I am going through the full IRF4 myeloma study for the umptieth time, but it has been sizzling hot in Florence today, and I confess that I have not felt inspired (to revise my IRF4 draft etc.). Today the heat wave that has been plaguing Florence for way too long reached the level of Red Alert or Stage 3 (again!). Ah yes, it’s HOT. Hot and damp. We are lucky to live in a green area of Florence, but even so we are not happy campers. My cats are even less happy, even though Peekaboo looks quite perky in this photo that I took of her yesterday.

Well, life goes on…in spite of the heat.

Yesterday afternoon I went to a downtown clinic to have an MRI of my spine. Unlike last time (2005), though, I didn’t fall asleep only to be startled awake at a certain point by a rather loud snort…well, ok, by my very own loud snort, hehe! I mean, REALLY, Margaret…snoring inside the MRI machine…!

No, this time I was slid inside a different machine. Unlike the 2005 MRI machine that was open at the sides, this was a closed machine that looked like a slender and long space capsule (I have read that the results from an open MRI are less accurate, by the way).

I didn’t mind the fact that it was closed. What I did mind was the tremendous NOISE: it was like being right on the stage of a very loud punk rock/heavy metal concert…not my favourite kind of music, either…boomboomboom! I wore ear mufflers provided by the very considerate MRI technician who also put a cushion under my legs so I would be more comfortable. But even with the mufflers, the noise was deafening.

When the noise began, I thought I might have to keep calm by doing some deep abdominal breathing but, as it turned out, I was quite relaxed through the entire procedure, which took about 40 minutes. To distract myself from being bored to bits, from the noise and also from the heat that I started feeling under my back (heat generated by the machine, not the weather this time…), I visited a few of the “happy places” in my mind. In other words, I meditated.

At the top of my “happy place” list is definitely Farne Island, Northumberland, UK. That’s where Stefano and I went last April mainly to see the puffins (see my blog header photo of a puffin; I took that photo, btw). That is where I experienced something that I can only attempt to portray as pure happiness…standing in the middle of the island with puffins whizzing all around and above me. Yes, pure bliss. The feelings I experienced on Farne Island were and are beyond description. And ever since then, whenever I meditate and decide to “visit” a happy place in my mind, that happy place is always Farne Island.

Anyway, mainly thanks to the powers of meditation, the MRI was no big deal. As I mentioned, perhaps a bit on the boring side (now, why can’t DVD players be installed inside those things? I wouldn’t have minded watching a bit of the BBC “Pride and Prejudice” series again…or of “Chocolat”…or even listening to some soothing classical music…).

MRI results next week. No worries!

Last year I found a mouth-watering recipe for chocolate mousse on Debra Fioritto Weber’s Guide to French Cuisine website. I have tried this recipe again and again on friends and family members, and “first-timers” have always been completely taken aback when I inform them that the mousse has no added sugar. I repeat, no added sugar. The only sugar in this recipe is contained in the type of chocolate that you use. Therefore, the darker the chocolate, the better. And by omitting sugar, you can enjoy this mousse without worrying about feeding your myeloma or cancer cells. All you need for the recipe is: fresh whipping/heavy cream, good quality dark chocolate, a bit of salt (a bit of salt enhances the flavour of the chocolate) and a teaspoon of liquid vanilla or a liqueur of your choice.

The following will make enough (?) mousse for four people:

1. Heat 1/3 cup of whipping/heavy cream over high(ish) heat until it (almost) boils.

Finely chop 5 oz. (150 grams) of bittersweet or semi-sweet chocolate. I use very dark chocolate to minimize the sugar content.

Now, Debra tells us to pour the hot cream over the chopped chocolate and whisk until the chocolate is completely melted and smooth, and I know this is a common method used by patisserie chefs, but when I am in a hurry I just add the chopped chocolate to the cream heating up on the stove. I haven’t found that it makes a huge difference in terms of taste and consistency. Just make sure that you end up with a smooth and shiny mixture. Important: allow the chocolate cream to cool.

2. Once cooled, add 1/8 of a teaspoon of salt  and also a teaspoon of vanilla extract (or a liqueur of your choice, just to give it a nice aftertaste). I make my own vanilla since it’s not a typical Italian sweet flavouring (not in liquid form, anyway).

