Good Morning All!  And a hearty thanks to at least 40 people who sent me White Rabbits, Bunny luck or Wabbit Luck yesterday!  You guys rock the boat!  I'm feeling well stocked in the luck department for the month of February and will make my appeal once again at the end of the month as March is going to be an important month for me as well.  That is when I will be having my surgery.  How invasive you ask?  Do you really want to know?  For the faint of heart read no further.  They will remove my esophagus, totally take it out and then stretch my stomach up and connect it to form a new esophagus leaving me with a smaller stomach and hence a smaller capacity for food consumption for the rest of my life.  I will have to become a frequent small meal eater but they say that's a better way to eat anyways right!?  It is a long surgery and I will be in ICU for a period of time and off of food for at least a week.  As you know the mission has been to "plump up Leslie" and has met with some success but I keep telling my family they are dead if by some miracle I go through this and don't lose an ounce!  Highly unlikely I'm thinking when I see what their plan for me is though!  I look forward to being back to my old weight though.  When I shower in the morning I have taken to towelling off in the shower then stepping out and facing the wall avoiding glimpses of my chubby body!  Caroline says I should adopt a technique she learned at yoga of "softening my gaze".......whatever the heck that means.  Think I'll just stick to looking at the wall.

To all of you who have supported my son Geoff in his Ride To Conquer Cancer on my behalf a big thank you!  He has reached his goal and is overwhelmed by your support!  It means the world.  His team, the "Honey Badgers" is growing and now Bill has also decided to join the ride.  Sooo.....if and only if you were planning to support Geoff perhaps you would consider throwing your support behind Bill instead.  All the money goes to the same cause but each rider in the group must raise a minimum of $2500.  This was Geoff's idea, not mine and I said I would stick it in my blog.  Thankyou my friends....I am in no way pressuring you to do this but for those of you who have done so and will do so I will tell you this is one of the nicest gifts you have given my family.  As Kelli's boyfriend Mike put it....people don't get cancer, families do!  He is so right.  The impact this has had on all of us has been huge!

Having said all this I continue to do well.  Only one chemo and four radiations to go!  It seemed so daunting at the beginning when I knew I had 23 radiations and 5 chemos.  The time has gone quite quickly......Hopefully this pace will continue!  Love to you all.
Leslie