Cancer is the biggest bitch I ever met.

I've neglected posting for a while. I have a good excuse, but I am a little over talking about it. I'm pretty sure this is the only time I'll ever post about it. So savor it.

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I swear my cancer is a girl and she's a mean one. The kind that talks about you behind your back and then is sticky sweet to your face. The kind that hurts you simply because she can. She takes pleasure in all of these things. She's a bully. I hate her. We're not friends.  (Plus she wears skanky clothes and her hair is super greasy.)

What is so frustrating about being sick is all the people that come out of the woodwork feeling sorry for you or feeling bad that they were a shitty friend and then trying to overcompensate for that by trying to be your best friend. Instead of being what you need, they end up working very hard at trying to be the kind of person they want you, and everyone else, to think they are when really they're just being posers for a moment while they try to gain a little favor from your misfortune.

You know what is so messed up about most of these "old" friends. They get upset if I don't acknowledge their cards or phone calls or whatever it is that they try to do. And, all I can say to them is that IT'S NOT ABOUT THEM. Half the time I don't even think it's about me. What I don't get is why they need validation for trying to be the friend they should have been all along. The friends I keep closest to me are the ones who do things for no reason and never out of a feeling of pity or obligation. My closest friends also know that I don't really let anyone do anything for me. They know that the way they show up for me is through a simple text or a call or a fun hour at lunch every week.

Tay, my bff (yes I'm 35 and I totally have a bff),  knows all of this quite well. I don't let her do anything. But, I think she knows that I love her more for letting me just get through this and for not trying to do the things that make me crazy. Like bring me dinner. People who bring dinner to my house drive me nuts. Unless it's my mother or my sister, or that one neighbor who makes the best penne vodka ever. They get a pass. Everyone else has to keep their meals to themselves.

This one time (I love saying that) a girl from our neighborhood brought dinner over after I'd had Sam. And, it became the biggest joke in our house. She brought canned peas. I know, gasp! The gagging and dry heaving that came from my girls was funny enough to capture on video. It looked like Sam's diaper. It smelled worse. And, since then my girls have always giggled when they see this poor girl.

I'm grateful for the kindness of neighbors and strangers. I don't want to sound ungrateful. But, sometimes it ends in a pretty good laugh in my house. And, honestly, I'm thankful for that.

I have good friends. I have the best kinds of friends. I'm not talking about the ones who show up when they think they should. They are posers and it actually makes me want to say "thanks but my dance ticket is full".  I'm talking about the ones that show up all the time, whenever they want, and when they must. They never think they should. They just do.

Last week I got a call from someone I've been working with. If you've read earlier posts... he's referred to as an asshat. He started the conversation by asking if I was mad at him because I had been acting upset all week. My initial reaction was that he was totally and completely pathetic. He is a grown-ass man. GROW A PAIR. I wasn't angry. I was sick. I've been sick. I hated to deflate his gigantic ego (actually I loved it) but I had to remind him that this cancer thing, and the chemo thing, and all this shit that is making me sick is and has never been about him. And, at that moment I remember thinking... No, HE is the biggest bitch I ever met... cancer is A OK when I compare it to him. 

Last week I was pretty much NOT a candyass. He cornered the market on that one.

The No Talk List

This will be a recurring entry. The No Talk List is a big deal in my family. The stories are wildly entertaining and simply cannot be forgotten. And, they must be shared.

The list started two years ago during a trip we took with my brother and his family to Huntington Beach and Disneyland. Truthfully, one of the best vacations ever. Our kids love each other and travel perfectly together. We spent the first few days on the beach and lounging at the pool at the fabulous Hyatt right on the beach. A much needed wind down for the parents.

We saw dolphins and took surfing lessons and rented bikes and boogie boards. The kids all learned how to body surf and collected buckets and buckets of seashells and sea glass. It was almost too good to be true. Something had to happen. This could not be the perfect vacation!! Our kids were all notoriously naughty. Little villains.

It was too good to be true. Our fourth day on the coast was the first day we ventured to Disneyland. We packed up and left that gorgeous hotel that spoiled our kids rotten for a few days and checked in to the skankiest sleeziest dirtiest mess any of us had every seen. It had this beautiful facade, and all kinds of great (fabricated) reviews. Under the very thin veneer was what a total shitshow. And, I mean that literally.

We checked in and got kids all lathered up with sunscreen and then waited on the front walk for the shuttle to the Happiest Place on Earth (sometimes). My nephew walked a few feet away from us to look at the flowers (probably plastic) in beds in front of the hotel. As his little eyes wandered around the colorful flowers, his little feet wandered in to the biggest pile of supercharged stinky dog poop. Right there in the middle of the sidewalk. It was bad enough to simply take his shoes and socks off and throw them away.

For a few minutes nothing was funny about this. Kids were all overly excited about the rides and the characters and the treats and the parades. They were all totally buzzed. We were trying to keep them contained. At some point I got the giggles. That was the biggest pile of poop I'd ever seen. It was like a cow patty, but not full of all that fibrous junk. He'd not just stepped in it. He'd walked through it a couple of times. Literally... a shitshow.

My laughing got my SIL laughing and my brother laughing and when my nephew had had enough he yelled "that's it, this is on the NO TALK LIST and you can't say anything about it ever again". And, the list was born. That first story is not as entertaining as some that will follow, but you had to know how it came to be. The list includes many entries from the little boy who lost his shoes at the shitshow. You'll get to know him quite well.

The second entry on the list happened within weeks of the vacation mentioned above. My brother decided it was time to introduce his kids to the most delectable sandwich ever made. The FLUFFERNUTTER. I know, it's bitchin right? Peanut butter and marshmallow fluff between a couple of slices of white bread. Delicious! My nephew agrees with me on the fabulousness of this sandwich. In fact, he agrees with me to such a degree that he was caught saying this under his breath: "I love this sandwich. This is the best sandwich in the whole world. I'm going to have sex with this sandwich."

My niece overhead this declaration and fell on the floor in fits of laughter. When she composed herself a little bit she ratted him out to my brother who then explained to my nephew that no sex would be happening with a sandwich. Crushed, he finished the sandwich... and made another.

More to come on the no talk list. Including the time my dad blew up a gas station in Vegas.