1:25pm. Ah, another crowded day inside the Radiation Therapy waiting room. Standing room only. They guy that complained about & dropped his coffee is here, as well as the other older couple with the guy who also has a laryngectony like Dad. Both of these couples are cut from the same cloth, and I'm thinking my parents are in that group as well. There's an older lady sitting next to me, talking to another woman about divorce papers - I think it's about her daughter. There are not many secrets here - the room is too small, and most of the people here are old enough that their hearing is probably going, causing elevated voice levels. There's been a younger woman here that must have an appointment before Dad's since she's always here with the rest of us.. She gets called in to get changed - few people do, must be specific to the location of the tumor(s). She stands out from the others because of her age - she's definitely below the mean average of the room. Mom is doing her plastic needlepoint craft work that she takes everywhere (and I do mean everywhere), making some Cub players. Yech. There's an electrical equipment closet, just inside the entrance of the reception area. Whenever some gets their radiation exposure, you can here a very loud buzz come from the closet. It makes sitting in here a little odd - you can tell how much radiation the patients are getting, like you can tell who is getting high dosages because of the exposure time. I think that younger lady is in there now, and her exposures are relatively short - 5-10 seconds. I brought this up to my parents about a week ago, and now it's always on our minds as we sit here. Somebody get's an exposure of just under 60 seconds. To me, being just a Joe Schmoe, I equate length of exposure to severity of the tumor(s). Well, Dad's getting called in, so it's time for me to walk back to the Parking Garage to get the car to drive around the buildings to pick them up when he's done...

But my day isn't over - my Mom wants to go to the cemetery (St. Adalberts). Seems that as of March 1st, the wreaths that may be on the graves must be cleared off, so she wants to pick up the stuff she brought out there who knows when over the winter. So we drive all the way up there and wind our way through the cemetery - only to find out that one of the sections have been cleaned out of decorations. We go to another site where she picks up the wreaths at her parents graves - then proceeds to steal two more to make up for what she lost on the other graves! Needless to say, it was a long ride home...