Published Part Deux

The second story from my Shanghai stay has been published here:

Hallmark Holiday

Happy Valentine's Day to all.  Given that we have a potential hefty hospital bill (30% deductible) coming our way from the out-of-network surgery we did not do anything extravagant.  As is our normal tradition, we celebrated the night before at Son Cubano, a new swank restaurant/nightclub-wannabe that opened in our complex.  On the Hallmark holiday itself, we ordered Domino's pizza and watched a Charlie Brown Valentine and then Jenn's movie-of-choice: "The Way We Were"

On Sunday, Jenn gave me the mother of all scares.  She had been off of her anti-seizure medication for exactly one week.  In the middle of the night while we were sleeping, she began to seemingly convulse in her sleep.  Thinking that she was having a seizure I leaped out of bed and fumbled blindly for the light.  As I frantically checked if she was okay, she woke up blurry-eyed smiling and mumbled about how funny her dream had been.  She had actually been chuckling heartily to herself in her sleep!

Hoppy New Year

We had an ambivalent trip to Sloan Kettering today.  The good news: the tumor was small, it was incidentally discovered, Jenn is young, the surgery was successful, and she has always been asymptomatic.  The bad news: this type of class II tumor will grow back at which point we might need to strongly consider radiation or chemotherapy both of which have potential irreversible long-term side-effects not to mention the immediate ramifications.  For the moment we are resigned to monitoring the situation and we have a follow-up MRI on March 10 where they should also have the results of some additional genetic 1p/19q testing.  The main takeaways were that Jenn is very unique and all the studies, statistics, and info you read on the Internet will never be 100% applicable to our situation so do not read too much into it.  Did that stop her?  Of course not and I caught Jenn watching YouTube videos of brain surgery!

"When it gets dark enough you can see the stars." - Charles Austin Beard (a great quote we heard from a good friend)

Short-Term Assignment: Take 2

Back in October through December of 2010, I got my second opportunity to work abroad (click here for Take 1)  I am adding this now because my story has been published! 

It's not a literary, print, or travel magazine but ShanghaiExpat.com was an invaluable resource to me while I was in China and with almost 700,000 members and over 3 million viewers per month, I am still quite proud.  Check out Part I: