JOSH
Monday, April 30, 2007
Back In The Saddle: A Personal Aside
It’s been over 100 days since I underwent a stem-cell transplant for two smoldering blood cancers. The good news is both cancers got zapped in the process and now it’s on to rebuilding my immune system and moving beyond my current welterweight standing to normal weight and activities. Right now I feel like an eleven year-old on an urban sidewalk swaying to the rhythm of things, waiting for the right time to jump in on a game of double-dutch. In my case, it is waiting to blog again.
I’ve been in a pre-transplant hospitalization period since mid-October, with a break in December, before the more intensive drug treatment that lead up to the transplant in early January. In my case I needed an outside donor, and I was fortunate to find one with a perfect match. I still marvel, at moments in theological terms, at how this anonymous donor disrupted his life, and gave of himself, so that I can heal and move on. Heady stuff.
Over the past few months, in mostly zombie states of awareness, I experienced the physical effects of intensive chemo, a spook word if there ever was one. (Why is there no euphemism for the words “chemo therapy”? After all, all chemos are drugs, but we don’t say we are taking chemo when we drop an Advil for a headache or when we take insulin for diabetes!)
While I was somewhat prepared for the physical side effect, I was totally caught off guard with the mental effects of the drugs. It was something I was not prepared for, nor something anyone else prepared me for, including the doctors. As a person who lives in “my mind”—new ideas every day, seeing the world differently, looking for variations and precedents in the order of things, searching for blog material, I was not ready for a “loss of mind”—loss of the ability to concentrate, remember things, focus, spell correctly, and manage a short attention span. It all went so quickly one morning, or one night…I don’t recall.
This mental side they now even more thoughtlessly call “chemo brain”. Oncologists, like other medical specialists, still emphasize the physical over the mental. More than missing the connection between the two, they miss the impact of drug therapy on the mind. While it is true the mental symptoms are not “visible”, it is nonetheless true that the mental effects are equally devastating, maybe more so because of the surprise element. At least it was in my case.
The only blessing of the mental affects is that my attention span for redundant MSN and cable coverage of the presidential race is short. It seems that everyone is saying the same thing, asking the same questions, backing the same early horses, and trying to hype early-on cattle calls, focusing mainly on two or three fat cats, (to mix metaphors) leaving the calves to fend for themselves. If truth be told, its the cable anchor folks who are have chemo brain. Or is it "chemo mouth".
So in a day or two, maybe after the Repug cattle call later this week, I'll start posting again, if you don't mind. It's a good cure for chemo brain. posted by Josh Hammond 10:46 AM
Tuesday, December 19, 2006
It’s been over 100 days since I underwent a stem-cell transplant for two smoldering blood cancers. The good news is both cancers got zapped in the process and now it’s on to rebuilding my immune system and moving beyond my current welterweight standing to normal weight and activities. Right now I feel like an eleven year-old on an urban sidewalk swaying to the rhythm of things, waiting for the right time to jump in on a game of double-dutch. In my case, it is waiting to blog again.
I’ve been in a pre-transplant hospitalization period since mid-October, with a break in December, before the more intensive drug treatment that lead up to the transplant in early January. In my case I needed an outside donor, and I was fortunate to find one with a perfect match. I still marvel, at moments in theological terms, at how this anonymous donor disrupted his life, and gave of himself, so that I can heal and move on. Heady stuff.
Over the past few months, in mostly zombie states of awareness, I experienced the physical effects of intensive chemo, a spook word if there ever was one. (Why is there no euphemism for the words “chemo therapy”? After all, all chemos are drugs, but we don’t say we are taking chemo when we drop an Advil for a headache or when we take insulin for diabetes!)
While I was somewhat prepared for the physical side effect, I was totally caught off guard with the mental effects of the drugs. It was something I was not prepared for, nor something anyone else prepared me for, including the doctors. As a person who lives in “my mind”—new ideas every day, seeing the world differently, looking for variations and precedents in the order of things, searching for blog material, I was not ready for a “loss of mind”—loss of the ability to concentrate, remember things, focus, spell correctly, and manage a short attention span. It all went so quickly one morning, or one night…I don’t recall.
This mental side they now even more thoughtlessly call “chemo brain”. Oncologists, like other medical specialists, still emphasize the physical over the mental. More than missing the connection between the two, they miss the impact of drug therapy on the mind. While it is true the mental symptoms are not “visible”, it is nonetheless true that the mental effects are equally devastating, maybe more so because of the surprise element. At least it was in my case.
