The Last Gasp

One thing that the unexpected victory of Donald Trump in the 2016 presidential election has undoubtedly done is to remove the collective beer goggles from the American public. What was a blurry-edged image of where we are as a nation is now in perfect focus. But what does it show us?

We are looking at the irresistible force of our country’s changing population meeting the immovable object of our historical white privileged class.

The demographic march continues to erode the old norms. As the huge baby-boomer cohort of our population proceeds past the retirement home and approaches the graveyard, our country is becoming younger, browner, blacker and yellower. The historic majority of white America is on the verge of becoming a minority. To say that the older, white, conservative folks are unhappy about this would be the understatement of a lifetime.

The clear product of this situation is the commitment of the American right to do anything – anything – to perpetuate the status quo for one more election cycle. From flat-out illegal voting eligibility laws to direct appeals to foreign governments, we have seen an unprecedented effort to subvert the will of the majority of Americans. In winning the popular vote by almost three million votes, the young and our citizens of color voted overwhelmingly for Ms. Clinton, or at least definitively against Mr. Trump. The total number of voters who decided the key rust belt states’ outcomes would fit in a football stadium. The most astonishing statistic coming out of the results of the election is that 53% of white women voted for Mr. Trump. I think this is less an indication that a majority of white women want to be grabbed by the pussy as a deep-seated and mostly unearned hatred of Ms. Clinton. Who would have thought that we could overcome our nation’s legacy of racism and elect (twice) a black man as president but be helplessly unable to overcome our sexism and elect a woman, no matter how experienced and qualified?

I will not recite the litany of reasons why Mr. Trump is unqualified for the office of dogcatcher, much less president, nor will I list the absolutely unprecedented number of blatant lies and petty attacks he has spewed. That’s been done by a thousand outraged writers already, and likely in finer fashion than I could. So why Trump, and why now?

The aging white power brokers in this country are not stupid. They see the demographic tidal wave that is preparing to break on our shores over the next decade. They view this period as their last chance to change the rules of the game.  Make no mistake, the forces of demagoguery and, yes, fascism, are taking over our government in just a few short weeks. The only way they stay in power after this insane  - and likely unfair – election is to suspend the constitutional rights of citizens, crush opposition under the banner of “law and order,” limit the freedom of the press, and expand the already ubiquitous surveillance state. This is terrifying.

So we are about to hear a “last gasp.” The only question is, will it be the sound of the old guard submitting to the new realities of the new majority and all that entails: expanded individual civil rights, continued progress toward universal health care, movement towards renewable energy, and a less belligerent stance on law enforcement and foreign affairs? Or will the last gasp be the final death throe of our beloved democratic constitutional republic? We’ll find out soon enough, and I believe it will be one or the other.

In this sad case, there is literally no middle.

Portland, OR 

December 15, 2016

Dylan Wins the 2016 Nobel Prize for Literature

And it's for writing poetic lyrics like these, from the 1966 album Blonde on Blonde. It's nearly impossible for me to pick a favorite Dylan lyric, but this just might be it!

 "Visions of Johanna"

Ain't it just like the night to play tricks when you're tryin' to be so quiet ?
We sit here stranded, though we're all doing our best to deny it
And Louise holds a handful of rain, tempting you to defy it
Lights flicker from the opposite loft
In this room the heat pipes just cough
The country music station plays soft
But there's nothing really nothing to turn off
Just Louise and her lover so entwined
And these visions of Johanna that conquer my mind.

In the empty lot where the ladies play blindman's bluff with the key chain
And the all-night girls they whisper of escapades out on the D-train
We can hear the night watchman click his flashlight
Ask himself if it's him or them that's really insane
Louise she's all right she's just near
She's delicate and seems like the mirror
But she just makes it all too concise and too clear
That Johanna's not here
The ghost electricity howls in the bones of her face
Where these visions of Johanna have now taken my place.

Now, little boy lost, he takes himself so seriously
He brags of his misery, he likes to live dangerously
And when bringing her name up
He speaks of a farewell kiss to me
He's sure got a lotta gall to be so useless and all
Muttering small talk at the wall while I'm in the hall
Oh, how can I explain ?
It's so hard to get on
And these visions of Johanna they kept me up past the dawn.

