Gee Bob, ya sure "flatpicked" that apart.
"Maria" of course . . . as a Canuck I shoulda known that . . . "eh" . . . must be my francophone influences.

Oh . . . you thought I was talking about legalized dope??????

No . . . . immigration is the hot topic here now. nudge, nudge.

Great research there, bud.
Ian

John, I'm sorry for your ordeal and praying for your full speedy recovery.

You have a whacked sense of humor and I always enjoy reading your posts. "grade, eh" LOL.

Hi John,
Sorry to hear that, and I wish you a speedy recovery.
Peter

Hey John,
"A cheerful heart is good medicine, but a crushed spirit dries up the bones."

Likewise.

Hang tough, old man.


--Mac

Hi John,

You've got my every best wish for a speedy recovery.

Thinking of you,
Noel

john,
you are one wacky canuck and i love you. we yanks here in the southern provinces need you to ride herd on us and keep us in line, please hang in there mate.

Q: why does an okie have tgif on his boots?
A: tpes go in first

Get well soon my friend. You are in our prayers.

Been there, done that chemo thing. Not fun but it does work.

I'm joining those praying for you John. And I'm asking that the Lord reveals himself to you in a way that speaks your individual spiritual language, or dialect, or whatever it is that makes you see Him in your life and currently very challenging circumstances.

Cheers from over the water.

John

My prayers will be with you! Get well soon!

John, my cancer was exactly like that. Tumor in my lymph node was a secondary, no sign of the primary tumor anywhere. 6 months after the surgery to remove my lymph nodes, the primary tumor emerged on the back of my tongue. It was just too small to be detected earlier. It's there, the docs just can't see it yet.

More prayers your way John.

Get well soon.

Best wishes for a speedy recovery John. Keep your good sense of humour with you at all times.

Chin up, John and hang in there! My uncle died of cancer in his mid 50s because he wouldn't do anything about it. My father had cancer in his 70s and got rid of it with no problem - he just felt a bit dizzy from the chemo but he is ok now. I had suspect cancer 4 years ago (in my 40s) but it turned out to be a phantom case. Get better soon and keep laughing!

Hang in there John. Saying a prayer here for ya brother.

Trax

Healing thoughts and prayers from the UK buddy....
Your sense of humour and upbeat attitude is your best tool right now....
All the very best,
Dave.

Man oh man. Many good thoughts and much good luck, John, and some big d--n manly hugs.

My wife and I took a weekend trip to Toronto. It's about 1.5 hours away. Got a really nice hotel room. Did a few walking trips, shopping, and chilling. We had a fancy meal, I ate some of it, you shouldn't have a tonsil out when your are going to be 60 next bday. Almost a week and it's still keeping me from really eating, although I choked down a couple of crepes filled with crab and cheese. Had a nice time all around, and I loved driving the Mini is the streets with the street car tracks, cars parked all over, squeezing through places no one else can go.

This 1/2 boost 1/2 coffee diet is really making me drop the pounds.

Now the humour from the weekend.

Staying in a huge hotel brings you in contact with some people from 'elsewhere'. The wife went to the parking garage to get my hat and cane. (The drugs make me a tad unstable at times, so the cane is a 3rd point to keep me up!). It was a bit cool, and windy. We decided to take a walk.

I'm sitting on a nice couch, the big flowers in front of us, the valets and doormen a few feet away. A woman about 45 or so with lots of makeup and fancy clothes sits beside me, well other end of the couch. I spot Marbourhoughs (American smokes sp?) sticking out of her purse. She turns to me and says "Want go out for fresh air and a cigarette?" I smile and say, "I gave up the cigarette and I'm just waiting for my Nurse to come back with my hat and cane." She says, "Nurse". I pull out a piece of paper, actually it is the list of emergency contact numbers and the other numbers at the cancer clinic, the chemo nurse the radiation nurse, the surgical nurse, the primary care nurse, the after hours nurse etc. "Yup I say, I have a bit of a problem with cancer, but the health plan give me a bunch of nurses, and this one will go away with me if I take a vacation."....

