Meta-versary

 As a survivor of metastatic breast cancer, I am what's called a "metavivor."

Today marks the beginning of my 8th year of survival, as on this day, in 2015, I sat, utterly terrified, in the chemo chair for the first time.

I'd heard so many stories of people who were not able to tolerate chemo...I knew a few of them personally...or who actually ended up hospitalized, or even died, from their first treatment.

But, here I am, stepping into a new year, which is 6 years past the average survival limit for stage 4.

I am, however, far from average.....

In other news, Arya kitty never came back.  She is probably dead, under the house across the street.

Her companion, Luke, now our eldest feral, has been coming around for his meals, though.  I hope he is staying in our shelters, instead of going under that house where her body, most likely, is.

It breaks my heart to think about that.

We do our best for them, though.  On some levels, I think they know this.

We had another extreme cold snap, with 50 mile per hour winds, and deep cold.  The great part is that a friend sent us a heated cat shelter just in time!

We set it up on the back patio, and Silver has started to use it.  She was in there when the wind was cold and raging yesterday.

The weather should be more moderate today and tomorrow, though.  I am off work tomorrow for Martin Luther King Jr. day, but Dave has to work.  

We might try to get out to a park this afternoon, after being stuck inside since Friday evening, with that cold wind going on outside.  You know that I get cabin fever if I can't get outside!

With this three day weekend, I have been cooking, and will do more tonight and tomorrow.  There will be lots of delicious left overs for the coming week!

The covid numbers continue to astonish us, and keep us locked down.  14,403 new cases, state wide,  yesterday. No numbers released today, yet.

Keep in mind that Oklahoma has a population of 3.9M.    Of course, the most populace county is the one we live in, so the numbers here are the highest.

The schools closed Friday, due to illness across the spectrum....kids, teachers, and other staff.  Just saw this morning that this will continue through the coming week.  Parents are suddenly caught in the middle again, after return to work mandates have come down from employers over the past several months.

Speaking of that, with the high covid numbers, I emailed my boss and asked about how to proceed to get a medical exemption for return to work, which was originally scheduled for a week from tomorrow, at the new building.

She said that the return to the office has now been delayed to February 8th, and that I would be allowed to stay at home until the numbers go down sufficiently.

I am thinking I will still make the one trip a week, to pick up and drop off work, at the new building, but I won't be required to stay there to work.

This gave me a tremendous sense of relief. However, I do hope that they will extend the deadline further, for everyone's safety.

Dave's office has officially removed their return to the office date from the calendar, and has extended work from home for his entire team indefinitely.

You'd think that the ambulance company would do the same.

Anyway, I have a 10:00am zoom appointment this morning, so I had better get going.

Have a good week, and stay safe and well.