Inside the museums, Infinity goes up on trial
Voices echo this is what salvation must be like after a while
But Mona Lisa musta had the highway blues
You can tell by the way she smiles
See the primitive wallflower frieze
When the jelly-faced women all sneeze
Hear the one with the mustache say, "Jeeze
I can't find my knees."
Oh, jewels and binoculars hang from the head of the mule
But these visions of Johanna, they make it all seem so cruel.

The peddler now speaks to the countess who's pretending to care for him
Saying, "Name me someone that's not a parasite and I'll go out and say a prayer for him."
But like Louise always says
"Ya can't look at much, can ya man."

As she, herself prepares for him
And Madonna, she still has not showed
We see this empty cage now corrode
Where her cape of the stage once had flowed
The fiddler, he now steps to the road
He writes everything's been returned which was owed
On the back of the fish truck that loads
While my conscience explodes
The harmonicas play, the skeleton keys of the rain
And these visions of Johanna are now all that remain.

A Thank You Note

It has been fifteen months since the publication of my book, Back To Life: A Bladder Cancer Journey.

So, I feel some thanks are in order.

First, I want to thank each and every one of my readers. The sales have so far exceeded my expectations that I am truly stunned and humbled.

Next I want to thank all of the bladder cancer patients, caregivers, and physicians who have reached out and contacted me through the email in the acknowledgments section of the book and through the book's Web site, www.bladdercancerjourney.com.  I have spoken on the phone with dozens of folks who are having to make some of the same decisions I detailed in my story, and actually met one reader in person for lunch when we both found ourselves in Las Vegas at the same time.

Special thanks to the 43 (and counting) readers who have put fingers to keyboard and published a review of Back To Life on Amazon.  Amazingly, 41 of the 43 reviews awarded it five stars!  Read the reviews here.

Thanks to the gallery owners, banks, and coffee shops that have hosted my book signings and readings here in Portland. I have met so many interesting people, and what fun they have been!

As always, I have to thank Dr. Sia Daneshmand, who not only saved my life, but also agreed to contribute the incredibly powerful Foreword to my book.

Mary Elizabeth Williams, who just released her own cancer story, A Series of Catastrophes and Miracles, was kind enough to write the back cover blurb, which is reproduced at the end of this post. She's a senior writer for Salon.com, and a storyteller extraordinaire. Thanks, MBW!

Lastly, I wrote this book not as a bladder cancer book, or even as a medical memoir, but as an adventure story. My thanks go out to everyone I wrote about in Back To Life, who make up this true story.

If you have read the book, please take a minute of two to submit a short review on Amazon.  A continuous flow of new reviews is the single best way to insure that one's book will appear high in the search rankings on the site.

And of course, if you haven't read it, now would be an excellent time to pick up a copy, either in paperback or Kindle e-book format.

Many thanks to you all!

The Author and Dr. Sia Daneshmand

"As a Stage 4 melanoma survivor, I found myself deeply moved by - and profoundly grateful for - Frank Sadowski's honest and enlightening account of what it's really like inside the cancer experience. But more than that, simply as a reader, I was enthralled with his effortless gift for compelling storytelling. Back to Life is full of humor, suspense, and grit, a medical drama that brims with heart and soul." 

-- Mary Elizabeth Williams, senior staff writer at Salon.com and author of Gimme Shelter and A Series of Catastrophes and Miracles: A True Story of Love, Science, and Cancer. 

Sous Vide ... or not Sous Vide?

That is the question.

About six months ago I finally broke down and used a gift certificate to a local cooking store to purchase a Sansaire sous vide machine and a vacuum sealer. Sous vide is a method of cooking food at very low temperature for extended time in a circulating water bath. The food is vacuum sealed in a special non-reactive plastic bag before cooking. After cooking, it is usually finished with very quick pan sear. Many chefs use a blowtorch for this final step.

Over the last few months, I've tried cooking almost everything except vegetables this way. The result is that there are some things that sous vide is absolutely perfect for, and others, well, not so much. Take chicken, for example. I bake skinless boneless breasts coated with a barbecue rub or Emeril's essence to slice for my standard workday lunch of Greek salad with chicken.  I've tried it sous vide and the chicken has a strange texture. However, due to its moisture-retention abilities, I have found sous vide the absolute ideal way to cook the same  boneless breasts when making chicken salad. It's perfect!

