Wellwellwell, I turned 54 on Saturday, July 18th. 🙂

We didn’t really celebrate my birthday this year because Stefano has been recovering from viral gastroenteritis. So he and I spent most of the day in bed, trying to keep cool under the ceiling fan, watching TV series and eating delicious sweets…mmmmh!!! It was nice and restful…just the two of us, surrounded by our furry family of seven (here are two of them–Pinga and Priscilla. Pinga sleeps under a cover, even in summer, so this photo was not staged, in case you’re wondering 😉 )…

It was actually the smartest thing we could have done: this has been the hottest July on record in Italy in more than a decade. Even Italian cows, I read in the below article, now have air conditioning and/or are getting showers to survive this horrendous heatwave: http://goo.gl/W6HrCJ. Mamma mia!

Anyway…Fifty-four…definitely an important milestone for me. When I was diagnosed with SMM in 2005, I thought I’d be dead within a few years, based on statistics AND on what a few hematologists told me…

But almost ten years have gone by since then (sixteen years, in fact, if you include the six years of my 1999 MGUS diagnosis…), and here I am, still very much alive and kicking…AND celebrating another birthday!!! Yaaay! 😀