Sunset, Kailua-Kona, The Big Island, Hawaii, March 11, 2024

Sunset, Kailua-Kona, The Big Island, Hawaii, March 11, 2024
Sunset, Kailua-Kona, The Big Island, Hawaii, March 11, 2024

Monday, March 2, 2015

It Does not Compute, Random Beer Garden, and Basal Cell Carcinoma - Week of February 22, 2015

Hans and Lisa (of Metamorphosis Road blog), Bob and I wanted to hike on Sunday, Feb. 22. However, the cold weather put a damper on that.

Instead, Hans came over to help fix my computer. It was massively sluggish, giving odd error messages, and wouldn't let me play Scrabble.

Oh, no! Please don't take my Scrabble away. I hadn't been able to play Scrabble on my computer for two weeks. Bob let me play on his computer when he wasn't using it.

Hans generously slogged through my registry, hard drive, and files to delete excessively large files and threats to my system. The upshot is: I need a newer, faster computer. On speedtest.net, my system performed terribly.

The other problem seems to be our AT&T air card. Hans had me run updates on the air card and that helped considerably.

By the time he had worked on my laptop for a couple of hours, I could play Scrabble and we were able to back up my computer onto an external hard drive. Thank you, Hans, for helping fix my ailing laptop. My laptop is three years "old." I guess that's ancient for a computer anymore.

We took off for Random Beer Garden in the afternoon where we treated Hans and Lisa to craft beers on tap at Random and Z's Wood-fired Pizzas. Lisa had her laptop with her and showed me Windows 8.1. She can edit her photos easily on her computer screen with flicks and swoops of her fingers. I see Windows 8.1 in my future when I buy a new laptop. Lisa did a great blog on San Antonio hikes and Random, and even took photos, which I forgot to do. You can click here to read her blog.

Here are some of my older photos of Random...


The old farmhouse
Inside the old farmhouse, now an events center.
Outside seating and beer garden
Over 80 craft beers on tap


After Random, we came back to Travelers World. Hans and Lisa invited us to their 5th wheel for a nice, warm, comfort-food dinner of sausage stew, rice with quinoa, and green salad. Good stuff! We sat and chatted for another hour and a half, said our good-byes as they were leaving in the morning, and headed home. 

With Bob and I working so much, we were happy to spend as much time with Hans and Lisa as we could. They will be in Austin for five weeks, then in Fredericksburg, Texas, and South Llano State Park. We plan to see them at least one more time while they're in Texas, maybe more.

Tuesday, February 24: Today Bob went to a Mohs surgery specialist to have basal cell carcinoma removed from his neck. He had a previous skin cancer removal site scar that had been bleeding for a few months. Mohs surgery entails removing cancer cells from the edges and depths of the wound. After each excision of cells, the skin pieces are sectioned, put under an electron microscope and the edges checked for cancer cells. They keep removing skin and checking the edges of the sections until no more cancer cells are found. Bob had to have three rounds of surgery today to remove more cancer cells. During his surgeries they were able to avoid the nerve in his neck that controls shrugging your shoulders. We were in the outpatient clinic for five hours!

The doctor was able to remove all the cancer cells from the edges of his wound, but the cancer had deepened into his neck muscle. The wound in Bob's neck is four inches by two inches and about 1/4" deep. The Mohs surgeon did not feel comfortable removing the cancer from Bob's neck muscle, so Bob has been referred to consult with both a head/neck surgeon and a plastic surgeon. He will have that consultation on Tuesday, March 3, at 1:00 p.m. Before the consultation he will have a computerized axial tomography (CAT) scan.

Bob will have a new surgery under general anesthetic, date to be determined. Because his wound is so big, the plastic surgeon is needed to consult as to whether a skin flap from another portion of his neck can be used to close the wound, or if a skin graft will be needed from another part of his body. The way I see it, his wound is way too big for a skin flap. He will most likely need a skin graft. We'll know on Tuesday, March 3.

That's the news from this "neck" of the woods. More reports to follow.

Travel Bug out.


17 comments:

  1. Susan, will be keeping you both in heart, thoughts and prayers.

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  2. Sure hope everything turns out well for Bob. Cancer is no fun at all to put it very mildly. We'll be thinkingof you both.

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    1. The basal cell carcinoma runs in Bob's family. His uncle has also had Mohs surgery. He told Bob to be sure he gets the Mohs surgery to make sure they get all the cancer cells out.

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  3. I loved Random! That is exactly what a country bar should be. Thanks for taking us there!

    Good luck to Bob. My sister had to have a skin graft and the graft site heals much slower than the original wound site.

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    1. If they're open on Easter Sunday, we could go there for lunch. It's only a couple of miles down the road from where we'll be hiking.

      Docs aren't sure yet if Bob will need a skin graft. Possible it will only need a skin flap. They won't know until they do the surgery next week. A plastic surgeon will be working with the head/neck surgeon and they will decide at that time.

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  4. Oh, gosh...I just had a squamus cell skin cancer removed and 11 years ago I had 3 little melanomas surgically removed from my arm. With my fair skin and blonde hair, it's a constant battle. I will also pray for Bob.
    Cheryl Ann

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    1. Thank you, Cheryl.

      Sorry to hear about your skin cancers. Bob is also blonde and fair skinned, so he is always getting spots frozen off. He has been scheduled for his neck muscle surgery on Wednesday, Mar. 11.

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  5. I saw your comments to Bettys blog so thought I'd link over to yours. We are currently in Hondo,Tx headed to Sequin of the 22nd tor a few days. Then on to Austin on the 30th.

    When in the San Antonio area we always stop in an the little Red Barn for steaks. Hope they are still good.

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    1. My steak was very good and the potato was huge! Little Red Barn is very close to Travelers World RV Resort. Let us know if you'd like company at The Little Red Barn.

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  6. We will be thinking of Bob as he gets this all done and over with. Guess he is really a "pain in the neck" and has a good reason to be!! LOL Gotta laugh a bit, it's healing....

    KarenInTheWoods and Steveio
    ~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~
    (Blog) RVing: The USA Is Our Big Backyard
    http://kareninthewoods-kareninthewoods.blogspot.com
    ~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~

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  7. Bob will be in our thoughts.

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