Chefs in fine dining restaurants have been using this method for years, and now that I am cooking with this method I can usually recognize its use. We had a thick king salmon filet at Bluehour, one of our favorite Portland eateries, a couple of weeks ago. I noticed that it was exactly the same medium rare all the way through, with a brown sear just on the top side. I sensed the blowtorch method!

We occasionally find top-grade Oregon Wagyu beef at our local farmer's market in Portland, sold by Pono Farms. The tenderloin filets are so amazing that overcooking them on the grill accidentally is a real risk.

Enter sous vide. Last weekend, Pono Farms' booth had the rarely seen certified A-4 grade Wagyu, the second highest grade of Wagyu beef available from US farms, according to the Wagyu grading system.

Here's how we cooked these incredible steaks. Here they are, patted dry with paper towels: (Check out the amazing marbling.)

Next, I sprinked the filets on both sides with fresh ground black pepper, added a pinch of dried tarragon leaves, and topped each filet with teaspoon pat of butter.  

Next I vacuum sealed them in the sous vide bag.

The sous vide immersion circulator "wand" was then affixed to the side of a very large stockpot and pre-heated to 127 degrees, and in went the bag of beef.

You have to experiment with cooking times to find your preferred duration. Since the water bath stays at precisely the same temperature, there is no danger of overcooking in terms of "doneness." A sous vide tenderloin steak cooked at 127 degrees will be the exact same perfect medium rare if it's cooked for one hour or four hours. What changes is the texture. For 1" thick filets, I like to cook them for just a few minutes over an hour. Here's what they look like when taken out of the bath just before they are removed and thoroughly patted dry:

Next, the steaks go into a very hot skillet with a light film of high smoke-point oil (I use grapeseed oil) just until a crust is seared into the beef, about a minute per side.

When you cook meats in a pan or on the grill, or even in a high-temperature oven like the big steakhouses do, it cooks from the outside in. While the center portion might be medium rare, the top and bottom will go from brown seared crust, to well done, to medium, and then to medium rare in the middle. A sous vide steak cooked as above is exactly medium rare all the way from top to bottom.

Because of the amazing quality and texture of the Wagyu, we served it without a sauce, just a little sea salt. We accompanied the beef simply as well, with fresh-shelled English peas, boiled and buttered and sea-salted, and sautéed shallot, garlic and chopped Crimini mushrooms. The chosen wine was a Mondavi cabernet.

Perfect.

Bon Appetit!

R.I.P. Shibuya at the MGM Grand

My posts seldom live up to the title of my blog, but today Frank is incensed!

Shibuya at the MGM Grand in Las Vegas was a one-of-a-kind Japanese restaurant, featuring exquisitely cut sushi and sashimi, innovative "modern Japanese" small plates, sumptuous entrees, and a broad and deep sake list. All served up by knowledgable, friendly staff in an absolutely beautiful decor. It was far from inexpensive, to be sure, but as the best Japanese food I've eaten outside of Japan, I always felt that it was worth the price.

The main dining room at Shibuya

I was down in Las Vegas in the second week of May, solo, for our annual condo maintenance trip. After two nights of burning our members' gift cards at the Foundation Room's private dining room, I was ready for a change. It should be no surprise that I chose Shibuya.

While sitting at the sushi bar savoring each delicious bite, one of the waiters who had been there for years came over to say hello. The restaurant boasted very low turnover, with many of the waitstaff working there for many, many years. This particular waiter joined shortly after Shibuya opened in the mid-nineties and had waited on us on multiple occasions. He leaned in and quietly confided that there were strong rumors that the restaurant would be closing, likely at the beginning of July. Of course, I said "How strong are the rumors?" He lowered his voice and said "They are not rumors."

I asked him if the restaurant was unprofitable, which seemed highly unlikely as the place is always jam packed, and, well, I already mentioned the prices. He told me that they were extremely profitable; in fact, they were the second most profitable of the seventeen restaurants at the MGM Grand, trailing only Joel Robuchon, where the grand tasting menu goes for $435 per person!