3. Beat one cup of whipping/heavy cream (if you want a less solid mousse, use slightly more cream) until stiff peaks form. Add the cooled chocolate mixture slowly and beat on low speed until the mixture forms soft peaks. This will take a few seconds. Don’t overbeat, or the mousse will be too firm.

Pour the mixture into a pretty bowl or whatnot and chill until ready to serve. You can garnish the mousse with shaved chocolate curls, raspberries, mint leaves and so on. I suppose I should have thought of taking a photo of the mousse that I prepared yesterday, but my girlfriends came over to play cards after dinner, and between a laugh and a giggle we managed to polish off most of it. Oops!

Anyway, enjoy! And please send me feedback if you try this recipe. Thanks!

I receive all sorts of daily alerts and newsletters. Frequently I am simply overwhelmed with too much information and don’t have the time, unfortunately, to examine it all. Including, I regret to say, some of my blog readers’ links. Well, I do my best! If only I could teach my cats to use Internet…!

Anyway, yesterday was the birthday of Florence’s patron saint, St. John the Baptist, so I didn’t go to work (in fact, the company was closed on Monday as well, which made this a four-day holiday, hurray). Since Florence is one of the hottest cities in Italy this week (yesterday we had a Stage 3 heat wave alert, and I think we are still in the red zone today…feels like it, at any rate!), I was happy to stay inside under my ceiling fan and do some catching up, reading and writing. So glad I am NOT a tourist in Florence today…

Curcumin, obesity and diabetes. One of the items I read was a Eureka alert (http://tinyurl.com/4qzjre) on curcumin and diabetes. A group of Columbia University Medical Center scientists lead by Dr. Drew Tortoriello, an endocrinologist, discovered that turmeric-treated mice were less susceptible to developing Type 2 diabetes, based on their blood glucose levels, and glucose and insulin tolerance tests. They also discovered that turmeric-fed obese mice showed significantly reduced inflammation in fat tissue and liver compared to controls. They speculate that curcumin, the anti-inflammatory, anti-oxidant ingredient in turmeric, lessens insulin resistance and prevents Type 2 diabetes in these mouse models by dampening the inflammatory response provoked by obesity. I am now curious to read their results, to be published soon in “Endocrinology.”

Very interesting topic. My glucose levels are perfect, but they have always been within the normal range, so I can’t say that I have noticed a huge difference. Yes, a bit lower compared to before, but I doubt there is much statistical significance.

And the link between inflammation and obesity is also interesting: Curcumin administration was also associated with a small but significant decline in body weight and fat content, despite level or higher calorie consumption, suggesting that curcumin beneficially influences body composition.

I am going to try to keep an eye on the work of these scientists because they are exploring novel methods of curcumin administration to increase its absorption, and are also interested in identifying novel anti-inflammatory processes invoked by curcumin and in adapting those processes in the development of more potent curcumin analogues. Yeah!

Drink coffee! Another item of interest to those of us, especially women!, who drink coffee is that apparently we will live longer. Have a look at this HealthDay article: http://tinyurl.com/3kojwq Okay, you may well object that this holds true probably only for healthy folks since all the Spanish study participants were free of heart disease and cancer, but hey, every little bit counts. And besides, I will never tire of repeating this!, caffeine inhibits angiogenesis, an important tumour-feeding process.

Another bit of recent research shows that drinking coffee lowers your risk of developing type 2 diabetes.

Okay, so myeloma may kill me in the end, but these studies indicate that thanks to my coffee and curcumin intake I will die without a trace of diabetes and probably with a healthy heart. Small consolation, perhaps…but after all, chi s’accontenta, gode (I found a not-very-good English translation of that Italian saying: there’s no point in complaining…). Eh!

A myeloma list member (thanks!) sent me this journal, and I almost coughed up a lung laughing, so I thought I would post it. I hope you enjoy it!

…I called my friend Andy Sable, a gastroenterologist, to make an appointment for a colonoscopy. A few days later, in his office, Andy showed me a color diagram of the colon, a lengthy organ that appears to go all over the place, at one point passing briefly through Minneapolis. Then Andy explained the colonoscopy procedure to me in a thorough, reassuring and patient manner. I nodded thoughtfully, but I didn’t really hear anything he said, because my brain was shrieking, quote, ‘HE’S GOING TO STICK A TUBE 17,000 FEET UP YOUR BEHIND!’

