Pour Some Sunscreen On Me

According to an article in today’s online US News and World Report, indoor tanning beds may be even more likely to cause skin cancer than previously believed:

“New research published online Oct. 6 in the Journal of Investigative Dermatology suggests that the main type of ultraviolet rays used in tanning beds -- UVA1 -- may penetrate to a deep layer of skin that is most vulnerable to the cancer-causing changes caused by UV rays.”

Yikes.

Please stay out of those things, slap on some sunscreen when you’re outdoors, and rock on to a ripe and pale old age with a new version of Def Leppard’s “Pour Some Sugar On Me”…



Step inside, hear my say
You and me babe, hey hey

Tan is like a bomb, baby, c'mon get it gone
Livin' like a tanner in the UV zone
Lookin' like a tramp, like a Jersey Shore vamp
Demolition woman, can I stop your tan
Your tan

Razzle 'n' a dazzle 'n' a flash a UV light
Tanning salon lover, baby, you’re a fright
Sometime, anytime, sunscreen is neat
Little miss-a-ignorant, sun screen thee, yeah

Take a bottle, shake it up
Break the bubble, break it up

Pour some sunscreen on me, ooh, in the name of love
Pour some sunscreen on me, c'mon pale me up
Pour your sunscreen on me, oh, I can't get enough
I've got flaky moles from my head to my feet yeah

Listen
Red light, yellow light, green-a-light go
Crazy little woman with a tan bed glow
Mirror queen, mannequin, weathered old glove
Sweet dream, save your skin, pale on up
I paled on up

You gotta squeeze a little, squeeze a little
Spread a little more
Don’t let melanoma come-a-knockin' on your door
Sometime, anytime, sunscreen is neat
Little miss ignorant, sun screen thee, yeah
Spread a little more

Take a bottle, shake it up
Break the bubble, break it up

Pour some sunscreen on me, ooh, in the name of love
Pour some sunscreen on me, c'mon pale me up
Pour your sunscreen on me, oh, I can't get enough
I've got flaky moles from my head to my feet yeah

You hear my preachin’, I could just scream
Hate to waste your young skin
'Cause you’ve got, you’ve got, skin so sweet
From your head, your head to your feet
To your feet
Do you use sunscreen, SPF true?

Take a bottle, take a bottle
Shake it up, shake it up
Break the bubble, break it up
Break it up

Pour some sunscreen on me, ooh, in the name of love
Pour some sunscreen on me, c'mon pale me up
Pour your sunscreen on me, oh, I can't get enough
Pour some sunscreen on me, oh, in the name of love
Pour some sunscreen on me, get it, come get it
Pour your sunscreen on me, ooh
Pour some sunscreen on me, yeah
Protect me

Everybody Wants To Find The Cure

Just my version of Tears for Fears’ “Everybody Wants To Rule The World”…

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ST86JM1RPl0


Welcome to your life
There's no turning back
Even while you sleep
C will find you
Looking for our new drug saviour
Put an end to Black C’s tenure
Everybody wants to find the cure

Black’s our own design
Wear with no remorse
Helps us show our pride
Let’s all make the most of giving and our treasure
Black C will not last forever
Everybody wants to find the cure

Here's a blog where the pink won't blind you
Joining hands so Black C comes tumbling down
When it does I'll be right beside you

So sad we haven’t made it
So mad we will not take it
Everybody wants to find the cure

We can't stand this black derision
Harried with this pink in vision
Everybody wants to find the cure
Say that you'll never never never never need it
No headlines, why believe it?
Everybody wants to find the cure

Let’s be giving of our treasure
Black C will not last forever
Everybody wants to find the cure

It’s pink frenzy season, and I can’t think of a better time to support organizations like the Aim At Melanoma Foundation and the Melanoma Research Foundation by sponsoring one of your fellow melanoma warriors in a fundraising walk or run!

Back In The High Life Again

Just a song for a cure, to the tune of Steve Winwood’s classic…



It always seemed to me
That our lives ran on too fast
And we have to take it slowly
Just to make the good parts last

But when you're born to run
It's so hard to just slow down
But don't be surprised to see us
Beating this Black Cancer down

We'll be back in the high life again
All the doors that closed one time
Will open up again
We'll be back in the high life again
All the eyes that watched us once
Will smile, they saved our skins

And we'll drink and dance while cancer free
Let the world back into we
And oh we'll be a sight to see
Back in the high life again

Cures, we pray to get the best
To make life be life for we
And we hope that they're still out there
And they’ll make us cancer free

We'll have ourselves a time
And we'll dance till the morning sun
And we'll let the good times come in
And we won't stop till we're done

We'll be back in the high life again
All the doors we closed one time
Will open up again
We'll be back in the high life again
All the eyes that watched us once
Will smile, they saved our skins

And we'll drink and dance while cancer free
And have the world so easily
And oh we'll be a sight to see
Back in the high life again

High life
High life
In the high life again

We'll be back in the high life again
All the doors we closed one time
Will open up again
We'll be back in the high life again
All the eyes that watched us once
Will smile, they saved our skins

And we'll drink and dance while cancer free
And have the world so easily
And oh we'll be a sight to see
Back in the high life again

High life
Back in the high life
Oh, we'll be back

A Race For The Dough

Whether we melanoma warriors like it or not, the fact is that the race for cancer research funding is a popularity contest. I’ll resist my lawyerly penchant for providing footnotes for my sources of authority (after all, I’m in recovery) but here are some funding facts gleaned from a couple of hours of research.