The only blessing of the mental affects is that my attention span for redundant MSN and cable coverage of the presidential race is short. It seems that everyone is saying the same thing, asking the same questions, backing the same early horses, and trying to hype early-on cattle calls, focusing mainly on two or three fat cats, (to mix metaphors) leaving the calves to fend for themselves. If truth be told, its the cable anchor folks who are have chemo brain. Or is it "chemo mouth".
So in a day or two, maybe after the Repug cattle call later this week, I'll start posting again, if you don't mind. It's a good cure for chemo brain. posted by Josh Hammond 10:46 AM
Tuesday, December 19, 2006
“Audacity” Needs To Be More Than A Word In A Book Title: Tips for Obama
We need to stop the comparisons to John Kennedy and Abraham Lincoln. Both Lincoln’s and JFK’s eras have long passed, never to return. While some of their messages still have currency, the mediums and the processes used today and next year and the year after are in a totally different stratosphere, one in which neither could be elected if they were running today.
For his part, Obama immediately has to stop the Gary Hart “look in my trash” approach to his personal life because you will be “bored” with what you find as Hart infamously said. He needs to be proactive and out in front of the discoveries, not CYAing as he did with his middle name and his land deal. (At least when it comes to realtors, Obama and The Wife will be on “equal” footing!?)
Let's start with what does a “little” blow mean? Hanging out there like a ticking bomb is what Obama means when he says he “did a little blow”? You and I know it doesn’t mean he didn’t inhale. We know that Bush, covering his past use of drugs, got away with saying “when I was young and reckless, I was young and reckless” (quickly adding that Jesus was his favorite philosopher and besides, he had been born again). Since he brought it up, Obama is bound to be asked to define “a little”. He will also be asked what he thought of the experience and where it happened, opening up another whole line (pun intended) of inquiry. Explaining the difference between “snorting” and “freebasing” will not help. Drinking Coca-Cola should be avoided. Pepsi is okay, but don’t mention Bolivia as a country he has visited or Evo Morales as a foreign head of state he knows.
On the drug front, we know Obama is a smoker trying to quit or at least he is saying he wants to quit. Knowing this and depending on what year he did his little blow, he may have tried a couple of other drugs. Usually where there is snow there is a little horse, and I’m not talking about the pony at the petting zoo. And depending on the year, it was not uncommon, nor is it still uncommon, to smoke heroin. So this one looms big in my book and he best give us the works now (another pun intended) instead of letting it trickle out in the parts of the country or the press that still think Blacks, jazz and cocaine are synonymous.
With a full disclosure on these personal matters, using his emerging self-deprecating, but winsome humor, Obama can put them to rest and move on the way Bush did. In fact, Obama should quote Bush once he has provided the basic facts, not the embellished details, but the simple straightforward facts of the matter.
More Importantly, it's Time to Act Audacious: Obama needs to get audacious and take a another page from Bush’s playbook—to this point: When we think of The Wife’s advisors and who would be in her cabinet, we’re cool because Bubba’s brigade will be there waiting. Also remember that the boys from 41’s administration were there to fill in the credibility gaps and experience Bush lacked. But when we think of Obama, none of this comes to mind. Right now he is a solo act, a young, Black solo act, in un-charted waters, both imagined and real. While the Democrats may cut him some slack, everyone else will not give him the benefit of the doubt. There is a Repig and MSM lynching mob around the corner.
I believe that Bush addressed his lack of experience in two powerful ways that helped him “win” the election—ways that would be enormously beneficial to Obama now. One, Bush agreed to Cheney’s self-anointment, which at the time came as a big relief to the Repig Party, many Independents, and some Democrats. (We are painfully reminded every photo-opp who Al Gore chose!) Two, Bush also said the name “General Colin Powell” repeatedly during the primaries and general campaign. Calling him by name, thereby putting a face on the kind of person he would appoint to the State Department, filled in a huge hole on Bush’s lack of global experience. A very smart move! This, at the time, was considered precedent-setting, and Obama should follow suit.
