Well, lovely.

This has been a tough few weeks.

My aunt died. We were never close, most of the family found her to be a royal pain in the ass in fact. Still, she was family, and she showed up to every birthday, every graduation, every holiday, with her check book in hand. She deserves respect, if not affection.

My dog developed a tumor behind her right eye, along with an infection. After struggling with antibiotics for weeks, we had to have the eye removed so they could get at the tumor. The biopsy results aren't in yet, and my poor dog looks very very pathetic.

In the middle of my Aunt's visitation, my insurance company called to tell me that my landlord policy (I rented my old place when I moved in with my fiance) was in trouble because the underwriters did an inspection and found a broken window. I checked on it, it's only a crack in a basement window, and it's been there since I bought the place and they insured it about a decade ago.

A week or two later, I was going through the mail, and found two notices from them saying that my policy had been CANCELLED, they even sent me back a check. Several angry conversations later I was told if the windows were repaired in a week, it would be reinstated. I sent the photos of the repaired windows to them this morning.

Ah, and the final insult. I was having gallstone symptoms. This is odd, since I've had my gallbladder out, but apparently gallstones can still form. After about a week and a half of dealing with them and living on tuna and crackers, I went in for a CAT scan. After that they wanted an MRI. In the middle of this, whatever stone I had dissapeared, but they spotted a 4 cm mass on my right kidney.

I talked to an urologist, 85% of the time, this is cancer.

The good news is that in 90% of these cases, if they successfully remove the mass (NOT the kidney!), the cancer is never seen again.

So, I have surgery (laproscopic) on March 29th. They'll biopsy the mass after they remove it, and if it's cancerous I'll be having 10 years of follow up visits.

My family is full of rediculous optimists, so they aren't making a big deal out of it, but...

Well... 85% chance that I have cancer.

Not a pleasant thought. In fact, considering my life lately, it's hard not to be depressed. Laid off, two years of searching, working at 2/3rds of my previous salary, the only good thing that has happened to me in the last decade has been my fiance. It's hard to keep fighting sometimes.

But I will.

And so it goes.

Much has happened since my last post.

I'm still employed. It's been a year now. The pay is low, and they expect a LOT of knowledge, and they work your ass off.

Good people for the most part, but it's an outsourcing company. They don't pay well, half the idea behind their existence is that they can provide cheap expertise.

I'm engaged. I'm getting married on March 12th. We've sent the invitations, I'm popping $1k for a suit that I can't afford, and I just paid $160 for a white shirt. I'm no clothes horse, believe me... I'm just hard to fit, and even big and tall shops don't have anything that fails to look like shit. I'm thick chested, and anything I find that fits my chest, hangs off in a huge bag around my waist.

Custom made? Well, J doesn't want to walk down the aisle to marry someone that looks like crap.

The kids are a constant challenge. For someone who has spent his entire life in a warm, comfortable bachelorhood.... Well, lets just say that two teenagers are a bit of an ice bath.

The last six or seven years have been tumultuous for me. Now, coming out of the whole thing I know who my friends are, and even though I'm earning 2/3rds what I used to and am having to rebuild my career at age 51, it's better.