He further confided that they were almost certainly falling victim to the unending wave of celebrity chef-named restaurants that has been a trend since Wolfgang Puck opened his first joint almost thirty years ago. He whispered that the restaurant was likely to reopen in the fall, as Morimoto.

Morimoto, of course, refers to Masaharu Morimoto of Iron Chef fame. He already owns and operates his eponymous restaurant in Philadelphia. I have had the pleasure of dining there, and while excellent, it did not compare with Shibuya.

Fast forward to Friday, July 1st.  Some weeks after my solo dinner where I heard the "strong rumors," it was confirmed by the Vegas Eater blog that Shibuya was closing, and in fact had stopped taking on line reservations. I had called the restaurant from Portland, and learned that Saturday night, July 2nd's dinner service would be their last. I made a reservation for the 1st, and Laura and I had an absolutely fantastic last supper, albeit somewhat bittersweet. The staff all had the same line when we said how sad we were to se them close.

"Change is actually a good thing," every single person said, obviously coached. We finally got one of our regulars to come clean and admit that they were devastated and more than a little bitter.

And now we know why. Since that dinner, we learned the whole story. Morimoto signed a huge contract with MGM, Inc. and had planned to open in the Mirage in the space formerly occupied by Japonais in late 2014. They could not agree on a budget for the radical redesign and remodel that Morimoto and his design team were proposing. The rumor is that the contract included a huge buyout clause if they could not agree on a space for his new venture.

The rumor continues, saying that he toured all of the MGM properties and made a non-negotiable demand for the Shibuya space. Rather than pay the buyout, the MGM agreed, and Shibuya's fate was decided.

In the land of celebrity chefs that is Las Vegas today, where even an asshole like Gordon Ramsey has the holy triumvirate of steak, burger, and pub joints, Shibuya made it on their own. No celebrity chef ever lent his name. Their reputation spread over the years due the incredible quality of their cuisine, their terrific staff, and the beautiful room.

What a pity.

And now you know why Frank is incensed ...

 

Mary Elizabeth Williams - In Her Own Words

Here is a link to a terrific video in which my good friend, the writer Mary Elizabeth Williams, tells her cancer story in five minutes. Here is my review of her new book, A Series of Catastrophes and Miracles.

http://www.health.com/mind-body/immunotherapy-treatment

Book Review - A Series of Catastrophes and Miracles

Author and Salon.com senior staff writer Mary Elizabeth Williams has just released a most amazing book. It tells the story of her diagnosis and treatment of stage four malignant melanoma over the course of several years. Cancer memoirs today are – unfortunately – a dime a dozen, but this book is about as far from the “I-fought-my-courageous-battle-with-cancer-and-heroically-beat-it” formula as you can get. Instead, we readers get a superbly written and very human view of what maintaining a life and a family in the face of probable death looks like.  It contains a wealth of medical information around the emerging use of immunotherapy as the first truly new treatment for cancer in a hundred years, presented in easy to understand plain English.

Her story takes us through the traumas of surgery, recovery, and recurrence, and relates the loss of friends and the difficulty of holding a family together, but it is the author’s deft and frequent use of humor that got this reader through this troubling tale.  Her humor is as natural and insightful as it is pervasive throughout. The story of her relationship with her best friend Debbie is as emotionally touching as anything I’ve ever read.

It should be noted that this book is for everyone, whether or not cancer has yet touched your life.

As a person who has – so far – survived a cancer diagnosis whose preliminary prediction was for a 5% chance of three-year survival, I feel a unique bond as she shares the cringe worthy details of the cancer experience from both a physical as well as emotional point of view.  As I read through this book, the word that kept popping up in my head was “honest.” We are presented with a brand of honesty that is so direct, unassuming, and shameless as to be almost painful.

Those of you who are already familiar with Ms. Williams writing will know that she is particularly adept at writing pithy endings to her articles, and without spoiling, let me just say she knocks this ending out of the park.

Finally, I have two pieces of advice: buy this wonderful book, and go with the jumbo box of tissues.

About the author:  

Mary Elizabeth Williams is a senior staff writer for award-winning Salon.com and has appeared in the New York Times and numerous other national and regional publications. The author of Gimme Shelter and A Series of Catastrophes and Miracles, she lives in New York City with her family.