"Must be expensive"...she says.
"No, this is Canada, it's part of the coverage."

"The wife shows up in her best dress, heels, nice short red coat, looks about 35... and says "here's your cane and hat honey you up for a walk."

I turn to the woman who was trying to pick me up and say.."I thought about ditching her and going with you for a walk, but now I think I'd better take the nurse...she knows what to do in case..." and get up and leave.

I swear I can't help myself LOL.

Good one, John!

Good one John.

I just don’t understand when someone puts fresh air and cigarettes in the same sentence, i.e. "Want go out for fresh air and a cigarette?".

Talk about an oxymoron

John,
That is terribly funny. I can imagine that this is an American woman, possibly a bimbette, but more likely some middle-aged divorcee who is going to come back and tell all her friends that in Canada their Universal Health Care system is WAAAAAAAAAY better than Obamacare, and we should all get nurses, too!

You're going to start a revolution down here, John, and the few of us who read this will know the ugly truth....it was all a JOKE!

But, I would have loved to have been there to see the look on her face when you told her that.

GOOD ONE!

Gary

Oh yeah, tell me about this half Boost, half coffee diet.

Gary

Actually the traveling nurse is a joke, but the rest is too real. I have about 20 phone numbers, nurses first, docs, specialists, diet consultants, emergency contacts etc. And given the speed it all happened the complainers have some sort of slow moving problem that the docs know to put on the back burner for someone like myself.

My favorite traveling sicko story involves Swedes I saw in Toronto about 10 years ago. Their national hockey team was playing a series of Canadian junior teams. The hotel had 3 buses full of 'fans'. I found out they were all being treated for depression, and sent to travel with the team as a therapeutic thing. I thought they were funning me, but I asked others on another bus what was wrong with the people in the other bus as they were standing outside and they said, "oh, we are all depressed over the long winter and our doctors sent us on a trip, we had a choice of 3."

OK, so that's a level of socialist medicine we will never see here...LOL.

Are we having fun yet?

So they chose to come to Canada to watch their hockey team lose? What were the other two choices, I wonder? LOL

1. Go to Washington D.C. to watch Congress try to figure out what they are doing

or

2. Go boating off the Somali coast

Gary

john, from this angle i've come to recogniz(s)e people by their nostrils and navels and everyone seems 8 feet tall. (chuckle)

Put up a sign,,"From this perspective I can examine your belly button for a small fee...", 10 cents extra for rings....LOL.

OK, I think this thread has run its course?

Anyway John, glad you're back.

I'll say it as it is, I lost my mother, dad, grandfather to this crap...........if I get it I will refuse the treatment, my wife and myself have made a pact to this due to US prices..........If Canada can do the job, great, but here it's bankruptcy................May God do what may, and hope you live another 30 years. Music will keep you living for ever...................................Keep it coming.

I asked about that option, do nothing. Less than 3 months. As it is I get an 85 percent chance of being around 5 years from now. Sorry!

I can understand the costs. The chemo clinic alone part of the building treats 90 to 120 people a day. In that you do chemo 1 day a week that exptrapolates to over 500 people a week. It is the "Regional Cancer Centre" and that has always peed off people from the boonies..." So if you look at Ontario that arm going up near the Soo USA is serviced from our hospital 200 miles away. What they do is give you a dorm room for the week you are having treatment, a free ride, and a shuttle bus to take you to the cancer centre. So they put all the resources in one building. I can call and a driver comes to my house and takes me there, but that's a volunteer, there were 12 of them the other day...sitting waiting for a call having coffee. I'm only a 6 dollar cab ride away, but the rides are free and I'm not sure, I like to support the new Canadians trying to eke out a living in a cab, heck the guy might be a Cancer Doc from Uzbeckiztan...