We’ve now had two Blacks serve as Secretary of State, courtesy of a Repig, so Obama can’t go there. I would do what no other candidate, especially The Wife, would dare not do: I’d say pick a prominent Arab right now for State and float the name. (I don’t know the all the actors in the casting room, but for this position let’s include Fareed Zakaria, editor of Newsweek International.) Pick a prominent Black person to head the Justice Department—float his or her name now. (Henry Louis Gates, Jr., Harvard professor, literary critic, scholar, and writer comes to mind, or his sociology professor colleague, Orlando Patterson—they need not be attorneys. In fact, that might be refreshing.) I’d also pick a white woman to head the Department of Defense, another first, and a prominent Hispanic (say Bill Richardson) to head HomeLand Security. I would then let that potential HSD appointee carry most of the election water on the hot, contentious (and un-winnable) immigration issue, thereby "freeing" Obama to talk about other broader issues. Obama sketches the canvas, his potential appointees fill in some of the details.
I can see Obama now, in “genuine” photo ops with all these potential nominees, listening, probing, learning, sharing the podium, showing his comfort and ease with people who are smarter than he is. This would be so anti-The Wife’s style that Obama would get major points on innovative thinking and yes, audacity! Edwards will be clueless and Vilsack will say, “That’s not fair; you can’t do that”. McCain and Guiliani would be caught off guard and unable to say "me too".
Hey, audacious is Obama's word, not mine. But that’s what I’m seeing he needs to do in the next three to four months, maybe sooner, to be taken more seriously. posted by Josh 8:15 AM
Monday, December 18, 2006
We need to stop the comparisons to John Kennedy and Abraham Lincoln. Both Lincoln’s and JFK’s eras have long passed, never to return. While some of their messages still have currency, the mediums and the processes used today and next year and the year after are in a totally different stratosphere, one in which neither could be elected if they were running today.
For his part, Obama immediately has to stop the Gary Hart “look in my trash” approach to his personal life because you will be “bored” with what you find as Hart infamously said. He needs to be proactive and out in front of the discoveries, not CYAing as he did with his middle name and his land deal. (At least when it comes to realtors, Obama and The Wife will be on “equal” footing!?)
Let's start with what does a “little” blow mean? Hanging out there like a ticking bomb is what Obama means when he says he “did a little blow”? You and I know it doesn’t mean he didn’t inhale. We know that Bush, covering his past use of drugs, got away with saying “when I was young and reckless, I was young and reckless” (quickly adding that Jesus was his favorite philosopher and besides, he had been born again). Since he brought it up, Obama is bound to be asked to define “a little”. He will also be asked what he thought of the experience and where it happened, opening up another whole line (pun intended) of inquiry. Explaining the difference between “snorting” and “freebasing” will not help. Drinking Coca-Cola should be avoided. Pepsi is okay, but don’t mention Bolivia as a country he has visited or Evo Morales as a foreign head of state he knows.
On the drug front, we know Obama is a smoker trying to quit or at least he is saying he wants to quit. Knowing this and depending on what year he did his little blow, he may have tried a couple of other drugs. Usually where there is snow there is a little horse, and I’m not talking about the pony at the petting zoo. And depending on the year, it was not uncommon, nor is it still uncommon, to smoke heroin. So this one looms big in my book and he best give us the works now (another pun intended) instead of letting it trickle out in the parts of the country or the press that still think Blacks, jazz and cocaine are synonymous.
With a full disclosure on these personal matters, using his emerging self-deprecating, but winsome humor, Obama can put them to rest and move on the way Bush did. In fact, Obama should quote Bush once he has provided the basic facts, not the embellished details, but the simple straightforward facts of the matter.
More Importantly, it's Time to Act Audacious: Obama needs to get audacious and take a another page from Bush’s playbook—to this point: When we think of The Wife’s advisors and who would be in her cabinet, we’re cool because Bubba’s brigade will be there waiting. Also remember that the boys from 41’s administration were there to fill in the credibility gaps and experience Bush lacked. But when we think of Obama, none of this comes to mind. Right now he is a solo act, a young, Black solo act, in un-charted waters, both imagined and real. While the Democrats may cut him some slack, everyone else will not give him the benefit of the doubt. There is a Repig and MSM lynching mob around the corner.
I believe that Bush addressed his lack of experience in two powerful ways that helped him “win” the election—ways that would be enormously beneficial to Obama now. One, Bush agreed to Cheney’s self-anointment, which at the time came as a big relief to the Repig Party, many Independents, and some Democrats. (We are painfully reminded every photo-opp who Al Gore chose!) Two, Bush also said the name “General Colin Powell” repeatedly during the primaries and general campaign. Calling him by name, thereby putting a face on the kind of person he would appoint to the State Department, filled in a huge hole on Bush’s lack of global experience. A very smart move! This, at the time, was considered precedent-setting, and Obama should follow suit.
