as a crazy as they come.

     Without me being able to pluck unwanted ear hairs, I look like something out of the Hobbit.  I have not been able to do my nails in three weeks, plus no dental floss.  I would make a terrible caveman.

     Jean Auer writes these caveman novels with sex scenes.  All I would think about when reading these is how totally gross this was.  These people had no soap, shampoo, tampons, pads, toilet paper, etcetera.  Disgusting.

     I will be able to sleep tonight without a television going.  Because I am kept on the cancer ward, and not a secure cell, therefore I have an officer in my room at all times.  Which means that TV is going.

     Some officers show some respect and turn it down really low, others have that thing blaring.  I should sleep solid tonight.

     I now must quarantine for fourteen days.  Silly since I am fully vaccinated, and the transport officers who brought me back to the prison were not wearing masks.

     If I am infected, after two hours in a small van with me, they are too.

14 April 2021

 

14 April 2021

     A crazy last few days.  I did complete a Jason Halda Mug Shot collage.

     I spent Monday and Tuesday at the hospital.  I received a PET scan, saw Dr. Kenkre, had a PICC line installation cancelled, had a brain MRI requested, underwent a neurological exam, and had a COVID-19 test.

     During my neurological exam, Jan, who works at the transfusion center, came barging in and asked if I has experiencing abdominal pain.  When I told her no she said something about that changing things, but never told me what that changes.  Obviously something showed up on the MRI they were not expecting.

     I am almost absolutely sure I am seeing disease progression in my abdominal cavity.  Too much disease and we cannot go forward with the CAR T-cell therapy.        

   So now Jan has me worried.

    I have a telecourt hearing on the Monday the 19th.  However, there is a strong likelihood I will be in or at the hospital. 

     I wrote the clerk of courts asking they work with prison officials to avoid a conflict.  I received a notice back on Monday that the hearing will only be changed with a formal motion.

     I asked around and was told by a supervisor and an iffy jailhouse lawyer that I needed to go through my social worker.

     My social worker, Ms. Bauer, is as bad as they get, and cannot get things done in a timely matter.  Therefore I went to her supervisor, our unit manager, Mrs. Grenier.  She said social services does not handle those things, but put through a phone call to an individual at the courthouse.

     This person said she would contact the clerk of court  and contact me back at the prison via Grenier.  But I never received a return call.

     I sat down and hand wrote out two motions to postpone the hearing for thirty days, and posted them in the mailbox.  Yet I find it hard to believe it will arrive at the court on time.

     More stress.

     This is my motion to have my sentence modified due to my terminal cancer.

     Lots of frustration.

10 April 2021

 

     I do not feel right.  Disembodied is about as close as I can get.

     I put work into the Tri-County drug investigation logo. 

 

11 April 2021

     Night sweats last night.  I was dripping, but do not believe I sweat through the sheets.  I had not had to deal with this since January.

     I continue to feel off.

 

8 April 2021

     I started Jed Perl's Calder: The Conquest of Space: The Later Years: 1940-1976.  I read book one of this biography in the fall of 2019 when I was death bed sick.  I recall being disappointed that I would not live long enough for the second half to be published.

     It came out last year, and the researchers who create cancer drugs and treatments, and the medical team at UW gave me enough time to read it.

     Well, start reading it.  Never count your chickens before they hatch.

     I spent another twelve-hour day in shackles and chains, as I went to UW for interthecal chemotherapy. 

     I learned I am neutropenic, meaning my neutrophils (the subset of white blood cells that are the first to attack invading virus and bacteria) are terribly low making me highly vulnerable to infections.  Plus the nausea is pretty bad.

7 April 2021

 

     I received the Johnson & Johnson COVID-19 vaccine this afternoon.  In two weeks this old man will begin to socialize more.  Although Dr. Pophali did tell me that she did not know if my body would be able to develop an immune response due to the cancer and/or the treatments for the cancer.

     Prisoners as a group have been approved by the state of Wisconsin for the vaccine well over a month ago.  While we have been approved, the state has approved multiple subgroups after us, and just a trickle of vaccine has made it within the prisons' gates.

 

6 April 2021

 Training day today.  Almost all activity (e.g. library, weight room, rehabilitative programs, school) off the housing unit are closed so the staff can train.  Around 10am about a dozen officers were loitering about at the sergeant's station.

     I caught the scent of cinnamon rolls and coffee.

     Very strenuous training.

     I am reading Hack's 191, by Bill Chastain, when it reminded me how today's form of cleaned up sanitized baseball has really dampened down on the real characters in baseball.

 In the 1930s Saint Louis Cardinals' owner Sam Breadon was upset with pitcher Flint Rhem for being out late.  Rhem did not deny the accusation.  He simply explained he was taking care of Cardinals' pitching ace, and known alcoholic, Grover Cleveland Alexander.

     Rhem told Breadon that he had happened upon Alexander with a quart of booze in front of him.  Since it was a team wide effort to keep Alexander off the sauce, Rhem acted responsibly and downed the quart himself.

     We do not have that color in baseball anymore.

     I recall during the 1980 All Star Game break, All Star and rookie, Joe Charbeneau was on national TV showing how he could drink beer through his nose with a straw. 

     There is no way baseball officials, or TV executives would allow that to happen on air today.  If word got out a player did that, there would be apologies and retractions.

     I really think it diminishes our lives.  Not that we should be drinking beer through our noses.  But we want everything to be this vanilla sameness.

5 April 2021

     Shawn "Nip" Lynch was locked up in solitary confinement today for allegedly fighting.  He had been playing basketball the other day when he caught an elbow to the brow ridge.  He later developed a slight black eye.

     Our unit wing officer noticed the eye this morning, and off to the hole he went.

     It bothers the hell out of me that once we enter the prison gates we are considered guilty before being proven innocent.  Yet our government officials have the audacity to condemn other counties for doing the same. 

     Just one of many things so wrong with the way things are behind bars.