Don't want to stir up a hornet's nest on the back of an encouraging and positive thread about and for John here, but critters post saddens me deeply. How tragic that so many in the worlds most wealthy nation live in such fear of serious illness, not just for the morbidity/mortality aspects, but of themselves and their family being financially ruined.

God bless America sure, and I'm sincere in that, no sarcasm or irony there but even though I am no socialist (ask my pinko brother) I am just so grateful I live in a system where I don't have to face that fear.

Even if Obama achieves nothing else of lasting significance, I suggest his achievements toward universal health coverage will provide him a lasting legacy. Once you guys give it a fly for a few years, you'll never choose to go back. Cost is 1.5% of gross yearly income here in Australia. They take it out of your yearly tax return. When I hear accounts like critters it blows me away your society can function like that. Sorry!

John

Don't be sorry. I'm just in awe that a country that gave bailouts to banks could have given everyone in the country free health care for 11 years with the same cash. Odd that....

There's good and bad everywhere, nothing is perfect, but I'm happy to be here, I've no decisions to make, I just get taken care of....Now if I could pick the nurses, they'd all be the girls from Ipememia...tall and tanned and young and...

Whoops never mind...LOL.

john, did you hear about the okie who won an olympic gold medal? he liked it so much that he decided to have it bronzed.

just trying to keep your spirits up.

you are obviously very well loved.

paging mister conley, paging mister conley...

please check in john, you are scaring me me we bucko.

btw, did you ever get your navel and nostril inspector's permit?

ps: drinking thickened coffee through a straw gives me something to do all day.

John,


Our best wishes for a miraculous and speedy recovery. Thank you for taking the time to write such a detailed report of your illness. It's wonderful to read that you still can maintain a sense of humor. Please keep us up to date.
And if I can help with any book or movie recommendations to help you pass the time please let me know.

Best,

Well I considered invading the U.(undeveloped) S.(outhern) A. (rea) just as a test of the defence system. I had a bone scan on Friday, and they scan you, stick radioactive dye into your blood, send you away, and you come back for an hour, which turned into 4. Some doctor sat in another room and wanted continual higher res pictures of certain areas and that took a lot of extra time. After they gave me a wallet card saying that if I crossed a border I was treated with radioactive agent X and I might set off alarms. It was signed by a radiation doctor with a 24 hour call number. I wanted to go to Port Huron just to see them scramble jets and blackhawks, but alas, didn't seem up to the mischief. The nuclear medicine department has 4 great huge machines and there was a steady stream of people in that area on Friday, it's one of the last areas on the old site where the hospital was when I was born, all the rest of the departments have moved to a huge ultra modern regional centre and the nuclear medicine department was moving on the weekend, so it was the last day there. All 5 kids in my family were born in that location...and I remember like yesterday my brothers and I all having our tonsils out in the children's hospital across the road connected by an underground tunnel. You went through the tunnel to the OR and I'd be 8 or so and we went in a convoy in 'cribs' and I was pretty upset at being in a cage at that age. I remember the popsicles after and wanting to kill my youngest brother who cried all the time.

The growth in my neck 5 weeks ago a pea is now a full fledged baseball. It's really starting to affect the carotid artery which looks like my fat index finger sticking below it, and I have to drop in daily to make sure the blood flow is ok. They talked about putting in an 'open incision' to allow the tumour to move out, and let the nerves and blood vessels work, but I have a 5 hour chemo and then radiation on Tuesday so they hope that shrinks it by 20 percent in the next week.

After Tuesday it's radiation every day for 7 weeks, and chemo every Tuesday. I have prescriptions out the ying yang, special Aloe cream for Radiation Burns, non alcoholic mouthwash (according to my doc using Scope 5 times a day (sometimes more for me) is the same in cancer terms as having 5 drinks per day, and they think this is causing oral cancer...NICE. I got 200 percocets, just take them as you wish. Heck when you were well and broke 3 toes getting an asprin out them was like a major deal, get cancer and if you want take morphine home and shoot up, kid you not.