[Full disclosure: I have been virtual friends with the author for several years, and she has been uniquely supportive of my own modest efforts at writing. She was also kind enough to pen the blurb on the back cover of my own cancer memoir. - Frank]

A New Excerpt from "Back To Life: A Bladder Cancer Journey"

Celebrating the first anniversary of the publishing of my book, I offer my readers another, longer excerpt. I hope you enjoy. You can buy the book in trade paperback or Kindle e-book HERE.

Chapter Forty-One

It was still pitch dark the next morning as the riders drifted into the hotel lobby. There was a special cash buffet set up there that offered coffee, juices, yogurt, bagels, and fruit. I loaded up on a cinnamon raisin bagel with cream cheese, two bananas, and copious amounts of black coffee. In front of the hotel, steam poured out of the buses’ exhausts in the cold, dark Texas morning.

It was about a forty-five minute drive out to the big school complex that would serve as the start/finish line and the site of the post-ride party, which featured live bands as well as plenty of food and drink, cookout style. The conversation on the bus was subdued, with most riders chatting quietly with their partners. We were all thinking about the physical challenge to come, and no one more so than yours truly.

The weather in the Texas Hill Country in October is nothing if not unpredictable. The pre-dawn temperatures can be in the low forties at the beginning of the ride, and it can easily hit the high nineties by the noontime finish. One year it was in the high thirties at the start, with many riders clad in nothing but cycling shorts and a short-sleeve jersey. That year I was shaking so hard at the start that I thought I might crash, but I had at least thought to stuff a pair of fleece arm warmers in my back pocket.

On Sunday, October 26th, 2008, the day started out cool and clear, with just a light breeze blowing, near ideal conditions for a long ride. I proudly rolled out with the first group, which included Lance and his group of celebrity friends followed by the different jersey teams in order. My strategy was the same as in past years: try to find a large group of experienced riders that were going at a comfortable pace for me to hang in with. I had no illusions that this was going to be anything like the screaming-fast rides of years past.

As I tried to hang with one group, then another and another, I realized that even my modest expectations were too optimistic. I finally settled in with my fourth or fifth group, riding on the mainly flat first part of the course at barely 15 mph.

A little under two hours into the ride I pulled off the group at the twenty-five-mile rest stop. I needed some nutrition and refills on my water and energy-drink bottles. I ate a banana and some wheat bread slathered with peanut butter, stretched a bit, and pulled out after barely a ten-minute stop, trying to avoid the muscle tightness that comes with longer breaks out of the saddle.

About three miles down the road, struggling to stay with yet another group going around 15 mph, I began to feel light-headed and nauseous. I knew this was not good, particularly as I had not yet made it to the halfway point of the hundred-kilometer ride, the thirty-one-mile mark. I soldiered on, getting dropped by one group after another, and finally, almost three-and-a-half hours after starting, I pulled into the forty-five-mile rest stop. I had serious doubts as to whether I would or could remount the bike.

I stayed at the rest stop way too long. After drinking water, refilling my bottles, and eating a Cliff bar that tasted like peanut butter mixed with sawdust, I lay down on my back in the shade of a fence along side the road. I remember looking up at the puffy white clouds and the cobalt blue Texas sky. I have no idea how long I lay there, but when I stood up I was dizzy and disoriented and my legs were stiff and sore. The bus that was parked there to take abandoning riders back to the start/finish area beckoned. The sun was high in the cloudless sky and the temperature broke ninety degrees. I had seventeen more miles to go.

When you do the Ride for the Roses, the Foundation provides you with a rider number for your jersey, but also offers three different placards to attach to your jersey or bike. The first two are “In Honor Of…” and “In Memory Of… .” You write in the name of your friend, relative, or loved one who has survived cancer or who has been killed by it. The third sign simply says, “I Am a Cancer Survivor.” My past four rides, I had worn the first two, one for my cancer-veteran wife and one for my good friend’s wife who died from breast cancer. It was her death that motivated me to raise well over a quarter of a million dollars for the Foundation over the course of my five rides.

