Saturday, February 25, 2017

The results are in, plus First Blood, Manchester by the Sea

Hate to break the news, but I saw my ENT about my biopsy results today, and it turns out I have cancer. The thing in my tongue (and perhaps related areas) which I wrote about a few posts ago.  I see a specialist next Saturday. The exact prognosis and length of treatment are 100% unclear, beside that there will likely be a combination of surgery, chemo and radiation therapy - standard stuff, really, hopefully leaving me relatively whole and healthy.

It's also looking like this might affect wedding plans - postponement, alteration, dunno yet, there's plenty that is unclear. My girl is bearing up but it's tough. I'll be blogging about it, I guess, and so forth. I'll also keep up with other writing too - I've got plenty of stuff I want to put into the world yet.
Speaking of which, filmwise, we watched First Blood, the first Rambo film, the other night, one of the earliest and most important stories in the history of Hollywood North. My girl came to it a Rambo virgin, which is a remarkable and positive thing, since she got to see it without the filter of the later films (all crap, though I have fondness for part 4). We were entertained by the BC locations (mostly Hope) and the story, which is much more critical of a certain type of masculinity than it is a reactionary macho celebration or such. I had forgotten that the climax of the movie, after abundant explosions, was Stallone breaking down and crying. It's a powerful,unexpected moment, and I was moved to tears by the pathos of it. I had also forgotten, or never realized, that David Caruso was in the film as the sole cop with a lick of sense, and I certainly never knew that Bruce Greenwood has a small, early speaking role, complete with a bit of babyfat on his cheeks (he plays a National Guardsman named Bruce, so he's hard to miss).

We also watched Manchester by the Sea, and to be honest, while it is moving and well-made, it is nowhere near as good as the long cut of Margaret. Lonergan seems to be the kind of filmmaker who basically needs three hours to flesh out his characters and story; Manchester by the Sea, at two hours seventeen minutes, still feels like a short.

That's it for a bit. Wish me luck.

4 comments:

  1. Looking forward to many many more days with you, brother. We'll take them at the usual rate, one day at a time.

    ReplyDelete
  2. Isn't that just for recovering alcoholics? The older i get, the more days seem to come in underdifferentiated glops!

    ReplyDelete
  3. Times like this I'm reminded of that Lester Bangs review of Metal Machine Music where the entire review was:

    NO. NO. NO. NO. NO. NO. NO. NO. NO. NO.
    NO. NO. NO. NO. NO. NO. NO. NO. NO. NO.
    NO. NO. NO. NO. NO. NO. NO. NO. NO. NO.
    NO. NO. NO. NO. NO. NO. NO. NO. NO. NO.
    NO. NO. NO. NO. NO. NO. NO. NO. NO. NO.

    You'll get through this my dude.

    xx, your other Judith

    ReplyDelete
  4. Time to let your Maple Ridge tough guy out of the cage. He has been waiting on this.

    ReplyDelete

Comments are moderated, and anything that is obvious spam or just hateful trolling will just be deleted, unpublished. Thank you.

Note: Only a member of this blog may post a comment.