Beautiful morning on Lake Georgetown and my last Doctor Day at the clinic

Even though I had to get up at 4:30, it was worth it to see the sunrise over Lake Georgetown from my boat.  I was on the water by 6 am, sunrise was around 6:40.  What a peaceful time of day.  I didn't see much in the way of shorebirds, other than a half dozen Great Blue Herons flying by before dawn and a couple of Cormorants as I left.  No Great Egrets, no Spotted Sandpipers or Killdeer.  Even though I didn't hear any Painted Buntings, I spotted one on the shore up river, drinking from the perfectly calm water with golden early morning light on him and a really good reflection.  I'm hopeful some of those shots will turn out.  On my way back to the dock, I did encounter a large number of Purple Martins hanging out on the dead stickups.  I had seen this a couple of years before.  I don't know if some of them roost there or not.  We have a very large colony of them that come in to roost a couple of miles from my home in the trees in a mall parking lot.  I need to get over there to catch them coming in at sunset before they are gone.  I was off the water and packed up by 9 am to make sure I got home in time to get ready for my next treatment.

I got to the clinic a little early because there is a questionnaire that you need to fill out each week about side effects and any questions you may have for the radiation oncologist during the post-treatment meeting.  The radiation session went as usual and I got to see the Doctor right away.  He was very please with my last 5 treatments and I got another Green Check Mark.  Woohoo!  I asked him about how soon the side effects of the radiation and particularly, the Lupron injection, would subside.  The radiation takes about a day of recuperation for every day of treatment.  I've had 45 treatments, with weekend off during the 9 weeks, so I already have about 20 recuperation days racked up.  This means that in 2 weeks to 2 months the problems that the radiation caused should be gone.  I got the Lupron shot in late April and it shuts off the testosterone for 6 months, so in late October or early November, my body should start producing it again.  He said some guys get back to close to normal in a couple of months, others take longer.  There are medications and other procedures for any of what I call the 3 "I"s, incontinence, impotence and the need for Immodium.  I'm hopeful the new normal will be close to the way I was before all of this.  And the Doctor did like the picture of the day and I reminded him he had been short-changed, the staff will get 45 of them and he only sees 9 of them, one for each Doctor Day.  More on that next week when I surprise the staff on the last day.

The picture for the day is of a Black-chinned Hummingbird at the South Mueller Greenway near the old Austin airport, in the neighborhood that I lived in for 23 years.  I took this picture on Tuesday after my appointment, since it is only 5 minutes away from the clinic.  I spend 20 minutes or so there after some of my appointments in the hopes of getting shots like this one.