Great holiday!

I am really making great new strides. This weekend I finally picked up my tennis racquet. While I only hit for about 15 minutes, it was really fun and I cannot wait to get back to playing. My summer team starts practice tomorrow night, and I am going to try to go down and hit with them some. I don't think I will be really ready for play this season, but I am getting there slowly.

I think I've mentioned that I have been going to the gym and walking about 40 minutes on the treadmill. I have not been trying to get my heart rate up at this point and havebeen working on endurance more than anything. And I have been walking with no incline at all. Sunday morning I was headed for the gym, and it was such perfect weather friend Rita and I decided to walk outside instead. We walked down towards the river and then around my neighborhood which is quite hilly. All in all, it was about a 1 1/2 hour walk and about 4 miles. While that is a pretty slow rate, it was quite an accomplishment for me. After that, I worked in the yard, cleaned some deck furniture, and had friends Joe and Debbie over for dinner. I don't think I sat down for more than 5 minutes the whole day. This was probably the most "normal" day I have had in 18 months. I felt like I was back to my normal "warp speed" weekend (except the walking speed of course). By the time I laid down last night about 10:30 I was whipped and achey, but it felt so good.

And if all that was not enough, we bought me a little convertible today. I have wanted one forever but could never really justify it in my head. I have a company car, and it seemed just sort of foolish. So what do I do -- when the economy is the worst ever, gas out the roof, etc., I go buy an extra car! What the heck - I wanted it. Actually, we have been talking about it for a while but I just kept putting it off. I was scared it would jinx my recovery. I decided a couple of weeks ago I would not buy one until after my June scans to make sure I was ok. Then, since we are going to England in July, I decided to put it off until we got back. The real truth was I was just plain scared I would have a recurrence of the sarcome and would not be able to enjoy it. This week I mentioned the whole thing to fellow sarcoma patient Carol Lynn, who just did have a recurrence and surgery. and she gave me the courage to just live in the moment and do it. (By the way, she is recovering well from her surgery, and I am so happy and relieved for her.) Bob and I went to the car dealership on Saturday and test drove the car. He really drove it the first time around, because we decided to buy a manual transmission 5-speed, and I have not driven one of those in about 25 years. It just seems if you are really going to enjoy a convertible it should not be an automatic. Also, whenever we are in England, we always have an manual transmission car as you do not see a lot of automatics there. I have never driven when we were tin England because not only did I not know how to drive on the "wrong" side of the road, but I was not confident enough to drive a 5 speed. So now I am forcing the obvious. I did drive it today, and I did pretty well. It only conked out on me once right in the beginning, so I am no longer afraid of it.

It is a Mazda Miata MX-5 and a cute little thing... and I mean little. My tennis racquet will fit in the trunk, along with a light shopping trip to Publix. I will never be able to go to Costco in the thing -- their stuff is just too big. There is absolutely nothing practical about this car, and that is what I love about it. I am pretty rational, practical, predictible, etc so this is pretty much nothing like me. But I do look so hot in it -- especially since I have grown a little more hair. (The hair is still pretty short and certainly not long enough to blow and be in the way when I have the top down. Now I have just another reason to keep my hair short.) My friend Pat from Memphis is coming here for the weekend on Thursday. I cannot even pick her up from the airport in the Mazda. Maybe if she just has one of those small roll on suitcases it might fit, but I am afraid she may pack like me. However, I am going to start packing light so we can take it on weekend trips .

So, it was a great holiday weekend--tennis, long walks, friends for dinner and a hot new car! And best of all my legs work well enough to do it all. What more can you ask for?