November 1 - Day Minus 8

It looks like we are finally on schedule. My blood counts on Monday in Atlanta were okay and still okay Tuesday night in Houston. I saw Dr. Hosing yesterday for the final check and will go into the hospital tonight. They will start the BEAM regimen to kill off the bone marrow Friday morning. The donor cells are suppose to be infused next Thursday, November 8.

We had the pleasure of going out to eat with our friends Terry and Linda from Pennsylvania Tuesday night right after we got here. Terry and I went through this process in 2006. He got his stem cells on August 8, so coincidentally he will be 15 months post-transplant on the day I get my 2nd transplant. We spent much of that summer here trying to get everything lined up for our transplants. The delays that I had this summer are not unusual as we saw in 2006. We had another crony with us then, too, Merlin Cohen whose wife, Janie, was undergoing treatment for a very stubborn melanoma. So we three hung out together some.

Even though going through this process and disease is not fun, you do meet a lot of very nice people. I keep with Terry and Linda, Merlin and Janie, and John and Anna from Austin fairly regularly. I would not have met any of them if I hadn't been here, so there you go. Janie is doing very well, as is John. Now I have to catch up with them. They are all inspirations to me.

Terry has gone through some pretty rough skin GvHD but looks like he's got it under control now. A couple of years of GvHD is not unusual apparently. Terry got ahead of me so I get to pick his brain about what to expect.

Terry and Linda, it was great seeing you. Enjoy the trip to Arizona and the warm weather. And congratulations on a successful transplant. Keep up the good work.

Merlin is a dentist turned sculptor, by the way. Check out his website at www.merlincohen.com. You won't be disappointed.

How about a little football now? I'm going to go out on the limb here and predict Georgia Tech over Virginia Tech tonight on ESPN in spite of the fact that GT is without their top two running backs.

Here's my logic. Florida had a week off to get ready for KY after KY had a tough game against LSU. Georgia knocked off Florida last week after they had a week off and UF had the tough game against KY. Now GT has had 5 extra days to prepare for VT, while VT suffered a real tough loss to Boston College last Thursday night. So by extrapolation I'm liking GT's chances.

Chan Gailey without his running backs will be forced to be creative, which is so unusual that Frank Beamer won't know what to do. I think GT will run the fullback, throw to the tight end and use a little razzle dazzle. He's just got to. We also have a Tim Tebow (UF's quarterback) kind of freshman quarterback in Josh Nesbitt who will get plenty of playing time taking the snap and running up the middle.

The defenses are comparable, both tough as nails. Neither team will get more than one offensive touchdown. I like GT's chances with our place kicker. In fact field goals may be all we get. So I think we win by a low score of 9 to 7, 10 to 7, or maybe 12 to 10. Look for a defensive struggle with a few trick plays. The winner may be the one who scores with special teams or on defense.