So I'm down 40 pounds, bought an AKAI EWI4000s which I'm learning to play. Like learning anything the fingering has been slow, I make mistakes and figure them out when sleeping. Sounds good through the Ketron...

I'm up early I have a great huge filet mignon about 5 pounds. There was a lot of fat, and if you know yer butchering it the roast has 3 muscles, with silver and some fat between them. I took it apart and cut off the silver and fat, put it back together with rosemary, peppercorns, bay leaves, herb de province, and flaked Austrian sea-salt, and olive oil, trussed it with butcher's twine, with the fat on the top to drip on it, and plan to sear it with a mustard crust and then slow roast it. Mother's Day, probably her last, she's 83.

So this is the week, and I hoped for some nice weather but it's +1C and it was so windy trees were falling for the last 3 days. I could use with some nice summer like days.

That's about it, I'm crossing my fingers this didn't spread to my bones, I do have a very bad case of osteoporosis and it' possible some cramping lead to cracks in bones, it's happened before.

DON: now I've have to dig around, coffee thickened with boost is OK but #2 Amber maple syrup, about a teaspoon in your coffee makes it really really good. My bottle is just about out, I might have to drive somewhere and get some more, producers often sell the #2 dark or amber to high end restaurants, it's got a LOT of flavour.
Hope you are still getting treated like a king....a little pampering is a good thing.

I just got 5 Nevil Shute books, read them as a kid, and Amazon is so efficient. I might get a kindle so I can read, I don't have the energy to cut the grass, but I am frigging around on the keyboard still.

Take Care......

Hi John,Only just come on to the PG site and seen your medical problems I wish you well and hope everything turns out ok Cheers Frankie

good to see you, you crazy canuckastani! you had me worried. yes, i'm still getting the royal treatment. i love the facijity and the staff and the food is great albeit pureed.
keep smiling john, i love you.

Goodness, John, that's an incredibly fast-growing tumor. All the best toward getting it under control.

In the midst of it all, you got an Akai wind controller? Congratulations! Are you using the brass or the woodwind fingering?

As has been said by many, you certainly haven't lost your sense of humor (humour?). That is helping you, no doubt.

I never dreamed a quick question about how you were doing would turn into the forum's longest current thread (along with a similar thread about Don). It's a tribute to you, John.

Best Wishes,

Matt

Glad you resurfaced, John . . . I'll admit to being a little concerned.
Had a chuckle thinking about Port Huron's loss - still LOL at your spur of the moment thought.

Coffee, boost and maple syrup - hmmm - the Conley Breakfast Cocktail - thinking of Lightfoot's song
"I'm on my second cup of coffee, boost and maple syrup,
And I still can't face the dawn." (apologies to Gord)

Do ya think Timmy's might be interested in this concoction, John??????

That steak sounds pretty good too.
Enjoy the day - heading for freezing tonight up here in Out-a-way.
Ah well not cold enough for the brass monkeys to worry.

Best - Ian

Yeah, forecast is for below freezing here tonight too.
Just put the flowers in Friday, it figgers..

That is a drag, Bob. Ah yes - life is what happens while you're making other plans.

Any way to protect them?

Ian

i think they're feeding me filet mignon but once pureed its just hamburger anyway. btw, is there any ham in hamburger?

Ian, I gave the wife a coffee with 1 percent like usual and snuck in the maple surple. Her first words were I hate sugar in coffee but this is outstanding, sell it to Tim Hortons. As both are Canadian I doubt I can claim credit.

Hey I just did Pussy willows cat tails, should send you the file, no melody in it though...all RealInstruments the guitar and fiddle make a great sound. Gordo would like it.

Will do tomorrow. Admit to watching the Canucks with a few minutes remaining, My Mom was here for supper, it was good. Lots of left overs. Wish I had some wild garlic, I bet that's good for the cancer, but finding outside the otter wah valley is tough.

