I see it has been ten days since I wrote--I'm sorry. I guess no news is good news--we have been plodding along, really, going to daily radiation and various other appointments, and the days have disappeared. Manford is tolerating the radiation well--tired, but not as bad as I had expected, and he only has two days left, Monday and Tuesday next week. Then he has a month break, and starts five days of chemotherapy per month for six months--but that is still oral medication, and he hasn't seemed bothered at all by the dose he's been on during the radiation. That dose will be higher, but we are hopeful it won't be too hard on him. We have to wait three months to know the effects of the radiation and chemo, since the radiation can produce ambiguous findings on an MRI if the MRI is done too soon after treatment.

So, Emily had a good time at camp, and we survived her absence and enjoyed the week of not going back and forth to school. This week she had "swimming sports day," which seems to be a New Zealand tradition where the whole school (or part of it, years 5 and up) goes to a pool and swims races all day; they are divided into houses (yes, like Hogwarts, but the sorting hat is probably computerized), and they compete against each other. Emily is in York (they are all named after British cathedrals). Her house colour is black (inconveniently on hot sunny days, as they wear their house colour shirts for sport, which is PE). If I can find the cable to put my photos on the computer sometime soon, I'll put up a picture from the day.

Joseph and I had an American lapse; we got a phone call to say that a computer game he had ordered was available at EBgames, so I thought "oh, good, we'll just go after dinner and pick it up." We got to the mall and got a really good parking spot (this should have been a clue) and were into the mall before we encountered barriers and darkened mall...having forgotten that most shopping centres close at 6, except for the movie theatres. Somehow they don't have the need to shop all the time here, and we've generally gotten along without it...Oh well. He had to wait a day to fight Napoleon's battles for him (he is trying to convince me that this is educational).

Emily has the school rats (Rattie and Smoky) this weekend, and she is enthralled; fortunately, they are very patient rats and seem relatively unflappable and not interested in escape. I hope I have not spoken too soon. They are staying in the garage, where we have found a use for the ping-pong table, after all...Emily and her friend were making an obstacle course for them. She insists they will not jump off the table. Charlie is wondering what that intriguing smell is...

It is starting to feel like Fall, with cool nights and sunny days, actually hoping for a bit of rain. We are still picking strawberries from the plants that are trying to take over one of our raised beds, and I am battling a rhubarb plant that is dominating the other one. We got a juicer, and have been making nice healthy, tastier-than-they-sound drinks like carrot-celery-beet juice, and I am trying to find a use for rhubarb juice. It is a bit tart...

Manford is worrying that the girls are going to drive the rats to distraction, and I do hear screams, so maybe I'd better check this out...
Carrie