Student Visionary of the Year


Floyd's Student Visionary of the Year Campaign benefitting the Leukemia & Lymphoma Society has come to a close. His team, "Cancer's Collapse," took first place in the Golden Gate chapter. Thank you to everyone who contributed. You can read about the gala and more in this blog post.


Strike another MATCH and start anew...

Blogging Tunes: soma.fm - Groove Salad

This has been an incredible week.  Not only am I feeling better than I've felt in months (in my body and mind, I know that we've achieved a remission -- we'll know for sure next week), but some pretty phenomenal things have happened.

First of all, between the San Mateo and San Francisco offices, the salesforce.com Be The Match donor drive signed up almost 400 people in the last two days!  You can see the official blog posting here.  We're hoping the story gets picked up by AP, etc.  If it does, I'll post more links.  Want to get into the registry so you can help someone in need, just go to marrow.org -- it's simple!

Next, I've been able to lead a reasonably normal life for the past week or so.  I'm eating like crazy, and my taste buds are almost back to normal.  Maybe I'll even like pizza again (eh, Tripper?)  Still, I've only gained about 3 pounds.  Heather bought me this weight-gain protein shake powder, but all I can think of is Cartman.  "MOM!  CAN YOU GET ME SOME WEIGHT GAIN 4000?"


I've been spending lots of time with the kids -- we even had a little sing-along last night, working from home a few hours a day (which feels great!) and am even getting a chance to walk around the neighborhood everyday.  Here's a pic from my walk on Wednesday.  Sorry it's a little washed out.


But that's all small stuff compared to the big news that I got from UCSF this week.  Don't hate me, but I actually knew this on Tuesday afternoon -- I just didn't want to draw any attention away from the Bone Marrow Drive.  Drum roll please....

In addition to my counts still being way up (which means I can do fun stuff like go out to restaurants) the donor database search returned a TON of results!  There are literally SCORES of matches for me, including several 10-out-of-10 high-resolution scan matches.  This means that UCSF can dig into the absolute best matches and find the absolute best for me.  

Obviously, this is the best news possible, and believe me, it was hard to keep under the proverbial hat for two days.  What this means, based on my understanding, is that we could potentially start the BMT as early as 3 weeks from now; more likely six.  If it's six week, it's likely I'll need a little more chemo before we start.  That kinda sucks, but hey, if that's what we need to do to ensure the highest success rate of the BMT, so be it.

A quick aside, before I sign off.  As my good friend Rob from Philly will continually remind me from now until the cows come home, when the iPad first came out, I thought it was cool, but far from a necessity.  I stand (sit) corrected.  I can't live without the friggin thing now.  Not for the games like Osmos, but for the utilities!  With the Hi-res Slingbox app, you basically now have a portable TV!  With the Mocha VNC app, you now have a way to control a headless PC driving an HDTV.  Streaming movies, anyone?  With the Kindle app, now Heather and I can both read in bed with a single Kindle account.  And Floyd absolutely loves the thing.  It's amazing what we can get him to do so that he gets "15 minutes of iPad time" after dinner.  :)

OK, so that's the news!  Rejoice all!  Now onto more important matters... big game this weekend.  Let's go Birds.  Tripper, B, Free, Raff, et al.... psyched to see you Sunday!!


I will kick its ass,

-jg

Comments

  1. John, I'm one of your distant colleagues in Dublin, Ireland. We've been hearing all about you through Kirsten. I've been reading some of your blog posts and really just wanted to wish you well and congratulate you on your latest news, and in general for your fighting spirit and positivity. Thinking of you as you battle through this! Best wishes from salesforce.com in Dublin, Ireland.

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  2. Congrats on the good news John! I really hope all goes well with the BMT process. Now that I've joined the Marrow donor list, hopefully I'll be able to help someone in need in the future!

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  3. what wonderful news! Glad you held off this news though, good to have another few hundred people in the registry!

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  4. That's fantastic, John. What amazing news! Here's to beginning the BMT in 3 weeks!

    I can't believe you held that back, but it was the right thing to do. Great job, again.

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  5. Best news ever! Happy Friday, John!

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  6. !!!!!!!

