Thursday, March 25, 2010 6:16 PM, CDT

Hello from OZ,

The day we have all been waiting for has arrived..kind of like Christmas...Karen, I and the good Lord were given the green light to take off today.

So tomorrow morning we leave Little Rock which has been home since September 09.

All labs and counts are great..I asked the Doc if I am in this 90% percentile of long life expectancy for 10 plus years ..he said yes no problem. He explained my disease has 2 types, the active and the smoldering. The smoldering may never go away but it does no damage, it justs sits around doing nothing...kinda like some people I know. The active has been eradicated from my marrow. This was great news to my ears.

We have been through many bumps in the road with this stuff but the Lord has preserved us. Praise be to him. He is master of my soul and a safe harbour in all seasons.

Continue to pray for all God's children in need..they are many.

We will now start maintenance in 1 month and it will last for 3 years. This will involve low dose chemo by mouth and shots.

Karen and I want all of you to know how much your prayers, support and thoughts have helped us. As mentioned, we encountered many bumps along the way but did not have any flat tires.

Enough of medicine.

Many years ago, in Ft Valley , Ga. I was baling corn and millet for my cows. In the process, also getting the field ready for upcoming dove shoots. I would leave the bales out in the field as cover for the hunters. The baler was one of these big round balers..it would make a nice 5 x 5 bale around 1500 lbs. Occasionally when a fellow is baling he will encounter some hay that has not dried well and it will stick in the throat of the baler and clog. Well this is not good because you then have to raise the baler door and climb in, get on your knees and start cutting, pulling the grass out of the baler. This is very tiring work and can take upwards of 30 minutes.

As you might know this is what happened... I am on my knees with the tractor running, unplugging my baler..of course alone out in this big field ...so the last thing I am expecting is for a human to show up.

As mentioned, I am on my knees, and I hear someone screaming at me..I turn to look and all I see is legs and hands pointing at a coiled up rattlesnake 2 feet behind me.
This had to be the fastest I have ever moved in my life...I turned and ran head first right into the top roll bar on the baler. I was probably out like a light for a few seconds...and awoke to laughter ... looked around for a few more seconds to figure out the situation...well it was my ole friend Tim McCord bent over double he was laughing so hard. He helped me up and explained the snake was dead. He had ran over it on the road and decided to use it as a joke. Well it worked.

However, I actually was a catalyst a couple of years ago in introducing Ben my son, to his daughter Linsey who is now my daughter in law and lives close by to us. It took me 30 years but "paybacks are hell, Tim!"

SIDENOTES AND VICIOUS RUMORS

• Let us rejoice with the day we have
• Duke will win the NCAA
• Dayton is my pick for the NIT
• now that healthcare is law..salaries and wages are next I suppose; then guns , then speech, then ....
• where do you apply for an IRS position ... vicious rumor has it Obama is hiring 19,000 new agents
• the only postive thing about all this debt we now must pay for is that China holds the paper..kind of ironic really..can a China man say three blind mice real fast
• ain't our Vice President Joe "F...ing " Biden a class act..and he is second in command..where do we find these people

Enough of my chemo rants

Love from Little Rock