Heyo

[logoutzero]

@zemaj @Luhkoh All things considered, I'm doing just peachy! I'm eagerly awaiting that upswing, and doing what I can to sort of, make my own luck! Big things in the works!

Sorry to hear about your tribulations. That's a lot to process in just a couple of years. Please keep your chin up and hug those kids every day! I spent my lieutenant years at Fort Hood so I'm familiar with your type of land. Do you plan on doing much with it? Maybe have a few cows or goats to get a farm exemption?

We need another Texan playing in the Barbarian tournament... but you'll have to install 1.14 for that. Come on in, the water's fine!

Meat sheep seem like a good start, my fence is good enough in some spots, but would require quite a bit of touching up in others. I'm thinking about goats for a few years, since they will clear a lot of the scrub off the property. I've tried my hand at cutting the cedar down for posts, miserable work and hardly worth the effort pay wise. I've always been interested in aquaponics, fish and plants working in tandem. I have enough space to get a good sized operation going, just need some time to recover and get my feet back under me. It takes 5 years of worth of effort to get an Ag/Timber exemption, it's definitely in the works!

Ah Hood. I grew up in Copperas Cove, and have lived in this area most of my life. Spent a few years at Ft. Lewis, was born at Ft. Bragg. Small world!
(Edit: I'm minutes off North Fort Hood, just outside of Gatesville, but I think you figured that out from the image, maybe?)

I started a random barb, I'll look into the Barbarian Brothers tournament a bit.

 

[Grisu]

It's so good to see you back, @logoutzero! But I am saddened by all the tough luck you had over the last years ☹ May I ask what the cancer is called? I can't deduce from the things you said, but it doesn't fit to any kind of bone cancer I know of (but hey, I am no oncologist after all...). If you don't want to talk about if on the forums though, then simply ignore this question though

I hope you will manage alright in the future and that life will get a bit brighter for you!

Good to see you join the random tournament! I unfortunately already joined the tournament, so no way for you to roll me up another "logoutzero" char that dies to normal Ancient Kaa

All the best for you! See you around

 

[logoutzero]

Yes, I saw that you already completed this round of Random, but I always look forward to seeing your builds @Grisu , and deeding whatever you roll up for me! Ha! Maybe the next time around!

The reason my thumb never healed, is because what affected the bone's structural integrity silently behind the scenes. X-ray found an enchondroma, which isn't a huge deal on it's own. Cartilage cells specifically never get the "stop growing" signal after puberty, and the growths surround and choke the nearby bones. Not terribly scary of itself, and likely that there are more in other areas. The bones become very fragile around the tumor(s) and can break on simple contact, which is how I ended up breaking my thumb. The problem, as I understand it, is that at some point, for reasons unknown, these cartilage cells may "de-differentiate" and stop growing where cartilage normally would, instead growing all over the body, replacing other native cell-types with cartilage cells. I understand this transition is extremely rare; I by no means claim to be terminal or dying. The news was shocking, to say the least, and I was in a position to afford the time off.

My father's mother died of primary cancer of the bone marrow, so when I found out I had something bone-related, it hit close to home. My primary care physician explained the odds to me as "finding an enchondroma is about as likely as getting attacked by a shark while swimming in the ocean. The odds of it becoming cancerous are lower than getting attacked by a shark on land."

 

[logoutzero]

Comparison of left thumb VS right. It looks like an oversized big toe now lol

 

[Grisu]

@logoutzero: Ah, I see. As far as I know, only those enchondroma that appear in syndromes can become malignant though? That is if you don't have multiple of those enchondromas, you should be quite safe. Still, nothing I'd wish anyone to have and rather you did not have to bother with it. I can imagine that the diagnosis came as a shock. Is your thumb back to full functionality?

Looking forward to reading about your random barb!

 

[logoutzero]

@Grisu Sounds like you may have a bit more knowledge than I do. I've consulted directly with a general practitioner, an orthopedist, and an oncologist. Independently, each told me "we don't know much about them, only that the chances of it becoming bad are practically zero if we leave it alone, and it doesn't get bigger." What is your background?

As far as the digit is concerned, I have no use of the distal joint. I can manipulate it with my other hand, but from the looks of the images, the joint is practically disintegrated. There is discomfort, but no pain, which I understand to be the first major pointer that things are going wrong.

 

[Grisu]

@Grisu Sounds like you may have a bit more knowledge than I do. I've consulted directly with a general practitioner, an orthopedist, and an oncologist. Independently, each told me "we don't know much about them, only that the chances of it becoming bad are practically zero if we leave it alone, and it doesn't get bigger." What is your background?

My background is only what I learned during my medical training, so very probably way less profound than that of a GP, orthopedist or oncologist.

But some research on pubmed at least confirmed both what you said and what I said. (i.e. not much known, usually benign, risk below 1% of transformation to malignant form, higher risk for syndromes like Ollier etc which usually means onset as a child with multiole enchondromas).

Enchondroma - StatPearls - NCBI Bookshelf

www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov

Differential Diagnosis of Cartilaginous Lesions of Bone

Context.—. Cartilaginous tumors represent one of the most common tumors of bone. Management of these tumors includes observation, curettage, and surgical excision or resection, depending on their locations and whether they are benign or malignant. They can be diagnostically challenging...

meridian.allenpress.com

Ollier disease - PubMed

Enchondromas are common intraosseous, usually benign cartilaginous tumors, that develop in close proximity to growth plate cartilage. When multiple enchondromas are present, the condition is called enchondromatosis also known as Ollier disease (WHO terminology). The estimated prevalence of...

pubmed.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov

Couldn't find anything at first glance about spreading tumor cells if you do surgical treatment, but I would trust the assessment of your GP, orthopedist and oncologist.

