Mmmmm... hair....

The new family activity is rubbing Peg's head. Enjoyable for the "rubber" (ooooh, it's soooo soft!) and for the "rubbee" (mmmmmmmmmmm).

Today we took Zoë and her friend Jessica to the midtown Sacramento skating rink. For those of you from out of the area, it does not get cold enough for water to freeze here; the city closed off a street and allowed a company to create a rink there. Yep, they even have a Zamboni, though it was a little overkill for such a small area.

Getting more distance from "Cancerland." Peg's getting her port flushed on Tuesday, and we see her oncologist in mid-March. This is precisely where we like to see the "Big C": in the rear-view mirror, getting smaller and smaller.

Our own personal Chia Pet

It's official... Peg's sprouting soft, downy hairs from her sweet, sweet head. Got a few long survivors from the summer's hairy ordeal (yeah right, Pun Boy), but this week her 1/8" mane has gotten noticeably longer.

We've heard that post-chemo hair grows in differently than pre-chemo. I'm picturing Peg three years from now with a caucasian "Angela Davis" style ginormous white afro. Riding a tiger. Wearing a leopard skin bikini. I'll do a painting on black velvet of the whole effect... how could I not?

Peg's got a big ol' mole on the side of her head, about half inch around, that our family doc is burning off tomorrow. Totally foils my plan of drawing spider legs around it with a Sharpie marker. I was thinking Peg could do a social experiment at the grocery store by letting me do the spider thing and not wearing a cap... and then catching passersby in the act of staring at it. "Hey, waddayou lookin' at, pal?"

She'd be unlikely to do it, and it's a moot point after tomorrow, but Peg is far more fearless than she was before June 12. It wouldn't surprise me if she actually went for it. Life 2.0.

Harry Potter and a Midnight walk in the fog

This was the first Harry Potter film we hadn't seen in the theater ("The Half-Blood Prince"). Zoë had seen it twice and swore she didn't want to see it again-- too much omitted from the book, and "too much snogging." We were, um, a bit busy this summer, but having seen it I think it's just fine on DVD. I agree with our daughter-- too many dramatic pauses, artsy-fartsy lighting and snogging, not enough adherence to the book.

Speaking of which, Peg and I learned a new Zoë fact-- she's read all the Harry Potter books anywhere from 5 to 9 times, depending on the book. She can connect all the dots from anywhere in the series, referencing every hint and foreshadowing and how it resolved. No wonder the movies bug her. This one left out some key plot lines that are resolved in the last book. Doh!

The fog had rolled in while we were watching the movie, so we took a 12:30am stroll in the pea soup afterward. Really fun and beautiful. Reminded me of when we first moved to Sacramento in 1988 and would drive around in the fog for hours, listening to Patrick O'Hearn (atmospheric electronica) on the cassette player in our '85 Honda Accord.

My favorite part of the walk was coming back to our house. I'd left the Christmas lights on (yes, we have... um... plans... to take them down before next week). There's something magical about soft glows that reveal themselves the closer you get.