In 2008 I had a fourth sign on my back in addition to the race number and the two memorials. I am a cancer survivor. I thought about that fourth sign as I contemplated the alternatives: walk across the grass in front of the rest stop and put my bike in the bus and climb aboard, or throw a leg over it and give it one more try. With the words “In Honor Of…” and “In Memory Of…” singing in my head, the decision was easy. I rode unsteadily out onto the course, legs stiff and achy, stomach churning, head pounding under the noonday sun.

After the first two miles, I was questioning my decision. People on hybrids and mountain bikes who in past years would have finished the better part of two hours behind me were cruising up and passing. With my carbon-fiber bike and full Livestrong Yellow Jersey Team kit, it was obvious that this was a rider in distress.

Then a strange thing happened. As a small group approached me, they began to call out, encouraging me to keep on riding. I realized that it was the survivor badge pinned to the back of my jersey. I waved and smiled, and five minutes later it happened again, and then again.

I still had twelve miles to go, and I remembered one of the mental tricks we used to use when we were suffering at the end of long rides. We would say to ourselves, “I can survive anything for ten miles.” So the goal became the ten-mile mark rather than the finish line. It sounds like a pretty cheesy motivator, but it actually had worked for my friends and me more than once. I said it out loud: “I have only two miles to go. Then I can survive anything for ten miles!”

With about five miles left, I heard the unmistakable thrum of aerodynamic racing wheels; a large group of fast riders was approaching. It was a group about to complete the 108-mile route that I had done in previous years, and they had nearly doubled my speed to be passing me. I pulled far to the right as they approached.

It was a group of about thirty guys, and as they flew by me I noticed several polka-dot jerseys and a couple of yellows. Then I heard a shout, “Hey, I think that’s Frank!”

Suddenly two riders dropped off the back of the group and slowed quickly. They drifted back to where I was huffing along at about 11 or 12 mph. It was two of my Yellow Jersey cronies with whom I had ridden in several of the rides over the years.

“Jesus, dude, are you OK?” said Jim, who was a forty-something doctor from Texas and a very strong rider. Both of them were looking at me with clear concern.

“Thanks guys,” I said, “but I’m totally toast. I’m just going to ride my own pace on in. I’ll be OK. No need for you two to wait around. Ride on.”

“Fuck we will,” said David, an investment counselor from Montana. “Hop on.”

In cycling terms, they were offering to pace me in to the finish, allowing me to ride in their slipstream and conserve valuable energy. They ignored my pleas for them to leave me, and rode together very closely side by side in order to give me the maximum benefit of their draft. It is gesture of camaraderie and compassion that I will never forget.

The finish line at the Ride for the Roses is unlike any other. The approach road is lined with hundreds of cheering spectators, volunteers, and friends and relatives of the riders. As you approach the line, the route divides in two; the smaller lane on the left is just for cancer survivors, while the larger lane to the right is for everybody else, the “civilians” as the volunteer ride marshals called them.

Laura had warned me about this. A few years back she had done one of the shorter rides while I did the big one, and she, as a survivor, naturally went through the appropriate lane, where she was handed the traditional yellow rose. I was still out on the course at the time, but she described the flood of emotions that overtook her when she crossed the line and accepted the rose. Naturally, I told her that was unlikely to be a problem for me. After all, I’m a big tough guy, right?

Yeah, right.

The last three hundred meters of the course ascended a small rise to the finishing straight. My two protectors pulled away with a wave as they delivered me to the split in the course. They were going right, but I was going to the left. I had been woozy and mentally and physically sluggish for several hours, but in those last few moments before crossing the line everything was crystal clear. I heard every cheer of encouragement, saw every waving flag. And then the banner was upon me. Under I went, too exhausted to even raise my arms in the traditional cyclist’s finishing salute. I coasted up to the volunteer who extended her hand with a single yellow rose.

I took the rose and coasted slowly over to the side, away from the finishers swooping through the chute. I saw Laura standing there with tears in her eyes. I dropped my bike on the ground and we wrapped our arms around each other. And then I totally lost it, literally crying on her shoulder for many minutes.

*********************************************************************************

Click HERE to view a gallery of pictures of many of the actual events depicted in Back To Life, including the finish line and the yellow rose at the Ride for the Roses.

Portland - April 8th, 2016