A Much Needed Break Before the Cyberknife Treatment

This week, we had a most enjoyable trip to Cedar City and St. George with our good friends, Richard and Mae Pattee.

On Monday, Dick went in for his CAT scan and MRI. Then, we had to wait for a couple of days before he started his Cyberknife.

So, we decided to go to the Utah Shakespearean Festival in Cedar City. We left on Tuesday, August 18th. The first day we were there, we saw "Comedy of Errors" and "Secret Garden." We laughed our heads off at "Comedy of Errors," which is really a fun Shakespearen comedy. In the evening, we saw our ten-year-old neighbor perform as Colin in "Secret Garden." He was really terrific. He has a great voice and played his part well. It was fun to see someone we know in the play.

The next day, we drove to St. George to take in a session at the temple and visit the Visitor's Center. I love the St. George temple. It is so beautiful and white and tastefully decorated inside. It was a great session, but it was full of senior citizens. More power to "all of us." Sorry this picture is on its side. I didn't turn it.

Dick, Evie, Mae and Richard in front of the temple.

Dick and I sit with William Shakespeare.

On Wednesday night, we saw the play "Foxfire," which was a drama about learning from our fathers and our fathers learning from us. It was well done.

Richard Pattee, Dick, and Mae Pattee with William.

We stopped at the Iron Museum in Cedar City before we left to come home. Richard and Mae sat in the old Wells Fargo stagecoach.

We had some great food at Milt's Steak Restaurant, and we dined in the same room as Senator Bob Bennett and his family. Senator Bennett is one of our senators from Utah. That's our claim to fame. He didn't talk to us though.

All good things must come to an end. We came home on Thursday afternoon. On Friday, we drove to Salt Lake for Dick's first Cyberknife treatment. He had to lay on the chair for one and three-quarters hour. His back was really hurting him when he finished. One treatment down and four more to go.

The Cyberknife machine. It has a little pencil-like hole down at the bottom that sends the lazers into his head. It moves all around the head.

This is my favorite picture of him, with his netted mask. I thought maybe his nose might become more pointed, but it didn't. The funny thing was that after the mask was taken off, Dick had a checkered head for about half an hour. It looked pretty funny. I should have gotten a picture of his head, but I didn't.

After the treatment, we had lunch with Kent and Joye Corry, who were celebrating their 40th wedding anniversary in Salt Lake. They live in Cedar City, and we had tried to get in touch with them when we were there. We did connect via cell phones and made arrangements to meet them and have lunch with them. Kent was in the mission field with Dick and then in law school with him. Our association goes back about 47 years. Whew! We're getting old. We truly appreciate our good friends.

By the way, Dick felt fine and was able to drive home.