► Cancer research spending by the federal government’s National Cancer Institute for each breast cancer death well exceeds spending per melanoma death. And among the five biggest cancer killers (lung, colon, breast, pancreas, and prostate cancer), breast cancer receives the most N.C.I. funding per new case and per patient death.

► The Department of Defense will spend $150 million on breast cancer research this year, but they don’t provide our servicemen and women with sunscreen.

I have absolutely no desire to take away a nickel of government or private spending for breast cancer research (or for any other cancer brand, for that matter). But I will continue to pursue my own little Quixotic campaign to increase melanoma awareness, regardless of how much it might annoy people who’ve yet to check into this Hotel, and I urge you to do the same.

October may be pink cancer awareness month, but let’s “show our style” by using this time as an opportunity to make our cancer just a bit more “popular”. According to the The Skin Cancer Foundation, women aged 39 and under have a higher probability of developing melanoma than any other cancer except breast cancer; and I can’t think of a more opportune time to inform folks of this ugly truth.

I’ll sign off with a new version of The Allman Brothers Band’s (and The Marshall Tucker Band’s) “Can’t You See”…

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=gCXQycyN_Vs&feature=related


Gonna end this black reign
All ‘round the nation, lord
I don't care where it goes
Gonna climb a mountain
The highest mountain
I’ll sound off
Somebody gonna know

Can't you see
Woah, can't you see
What Black Cancer, lord
It been doin' to we
Can't you see
Can't you see
What Black Cancer
It been doin' to we

I'm gonna find C
A hole in the wall
gonna crawl inside and die
That cancer, mean ol' cancer Lord
Gonna tell us goodbye

Can't you see
Woah, can't you see
What Black Cancer, lord
It been doin' to we
Can't you see
Can't you see
What Black Cancer
It been doin' to we

I gonna keep a bloggin’ now
As long as I can
Ain't never goin' back
Grab me a soapbox
Seize the day like Komen, now
'Til these songs, they run out of tracks

Can't you see
Woah, can't you see
What Black Cancer, lord
It been doin' to we
Can't you see
Can't you see
What Black Cancer
It been doin' to we

Trying To Reason With Pink Cancer Season

October is a bittersweet month. A time for seeing docs and hoping my luck hasn’t ran out, while celebrating that I’ve come this far. A time for enjoying some last rounds of geezer golf and getting the skis tuned before the snow flies. And a time when the pink cancer world commands center stage, to a degree that will sometimes make me cringe when even NFL players are wearing pink. (By the way, Denver Broncos orange doesn’t look good with much of anything, much less hot pink.) But therein also lies an opportunity for we lonely guests at this less popular brand in the Hotel Carcinoma chain: to remind whomever will listen that it isn’t the only cancer that’s a beastly threat to the women we love. So let’s all go for it.

So as I start to grapple with this month of endings and beginnings, here’s a new version of Jimmy Buffett’s “Trying to Reason With Hurricane Season”…

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=oh9qWX0iaxs&feature=related

Leaves turn on the aspen
Checkups come in two’s
I’m nearly in my eighth year
And God it’s run by too soon
Survived and kept my focus
I hoped I wouldn't have to run far
I knew I could use a single malt scotch
So I hustled downstairs to my bar

And now I must confess, I could use some rest
I have run in this race for so long
Yes I’m quite insane, I think I hurt my brain
But they cleaned me out just so I can go on

There's somethin' about this Sunday
It's a most peculiar day
Surfin' through the blogosphere that's known to Black C’s preys
Feelin' mired, then I got inspired
I knew that it wouldn't last long
So all alone I rested my bones
Sat at my desk and then I made up this song

And now I must confess, I could use some rest
I have run in this race for so long
Yes I’m quite insane, I think I hurt my brain
Because they cleaned me out just so I can go on

Well this boy finds bloggin' easy now
Fifty things to write about
It’s pink month in October
But I'm callin' Black Cancer out
It's time to build awareness
It's time to show our style
Though this month we’ll be in gay pink seas
That's a mighty long time to hide

And now I must confess, I could use some rest
I have run in this race for so long
Yes I’m quite insane, I think I hurt my brain
But they cleaned me out just so I can go on

Yes they cleaned me out just I can go on