We’ve now had two Blacks serve as Secretary of State, courtesy of a Repig, so Obama can’t go there. I would do what no other candidate, especially The Wife, would dare not do: I’d say pick a prominent Arab right now for State and float the name. (I don’t know the all the actors in the casting room, but for this position let’s include Fareed Zakaria, editor of Newsweek International.) Pick a prominent Black person to head the Justice Department—float his or her name now. (Henry Louis Gates, Jr., Harvard professor, literary critic, scholar, and writer comes to mind, or his sociology professor colleague, Orlando Patterson—they need not be attorneys. In fact, that might be refreshing.) I’d also pick a white woman to head the Department of Defense, another first, and a prominent Hispanic (say Bill Richardson) to head HomeLand Security. I would then let that potential HSD appointee carry most of the election water on the hot, contentious (and un-winnable) immigration issue, thereby "freeing" Obama to talk about other broader issues. Obama sketches the canvas, his potential appointees fill in some of the details.
I can see Obama now, in “genuine” photo ops with all these potential nominees, listening, probing, learning, sharing the podium, showing his comfort and ease with people who are smarter than he is. This would be so anti-The Wife’s style that Obama would get major points on innovative thinking and yes, audacity! Edwards will be clueless and Vilsack will say, “That’s not fair; you can’t do that”. McCain and Guiliani would be caught off guard and unable to say "me too".
Hey, audacious is Obama's word, not mine. But that’s what I’m seeing he needs to do in the next three to four months, maybe sooner, to be taken more seriously. posted by Josh 8:15 AM
Monday, December 18, 2006
Top-Ten Dunce Awards for 2006
For this inaugural annual list, I have decided to exclude Bush, politics, and anyone having anything to do with the war in Iraq because it would be unfair, not to mention unimaginative, to list Bush ten times and deny others the opportunity to make this list. The first listing may be an exception to the criteria, but it heads the list because this was a just another stupid PR mistake this year, like most of the other PR in politics, business, sports, entertainment, religion, and culture. Here are my nominations, in order:
1. Iraq Study Grope’s decision to use the bankrupt Ford Motor Company’s “comeback” slogan, “A Way Forward”, as the title for their soon-to-be-forgotten “Edsel” report.
2. NYPD’s continuing Unload-Your-Magazines-On-Unarmed-Black-Men-And-Get-Away-With-It Syndrome.
3. All celebrity babies.
4. Katie Couric resurrecting the Peter Principle.
5. The “un” brilliant Guinness ads.
6. U.S. team finally playing in a real world baseball series and badly losing.
7. Mel Gibson, the Mouth and the Movie.
8. Vote to outlaw foie gras in Chicago restaurants.
9. The Zidane Head-Butt Felt Around the World.
10. Oprah-backed James Frey who claimed his lying in A Million Little Pieces was about “emotional truth”, not labeling it as such, and for using the time-abused excuse, “everybody else is doing it”.
Ground rules for other nominations: If you add any, you have to tell which number(s) you would take off.
For this inaugural annual list, I have decided to exclude Bush, politics, and anyone having anything to do with the war in Iraq because it would be unfair, not to mention unimaginative, to list Bush ten times and deny others the opportunity to make this list. The first listing may be an exception to the criteria, but it heads the list because this was a just another stupid PR mistake this year, like most of the other PR in politics, business, sports, entertainment, religion, and culture. Here are my nominations, in order:
1. Iraq Study Grope’s decision to use the bankrupt Ford Motor Company’s “comeback” slogan, “A Way Forward”, as the title for their soon-to-be-forgotten “Edsel” report.
2. NYPD’s continuing Unload-Your-Magazines-On-Unarmed-Black-Men-And-Get-Away-With-It Syndrome.
3. All celebrity babies.
4. Katie Couric resurrecting the Peter Principle.
5. The “un” brilliant Guinness ads.
6. U.S. team finally playing in a real world baseball series and badly losing.
7. Mel Gibson, the Mouth and the Movie.
8. Vote to outlaw foie gras in Chicago restaurants.
9. The Zidane Head-Butt Felt Around the World.
10. Oprah-backed James Frey who claimed his lying in A Million Little Pieces was about “emotional truth”, not labeling it as such, and for using the time-abused excuse, “everybody else is doing it”.
Ground rules for other nominations: If you add any, you have to tell which number(s) you would take off.
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