I left Andy’s office with some written instructions, and a prescription for a product called ‘MoviPrep,’ which comes in a box large enough to hold a microwave oven. I will discuss MoviPrep in detail later; for now suffice it to say that we must never allow it to fall into the hands of America’s enemies.

I spent the next several days productively sitting around being nervous. Then, on the day before my colonoscopy, I began my preparation. In accordance with my instructions, I didn’t eat any solid food that day; all I had was chicken broth, which is basically water, only with less flavor. Then, in the evening, I took the MoviPrep. You mix two packets of powder

together in a one-liter plastic jug, then you fill it with lukewarm water. (For those unfamiliar with the metric system, a liter is about 32 gallons.) Then you have to drink the whole jug. This takes about an hour, because MoviPrep tastes – and here I am being kind – like a mixture of goat spit and urinal cleanser, with just a hint of lemon.

The instructions for MoviPrep, clearly written by somebody with a great sense of humor, state that after you drink it, ‘a loose watery bowel movement may result.’ This is kind of like saying that after you jump off your roof, you may experience contact with the ground.

MoviPrep is a nuclear laxative. I don’t want to be too graphic, here, but: Have you ever seen a space-shuttle launch? This is pretty much the MoviPrep experience, with you as the shuttle. There are times when you wish the commode had a seat belt. You spend several hours pretty much confined to the bathroom, spurting violently. You eliminate everything. And then, when you figure you must be totally empty, you have to drink another liter of MoviPrep, at which point, as far as I can tell, your bowels travel into the future and start eliminating food that you have not even eaten yet.

After an action-packed evening, I finally got to sleep. The next morning my wife drove me to the clinic. I was very nervous. Not only was I worried about the procedure, but I had been experiencing occasional return bouts of MoviPrep spurtage. I was thinking, ‘What if I spurt on Andy?’ How do you apologize to a friend for something like that? Flowers would not be enough.At the clinic I had to sign many forms acknowledging that I understood and totally agreed with whatever the heck the forms said. Then they led me to a room full of other colonoscopy people, where I went inside a little curtained space and took off my clothes and put on one of those hospital garments designed by sadist perverts, the kind that, when you put it on, makes you feel even more naked than when you are actually naked.

Then a nurse named Eddie put a little needle in a vein in my left hand. Ordinarily I would have fainted, but Eddie was very good, and I was already lying down. Eddie also told me that some people put vodka in their MoviPrep. At first I was ticked off that I hadn’t thought of this, but then I pondered what would happen if you got yourself too tipsy to make it to the bathroom, so you were staggering around in full Fire Hose Mode. You would have no choice but to burn your house.

When everything was ready, Eddie wheeled me into the procedure room, where Andy was waiting with a nurse and an anesthesiologist. I did not see the 17,000-foot tube, but I knew Andy had it hidden around there somewhere. I was seriously nervous at this point. Andy had me roll over on my left side, and the anesthesiologist began hooking something up to the needle in my hand. There was music playing in the room, and I realized that the song was ‘Dancing Queen’ by Abba. I remarked to Andy that, of all the songs that could be playing during this particular procedure, ‘Dancing Queen’ has to be the least appropriate.

‘You want me to turn it up?’ said Andy, from somewhere behind me. ‘Ha ha,’ I said. And then it was time, the moment I had been dreading for more than a decade. If you are squeamish, prepare yourself, because I am going to tell you, in explicit detail, exactly what it was like.

I have no idea. Really. I slept through it. One moment, Abba was shrieking ‘Dancing Queen! Feel the beat from the tambourine …’

…and the next moment, I was back in the other room, waking up in a very mellow mood. Andy was looking down at me and asking me how I felt. I felt excellent. I felt even more excellent when Andy told me that it was all over, and that my colon had passed with flying colors. I have never been prouder of an internal organ.

Dave Barry is a Pulitzer Prize-winning humor columnist for the Miami Herald. The whole story can be read here: http://tinyurl.com/yt8xd8