    In order to keep your blog rated G, I will not post the litany of very, VERY gleeful/joyous/happy/exuberant expletives I emitted upon reading this. Suffice it to say that I am grinning for ear to ear and psyched beyond belief.

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  7. Hi John, I'm a SFDC employee and I love reading your blog. You are a huge inspiration to me. I am SO incredibly happy that you found a match. I gave my sample yesterday and I'm really hoping that I'm be a match for someone. Wishing you strength during your procedure and a fast recovery!

    Best,

    Tammy Edlin

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  8. OK, however happy I looked when you surprised me at our door last week, I am about 100x happier. This is just wonderful, amazing news. XXOOXXOO

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  9. This is such great news! Congrats, congrats, congrats. :)

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  10. SOOOOO thrilled for you - this is such great news!

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  11. Incredible news!
    Your blog inspire us John.. :)

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  12. It was great to see you up and about the office, John, not to mention to get this piece of news live!
    Guido

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  13. Speechless. I'm just super super happy right now.I admired you and Heather so so much and I pray that everything will go well with BMT.

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  14. FANTASTIC!!!!! So very, very cool about the matches results. That's 'UGE!!

    Very cool of Salesforce to do the drive.

    It's so great that you're feeling so much better. Keep stuffing your face!!

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  15. Best news ever! Unbelievably wonderful!! KIA!

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  16. Unbelieveable! Awesome! Incredible! Amazing!

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  17. soo awesome!! who's this rob guy? :)) keep it up!! xox

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  18. Fantastic news, John! Thanks for inspiring another 400 bone marrow donors at SFDC this week, ensuring many others will also be able to KIA!

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  19. I hope you are doing better my friend. I remember when we got that cabin in Tahoe like 10 years ago and gave my friend the nickname of "Beefcake! BEEFCAKE!!!!" - I can have him bring you some of the Beefcake he consumes. :) You're in my thoughts and prayers. GO EAGLES today too against Green Bay!!! Best, KV

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  20. Great news John, I was hoping there would be some matches. Just saw Vick throw a TD, why couldn't he do more of that last week against Minnesota (I lost my championship game because of that subpar performance). Anyway looking forward to when we can go to Korean BBQ again, it's been a while! Glad you are feeling good!

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  21. Amazing news John! You are officially now the most ass kicking-est friend I've ever had!! I can't imagine how great it must feel to be back with the fam ;). -mg

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  22. Hi John,

    Haven't had the opportunity to meet you at SFDC since I'm part of the AE army, but fully inspired by your blog and stoked to hear the positive news. A few of us are doing the Lavaman triathlon for Team-in-Training and I hope in a small way the dough we're raising will help guys like you. Keep up the good fight! Sorry about the Iggles though

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  23. Great news John. Ass-kicking news, I would say!

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  24. Hi John, I am also an sfdc employee and sooo happy to hear the wonderful news. It is also great to hear the drive was a huge success (I had registered in a separate occasion before - I heard Asians tend to have lower match rates). You are in my thoughts and everyone's at sfdc, and we are sending lots and lots of good thoughts your way.

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  25. congrats John... I love what I'm hearing. :D

    -Laurence C

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  26. Amazing. I'm so happy for all of your good news. You are kicking its ass.
    Hugs,
    Mary

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  27. Great news John! Can't tell you how happy this makes me!

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  28. Amazing news and an inspirational way to start off a new year. Hope you are enjoying the time with your family!! - Chuckie

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  29. AWESOME, dude! This is great news... about your iPad enlightenment, that is. I'm glad you've come over to the i-side. I have been astounded at how fun AND useful the thing is on an hourly basis.

    The bone marrow thing is good too.

    ;-)

    Unbelievably glad to hear of the progress... keep posting for us! And how about some MP3s of the new piano?!?

    Big love,

    Matty Nabib

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  30. From a distant colleague from Sydney, Australia: Great news and keep your eyes on the prize! It's great to see everyone rally around for support.

    Oh, and Go Packers! (Sorry, I had to...)

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  31. Hey John, this is terrific news! I'm so happy for you and am looking forward to seeing you next time I am out there as a totally healthy guy!

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