The Struggle Has Ended

Greg Hewlett passed away on January 17th after nearly eight years of battling colon cancer. While we grieve his loss, we are comforted to know that he is with his Lord.

If you would like to leave your thoughts on Greg, please see this thread.

If you would like to make a charitable donation in Greg's honor, please see this thread.

Friday, August 31, 2007

Julie published

My sis was published in the San Fransisco Examiner yesterday. Sorry they're taking away your puzzle, Ju. Whatever will you do?

Letters: Aug 30, 2007
Pining for old puzzles page

For a newspaper representing America�s most anti-war city, you sure know how to start a war on your faithful readers. Mr. Know-It-All may know it all, but he will never compare to my daily dose of Will Shortz! Take the Sudokos and Kakuro, but please bring back The New York Times Crossword Puzzle.

Julie Burck
Oakland


Tuesday, August 28, 2007

iPhone Hacker first tried DLP

A teenager named George Hotz made big news this week when he announced that he hacked into his iPhone to get it to work on Sprint network (The iPhone is hard-wired to only work with AT&T). I find it amazing a high school student could pull that off. He ended up trading it to a cell phone repair company for a new car and three new iPhones.

dlpGoesDown.jpgSo what was George's last project? In the spring, he hacked DLP. "DLP Goes Down". It is a lot of fun to read about a guy trying to re-engineer your own team's work. From his blog, it didn't seem like he got far enough to actually drive the DMD differently. Still, admirable work. I'd like to meet the guy.


Chemo update

I finished my first round of chemo and yesterday began my second.

The first round was pretty bad. Better than the last round in November but worse than the typical first round. They used less pre-meds to prepare my body because that is the normal protocol for the first round. The problem, I think, was that I still have toxicity from all the treatments from before. So the chemo hit me like a truck and they had to stop it for an hour and give the pre-meds and let my body recover before giving me the rest. I think the trauma from that affected me the rest of the week.

Yesterday, however, to begin the second round, they gave all the pre-meds, as well as an extra relaxant to make me drowsy throughout it. (Maybe to keep from from complaining?) My body seemed to do pretty well. That seemed to get me off on a better trajectory this week.

I miss everything. People, work, friends, enemies, chores, traffic, church, taste buds, wine, sushi, Fry's.

Sunday, August 26, 2007

Handcrafted in Texas

incisions.jpg CollingsArchtop.jpg

Dr. Wayne Hofstetter double thoracotomy.
MD Anderson, Houston, Texas
Medium: Greg Hewlett
~$50k
(painful)

Bill Collings Archtop Guitar
Austin, Texas
Medium: Maple
~$8k
(not painful)




Peg Leg Blues

pegleg.pngMy YouTube activism has seen a little attention:

Taking it Off the Streets: Activism Goes Online

New Media Activism

You Tube Activism

ACA: "...pulled out all the stops."


Sunday, August 12, 2007

Full throttle ahead, tank on low

Quick update:

After more discussion this week with my oncologist, we've decided to move forward with chemotherapy to attempt to control (shrink!) these two lymph node tumors. The PET scan this week confirmed they were cancerous. They are in the center of my chest near where the windpipe splits into a branch for each lung. Three times we've seen an inoperable situation followed by chemo response that surprised the doctors. We need a fourth.

Chemo begins tomorrow. Christine puts it this way, "the tsunami is coming Monday." Dripping starts at around noon. Please pray that these tumors will respond and that the door will open up for surgical removal. Also for our strength.

Tonight, Christine and I are going out - to celebrate life.

---

On another note - send your Simpson avatars this week to be included in the group shot!

Friday, August 3, 2007

Update and thanks

Christine and I are still making decisions about how to move forward. we're facing tough choices.

As I think back, this is the fourth time since June 2003 that I've been told they could not operate. It is good to think back, because it gives me thanks to the Lord for my miraculous survival. I tend to forget just how dire things looked in the past. The first three times surgery was not an option, chemo was surprisingly successful and opened up a window for the surgery. Earlier this week, I received an email reply from my lung surgeon and he indicated that surgery "is not out of the question", but not an option now. However, I'm still trying to find out just how realistic surgery is and what needs to happen. This time sounds different. This pulmonary lymph node involvement is more serious than nodules in the lungs.

For those of you praying, I want to thank you for your continued faithfulness. And we have been encouraged by all your comments and emails. It is clear to me that "we haven't given up on you".


Do you know this couple?

Simpson_Hewletts2.jpg

You can Simpson me, too (here's another way to create your character). If you do, email the image to me and I'll post those I get by Aug 15 in a Greg's Place gang shot. Send the full body shot of your character, not just the head-and-shoulder view.

(Is there a photoshop-adept volunteer who can put together the group picture with all the resulting images?)