2 minutes left in the hockey game.

Hey Don, you are gonna like the next 2 or 3 songs....I've one for you done special...

That story JC, my friend is a riot! You've certainly know how to improvise! Very creative.

Best,

Re: J. Conley - Latest Treatments, EWI, and Food,

Sounds like a lot of hard work ahead with all of the treatments, and as I understand it is not so easy to keep your strength up.
Do the doctors recommend getting some Sun, in order to get a good blast of vitamin D (or take pills) ? Of all the vitamins, D has turned out to be the only one that's truly hugely beneficial. Research going back more than 10 yrs has all been very positive, whereas new research has sown doubts about many of the other vitamins that were at some earlier time highly recommended.

I'm even more convinced than ever that the EWI-4000s was the best choice for you even apart from not having to have a computer around. I've finally tweaked the sensitivity knobs and got the dynamic range optimized, so the sm Baritone Sax now sounds really good -much better than with the EWI-USB.

The samplemodeling software is much cheaper at this point than when I bought it -especially the all combo deal, due to the relative pricing of the Euro vs the Dollar, so if you're considering buying any check the prices.

I bought a number of Hal Leonard Play along music and the best one is Gerry Mulligan (vol #43). He composed all the songs and he plays them. What could be more fun than playing with Gerry Mulligan (assuming you like his music, of course)? The other play a-longs are mostly ok (I don't care for a lot of the soloists stylings), but the Gerry Mulligan volume is in a league of his own.

I'm glad to hear you're a good cook and your ability to enjoy food has not been been compromised.

Please keep us updated.

Wishing you a speedy recovery,

We continue to pray, John.

John

John C,

With all of the certified radiation that you got you can now truly claim to be one helluva HOT MUSICIAN!

I'm da bomb!

Another round of radiation today.

Then I played the piano in the atrium, was turning the pages and decided against Miss Otis regrets...lol, and did variations on Summertime, uptempo.

Along with But Not for me uptempo, and a few other songs I sometimes do slow but figured should be jazzed up to make them less morose.

Anyone have ideas on playing to an audience where about 25 percent from the look of them won't make it? That's a tough one...

Upbeat, easy to understand melodies...how about the Young Man on the Flying Trapeze???

john, the radioactive you hasn't scorched his sense of humo(u)r. been lookin for a great hospital story but lost it somewhere. will keep at it as its written in canadian so even you will understand it.

i love you jc.

Hi John,

I have found it difficult to respond to this post as my Father had very similar problems so it brings back painful memories.
He was cured of his cancer but he was too frail to overcome the cure itself.
I find your bravery staggering.
Your humour is a rock you stand on and long may it continue.
Positive thinking will get you there.
I wish you well John.
All the best
George

Well most people thought I was out of shape. I always kept, throughout the extra 40 t0 50 pounds the core body strength my 6 foot frame should have had it was just padded. Now you see that again, so as osteoporosis dictated some tanning and I still through a dumbell through 10 to 15 minutes of workout a day I'm getting things like a strong young man like you should do fine on this, it's going to get very rough. OK.

Turn that back on the nurses and that starts the thing about my calling her out on the 16 year old daughter she must have adopted, was she that nurse in playboy I saw a month ago...yada yada....

Jeez I'm half bald, look like some guy from a British Tv show on the buses and my best asset is the wit. Funny cause I ordered that from a mail in course, 20 lessons on how to be a wit and the last half got lost during the mail strike of 82. (Ponder that a tad).

I wrote out the end game for the wife, a 20 minute masonic funeral with family, and my core friends after cremation. Paul the funeral director friend of mine sat with me and is giving me the 200 people chapel for free for that, and told me everyone won't fit. He claims I'm too modest. I have then 5 or 6 weeks to sit in the urn and then there's a party. I've done the video, music and me, music and everyone. Stories, photos, powerpoint. Redesigned a coaster my wife made for me, plasticized photos saying , "Have a drink on John.."

