Uncle One Feather

I was fortunate enough to have a friend, Brooke, that was married in Santa Barbara on July 16. Five high school friends and I attended. The only bad part was that it took me 15 hours to get there, which was a crazy mess. It started out bad as soon as I arrived at XNA around 5am. Any time you hear the check-in clerk say, "That's funny...I wonder why the computer won't check your bag through to Santa Barbara?" you know you're in trouble. Turns out my flight from Denver to LAX was cancelled before I even got on the first plane. Long story short, I decided to go to Denver and get on standby to LAX. When I got there, I learned that there was a hail storm that damaged 20 aircraft in Denver the night before. You can probably guess how long the customer service line in Denver was. There were 72 people on standby and only 15 got on the plane. I was number 10! But that only got me to LAX. I then waited on standby to Santa Barbara and didn't make it. Turns out that my hero and friend Susannah just happened to be at LAX and was renting a car at the airport at that very moment! So I ended up hitching a ride with them in a convertible Camaro on the weekend of "Carmeggedon" and driving up the PCH, which was beautiful and amazing. So it all turned out better than okay.

Brooke & Porter

The wedding was at a rose farm. A rose farm is exactly what it sound like: rows and rows of roses. The weather was nice and cool the whole time we were there. Fifties at night and 60s during the day. Santa Barbara would be a great spot for a family vacation. The hotels are just across the street from the beach. The beach is all public and it's a huge park. You can rent bikes and ride all along the bike paths, play beach volleyball, or just lay around. Along the beach is where we met this fella...

Sarah, Missy, One Feather & Me

He calls himself One Feather and you absolutely MUST enlarge this picture and look at all the baubles, curios, knickknacks, and trinkets he has on his van: Princess Leia, the Enterprise, Smurfs, and every McDonald's toy ever made. He says he "Lives on Love" (and tips, of course) and only pulls his van out of storage three months out of the year. Apparently he travels Europe at least part of the other nine months.

I See London, I See France

Chad, Henry and I came to Houston to visit my mom while she continues undergoing chemo and radiation at M.D. Anderson. She is having very few side effects--a little tired, some hair thinning, and some trouble with food because the pancreas helps with digestion. But she's feeling well enough to go out and see the sights of Houston with me, so I think that's great! Chad and Henry left on Sunday, but I'm still here until Friday.

Yesterday my mom had an appointment for some genetic testing. There are several genetic mutations that people are born with that can cause cancer. Because my mom does not fit the profile for pancreatic cancer, and because there is a ton of cancer on her side, there is a small chance that it could be genetic. This could be both good and bad. The good part is that the genetic type of cancer responds better to treatment, but that would obviously suck for all of her blood relatives. Two of the genes they are testing for are BRCA1 & BRCA2, which are the genes that can cause hereditary breast and ovarian cancer. These two genes can also increase your risk of pancreatic cancer to about 6%. She will have a blood test tomorrow and we will know the results in four weeks. The other genetic mutation they are looking for is Lynch Syndrome, which affects four different genes. Those with Lynch Syndrome have an 80% chance of developing colon cancer and a 60% chance of developing uterine cancer in their lifetime. Wouldn't that be awful? Let's hope it's not.

While Chad and Henry were here we visited the Houston Children's Museum. They have a Kidtropolis there, complete with banks to get money, a police force where they could get in the police car, a news station where they could sit and read the news off teleprompters, and a veterinarian's office where they could pretend to weigh the animals and give them shots. In the picture below Henry is checking out at the grocery store.


The next day we visited the Houston Aquarium. There was a train through a shark tunnel and a real white tiger there. (Not sure what a white tiger has to do with anything, but oh well...) There were also some rides outside--a ferris wheel and a carousel to name a few. Here Henry is looking quite sweaty in the Texas heat riding a seahorse. It has been a steady 98 degrees every single day here.


On Saturday we all went to Galveston to Stewart Beach. I've always been really against taking Henry to the beach because he can't swim yet. But he loved it. My mom's apartment has a pool, and Henry was in it almost every day he was here. He got pretty comfortable in the water. With his floaties on, he jumped off the side of the pool and went all the way under, and "swims" fairly well. So by the time we got to the beach, Henry was very experienced in the water. Glad we went and finally got Henry's first trip to the beach over with. It wasn't as scary as I had imagined. Certainly not for Henry anyway. Just mama's nerves to get over.


After Henry and Chad left, my mom and I visited the Medical Science and Health Museum. Don't know why, but they had a Star Wars exhibit there. They had so many cool props and costumes from all six movies--Darth Vader, stormtroopers, Luke's mechanical hand, all the models of all the ships, a Jawa, etc... They also had TV's set up next to the props that showed the scenes they were used in and explained how they did it. Here is my best pic: the landspeeder.

Disclaimer: THESE ARE NOT MY PANTIES!

Finally, we have a bit of a mystery here in Houston. While Chad was here, we did a few loads of laundry. (My mom has her own washer and dryer in her apartment.) Chad dutifully folded all the laundry and placed it on our bed. I noticed a pair of panties that were not mine, so I took them to my mom's room and put them on her bed. They were not hers! We are all puzzled.