honored guest and an appointment

It was a sudden change of plans, but my brother Sean, who lives in DC, offered to pick up our friend (maybe I should say sister) Renée from Union Station. This gave me time to do a bit of extra shopping, and my brother David, who was a very good sport despite being so overworked, helped me with some food prep while Sean drove Renée to our house. Dad tried to stay awake so as to see our guest when she arrived, but the hour was late and Dad, unlike yours truly, tends to wake up rather early.

We'll be hosting Renée until very early Tuesday morning, when she has to return to NYC. We brothers spent some time catching up with her, which was very cool. I even found out that her multi-talented beau has written a children's book, which she helped illustrate. Most awesomeous. Best of all, Renée isn't a morning person, either, so we were able to sit up until after 3AM and chat about life, the universe, and everything.

Renée's friend Carla (whose mother was with us the day Mom had her first major surgery) will be joining us for dinner. I'll be inflicting bulgogi on everyone; the marinade tasted all right this evening, so I'm hoping the meal will turn out fine. I often feel I'm going out on a limb when I cook Korean food; Koreans can sometimes be hard to please, leaving the novice cook with little margin for error. Neither Renée nor Carla is Korean, however, so maybe my judges will be lenient. I'll never know: if the food sucks, I doubt that either lady will breach etiquette to say so. Heh.

Monday is also important for Mom, as she has a 2PM appointment with Dr. Tonnesen, her radiation oncologist. I don't know what we're going to discuss; radiotherapy is over, but I suppose the doctor might be interested in the 9/11 MRI done at NCI. That scan shows some necrosis in the second tumor, i.e., the radiotherapy did have some effect. Alas, Mom's third tumor might have originated at a point in the brain not covered by the radiotherapy, or it might have grown in spite of the radiation. Perhaps the doctor can shed some light on that topic.


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