We are sad to announce that our beloved friend and colleague Joe Murphy left us today to his on going battle with leiomyosarcoma. We loved him very much and will be greatly missed in our lives.

Joe has been moved into hospice care and he will not be with us for much longer. That’s about as straightfoward as I can make a very painful and fucked up situation.

So, I’m at Mike’s and Lorrie’s, vegging out and slowly getting better. The doctors were unable to do much when then performed the surgery, which sucks beyond belief, but makes the recouperating easier.

I can’t believe the outpouring of love and generocity you have given me through all this. You have no idea how much it has meant to me. Thank you.

They removed a large chunk of it to do more tests, and see if it can respond to and be manageable with chemo or radiation, but the results of those won’t be in for a while.

So please keep your thoughts and prayers with Joe and his dad, and we’ll have more updates as soon as they’re available.

Joe’s prepped, and as of 4:20pm, he was heading into pre-op.

This afternoon, Arizona time, Joe goes into surgery, where those with their A-game and their scalpels are going after Kuato.

I wasn’t sure I wanted to do this, but people have been asking how they can help. As with a lot of things, this whole process has had hidden expenses I wasn’t expecting.

I want to thank everyone who has emailed, called, and voicemailed, and sent me words of encouragement and advice. You have no idea what it means to me.

Did the laxative on Wed. Went easier than I thought it would after what people told me. Did the scope on Thursday. Don’t remember a thing. Gooood drugs. Mass didn’t seem to penetrate the colon, but does invade the duodenum. I guess that’s where the stomach meets the small intestine. Screw it, if you’ve never [...]

Just to give everybody a idea of what’s up. I talked to the surgeon this past week, and we decided on a colonoscopy, and based on those results, determine whether to start with surgery, or do chemo first to shrink the mass. I’ll have the colonoscopy on the 21st (these docs are lightning fast, eh?) [...]

I don’t know when the surgery is, not sure if it’ll be here in Tucson, or in Phoenix. Don’t know what stage, not sure how malignant it is.

Thank you all for your kind calls and emails. They mean a lot to me.

I’ll let you all know something as soon as I do. Know something, that is.

There’s good news and bad news about the tumor, so right now I think I’m 50/50 between coming out of this ok, and being fucked.

I’ll keep everybody posted.