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.