after the phone conversation tonight,
i think i'm going to nickname him timex, because of all the things that
has happened to him in the past and present.  

at age 75, he was dx'ed with pca, T2c and did radiation treatments.  he
is going in next week for his psa test but so far he said they are fine.
he is now 80.  he did say that he passed blood in his urine for about
three weeks because of the radiation, but they gave him something for it
and he stopped bleeding.

here's the rest of the timex story.  in talking with him, i found out
that he was hit by a SUV while he was on his tractor.  the SUV slid for
126 feet before hitting the tractor and it totalled the full size
tractor.  his face and skull was all crushed in and he had to be life
flighted to the hospital.  he tells me that he has 3 plates of metal in
his jaw, a plate of metal where his cheek was all crushed in  and his
eye is sitting in a metal socket,  (didn't lose the sight of the eye)
his scalp was stapled on by 40 staples and he says that he is not in any
pain from the treatments.  his only complaint is that he doesn't
remember things to do as easy as he did before the accident.  he doesn't
appear to have any trouble remembering anything in the past at all.

he's had a total hip replacement, and is going in for a total knee
replacement in a couple of months.  he lives on his farm still with his
wife, who also has health problems and in her 80's, but they are still
independent living.  

he still smokes his pipe and  he never says anything about his health
unless you ask.  definitely a timex.

~ curtis

knowledge is power - growing old is mandatory - growing wise is optional