Escape from Portland.

OHMYGODFUCKINGCABINFEVER.

That is the best way I can describe, using letters instead of frustrated and unintelligible noises, how Round Three has gone so far.  

Chemo was Monday this time around, due to a scheduling issue with the doctor's office.  And I woke up Monday morning with a head cold.  So I knew going in that R3 not going to be the cakewalk that R2 had been.  

The infusion itself...no problem.  As the owner of a brand new iPad, I spent the two hours geeking out on my new toy.  Some out there might say that porn is the best way to kill time on the internet.  I am not one of those people.  I am a person that spends an hour in a measurement conversion application calculating that I weigh 10.71 stones and averaged 16.7 knots at Jack Frost this year.  All very useful and important information. 

By Monday afternoon, I could feel the fatigue clamping down on me.  And it didn't let loose until Thursday afternoon.  Cold fatigue on top of chemo fatigue was not fun.  Didn't exercise, didn't cook.  Just shuffled in a bermuda triangle from the bed to the couch to the kitchen.   Slept, dazedly watched bad TV, ate burritos and tried to stay hydrated.  (One of the strange things about masking nausea with medication is that it really doesn't affect my ability to eat.  What it does affect is my fluid intake.  There is something about drinking water that made me feel more wonky than eating a heavily loaded bean and cheese burrito.  Go figure.)

I now have a serious case of cabin fever.  It started yesterday afternoon when I was driving home from acupuncture.  The treatment did wonders for clearing up my sinuses and lungs--one of the last things that I need right now is a respiratory infection.  Stuck in the construction traffic on MLK, I had an overwhelming urge to get on to I-84 and drive until the car ran out of gas.  To go anywhere with wind and fresh air and sunlight and without a incessantly beeping clothes dryer.  Something to jerk me out of falling back into bad habits of funk, procrastination and ambivalence.

A horn honked nearby and I was jerked back to reality.  The reality of my body and its need for more rest.

I gave myself another twelve hours of couch surfing, tea drinking and wedding-reality-show-watching.  But this afternoon I am headed to Astoria to spend some time with a friend, then to Pacific City to meet some teammates at the end of the Reach the Beach ride.  Time to get back into good habits--writing in my journal, finishing a book that has taken me too long to read, walking, connecting with people. Living, not waiting.