Here is one of the key paragraphs:

To date, no singular serologic or radiologic test may differentiate ACT/CS1 from enchondroma. This differentiation has limited clinical and therapeutic value, however. The treatment for enchondroma and ACT/CS1 is identical: curettage with adjuvant phenol application or cryosurgery.

Realistically, most enchondromas require nothing more than supportive care and close monitoring.

And here is an article by a team with years is surgical treatment expertise:

The management and surgical intervention timing of enchondromas: A 10-year experience

Enchondroma, reportedly the most common primary tumor of the long bones of the hand, usually develops during the first till fourth decades of life. However, there has no consensus been reached regarding the surgical intervention timing for these patients. ...

www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov

Maybe you already know all of those, but maybe there is something new to be found, too in any case I do hope it at least stays as it is, although you probably have to give up console games in favour of mouse games like D2... Which brings the side effect of gluing (is that even a word?) you more to the SPF I guess

 

[logoutzero]

Wow @Grisu thanks for the links! I will certainly be checking them out shortly, sounds like there's definitely a good chance for some information I haven't yet discovered or been told yet. <3

I'm familiar with the DDX (thank you House, M.D.). I've read it and a couple others as well. I've got a few DVD's around here somewhere with images and their studies, was packed up in the last move and I haven't had need to fish it out just yet.

Gluing. I'm pretty sure that's totally a proper word!

Edit: The 10 year case study was an interesting read. A bone graft could possibly restore full use of my thumb, with certain risks and financial cost, but for now, a bum thumb isn't such a bad thing. I can use it, it just doesn't bend at the very end. I still have full use of the "opposable" directions, and I haven't noticed a significant reduction in grip strength, but holding things is where I have the most issues. I've always been ambidextrous, so starting to use my left hand more often for certain tasks isn't that difficult.

 

[OldSoldier]

@zemaj @Luhkoh All things considered, I'm doing just peachy! I'm eagerly awaiting that upswing, and doing what I can to sort of, make my own luck! Big things in the works!



Meat sheep seem like a good start, my fence is good enough in some spots, but would require quite a bit of touching up in others. I'm thinking about goats for a few years, since they will clear a lot of the scrub off the property. I've tried my hand at cutting the cedar down for posts, miserable work and hardly worth the effort pay wise. I've always been interested in aquaponics, fish and plants working in tandem. I have enough space to get a good sized operation going, just need some time to recover and get my feet back under me. It takes 5 years of worth of effort to get an Ag/Timber exemption, it's definitely in the works!

Ah Hood. I grew up in Copperas Cove, and have lived in this area most of my life. Spent a few years at Ft. Lewis, was born at Ft. Bragg. Small world!
(Edit: I'm minutes off North Fort Hood, just outside of Gatesville, but I think you figured that out from the image, maybe?)

I started a random barb, I'll look into the Barbarian Brothers tournament a bit.

Your conversation with @Grisu is much more interesting than what I have to say, but I'll continue anyway and say that we do live in a small world. I was at Hood from '97 to '00. Seems like a long time ago, but some of my closest army friends commanded battalions at Hood so I had opportunities to go back and see that while Killeen got pretty big, the post itself still looked a lot like it was when I was there. I was also able to show my kids where I used to work (my wife was also at Hood and overlapped with my time there by a year or two). I went to church in Cove, but I was glad I didn't live there and work on Hood because I'd have been driving into the sun twice a day. I still have my house just off the main gate. It has been rented nearly continuously since I left 20 years ago. Woo hoo!

My college roommate is the Madigan commander now, so we also have that Lewis connection! And my wife went to advance camp there in ROTC, ha!

It was a guess that you might be from around the area I used to live too; I can't tell it is Gatesville from the picture, I'm not that good. But your location gives Central Texas so that's a clue that you might at least be familiar with the Killeen/Cove area. Cool beans! I'd be interested in hearing about your aquaponics ideas if you want to PM me. One of my friends here in DFW is into that as well; he's told me a lot about his operation (which is indoors) but I'd be interested to hear about what you'd do on your land. I find it fascinating myself and love a good "synergy" concept.

 

[logoutzero]

@OldSoldier :

I've been toying with the idea of doing some indoor, modular type stuff, using shipping containers and LED full spectrum lighting. Mostly to help with pests. Locusts are a big summer deal here, and will destroy anything non-native. A property I co-op 30 miles down the road had 9 out 12 fruit trees stripped completely bare by dumb grasshoppers last year. There's a group of people up in Waco that have a VERY nice greenhouse setup, hand built in-ground water tank for the fish, which even feeds them on an automatic cycle with some sort of floating green plant that overflows from the tank above the fish tank. I got to tour the place a couple years ago, they've got a sweet setup with fly larvae, apparently their biological instinct is to "climb out of the trashcan" so to speak, so a scoop full of dirt/refuse in a box with a ramp up to the side of the fish tank, and when the maggots are big enough to move, they climb and dive right into the fish tank. Nice source of protein for the fishies, and very little maintenance.

I've amassed a solid collection of notes, pictures, and theories over the years. Nice to finally be in a place where I can start to act on it!