No regrets, except there should always be more music. A lot more.

And fun, if you don't have some fun, what's it about?

And mentoring..mostly my kids.

Stay thirsty my friends...

I just got back from vacation and I’m catching up on the forums.

John, you are in my prayers.

PS – DO NOT take a turn for the nurse

Man oh man. So many good thoughts, John. DON'T GO ANYWHERE for awhile, mmkay?

Have You Ever Danced?

An old prospector shuffled into the town of El Indio, Texas leading an old tired mule.. The old man headed straight for the only saloon in town, to clear his parched throat. He walked up to the saloon and tied his old mule to the hitch rail. As he stood there, brushing some of the dust from his face and clothes, a young gunslinger stepped out of the saloon with a gun in one hand and a bottle of whiskey in the other..
The young gunslinger looked at the old man and laughed, saying, "Hey old man, have you ever danced?" The old man looked up at the gunslinger and said, "No, I never did dance... Never really wanted to.."
A crowd had gathered as the gunslinger grinned and said, "Well, you old fool, you're gonna' dance now," and started shooting at the old man's feet. The old prospector, not wanting to get a toe blown off, started hopping around like a flea on a hot skillet. Everybody was laughing, fit to be tied.
When his last bullet had been fired, the young gunslinger, still laughing, holstered his gun and turned around to go back into the saloon. The old man turned to his pack mule, pulled out a double-barreled shotgun, and cocked both hammers. The loud clicks carried clearly through the desert air.
The crowd stopped laughing immediately. The young gunslinger heard the sounds too, and he turned around very slowly. The silence was almost deafening. The crowd watched as the young gunman stared at the old timer and the large gaping holes of those twin barrels.
The barrels of the shotgun never wavered in the old man's hands, as he quietly said, "Son, have you ever kissed a mule's ass?"
The gunslinger swallowed hard and said, "No sir...... But... I've always wanted to."

There are a few lessons for us all here:
Never be arrogant....
Don't waste ammunition.....
Whiskey makes you think you're smarter than you are.....
Always, always make sure you know who has the power......
Don't mess with old men, they didn't get old by being stupid. You can take that to the bank.....

Don, if it was the season you'd have to duck, that quacked me up.

Reminds me of the old bull and the young bull on the hill and the young bull proposes they run down and get a heifer each. At which the old bull said, 'son you we should just wander down slow and git us more than one, no use chasing what you can get anyways."

john, lemme try this one without my sheet music...

seems a cantankerous canuck horn player, ex-fire fighter was in hospital (note the brit absence of the article 'the') and driving all the attractive young nurses crazy with his tactile method of communication. well, the old head nurse decided to teach the old flatulent a lesson so she entered his room and said: "john, (any resemblance to persons, past or present, is purely coincidental) i need to take your temperature rectally. now, don't remove this thermometer until i get back and she left the room and his posterior fully exposed to foot traffic in the hallway. he noticed that everyone going by would burst into uproarious laughter as they passed his room and that the old nurse was very slow to return. finally, after several hours of enduring the laughter and humiliation, the head nurse returned and presented john with the 'thermometer', a beautiful crimson rose.

Gee Don, nothing that good ever came outta me except for the thorn part.

I'm going to move this 'blog' / light hearted banter to the next phase by starting it as C.

Keeps there from being less than 100 posts in the way. I'm going to try and twist my experiences with Band in a Box into it as a retrospective and homage to something that has taught me a lot in humanity, musicality, international relations, and in general goodness. Of course the usual dose of humility, or lack thereof should also creep into the tone. The fact that in my mind PG music represents a personal but a national standard (for the most part) and that there remains a place for each of us to take inspiration from the best practices of others, while embracing those things we hold as ideals in our own personal circle of influence.

Now that's a challenge. Part Deux,