Lawyers On Drugs

During biochemotherapy treatments, my cocktail of side effects meds included Ativan, Zofran, Compazine, Dopamine, Thorazine, Demerol and that’s not all. (That’s material for a rap song, but I am SO not going there.) It was a potent cocktail that really addled my brain and caused me to do some things for which I don’t accept responsibility—like trying to take an unauthorized shower with two IV pumps in tow. And, fortunately, my saintly nurses didn’t hold me responsible either or else one of them just might have considered euthanasia.


With my deepest apologies to the nursing staff at The University of Colorado Hospital’s critical care oncology unit, the Hotel Melanoma version of Jackson Browne’s “Lawyers In Love”…

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


I can't keep up with what's been going down
I think my brain must just be slowing down
Among the human beings in their hospital greens
Am I the only one who fears the schemes
And the tangled wiles of lawyers on drugs


Rich sends his chaplain to hysteria, she’s dutiful
She stands at six o'clock and there he are, not beautiful
Cheating those UV rays, tuned into sports for days
Waiting for drug round III while nurses slave
To the help bell calls of lawyers on drugs


Last night they called Code Blues in Eight East town, near capital
The patient escaped while they weren't watching him, like patients will
Now they’ve got him in room, they've even stopped his swoon
And I hear the new hospital will be open soon
As infusion land for lawyers on drugs


Lawyers on drugs…
Lawyers on drugs...

The Smoking Gun

One of the many reasons that I went wrong as a youth and became a lawyer rather than a medical doctor is that basic chemistry, physics and biology seemed like magic to me. So most of a recent article about an exciting breakthrough in melanoma research flew right past me. But the gist of it seems to be that researchers at MD Anderson have found three genetic mutations they describe as the first 'smoking gun' genomic evidence directly linking damage from UV light to melanoma.


This discovery could ultimately lead to new melanoma treatments that target these melanoma-driving gene mutations. And talk about an “inconvenient truth” for the indoor tanning industry shills, like our good friend Dr. Joseph “Carcinoma” Mercola, who are selling allegedly healthy and safe tans. Although I’m sure they’ll deny this new evidence and continue telling lies to teenagers. The industry denies the epidemiological evidence linking tanning to an increased risk of melanoma, so why let new facts get in the way of sales? All I know for sure is that if I was a plaintiff’s lawyer specializing in products liability litigation, I’d be licking my chops over this new scientific evidence that exposure to UV light causes melanoma.

For all of you purveyors of carcinogens in the indoor tanning industry, especially, Dr. Carcinoma, The Hotel Melanoma version of the Eagles’ “Lyin’ Eyes”…

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=5-NlR54PqLw


Pretty girls just seem to find out early
How to open doors with just a smile
A rich bold tan
And she won't have to worry
She'll dress up all in lace and prom in style


Later times the big old moles grow boldly
I guess every form of refuge has its price
And it breaks her heart to think her life is only
Given to a tanning scam as cold as ice


So you told her she must brown out for the D thing
That sun bed’s her old friend when feelin' down
But you know where she's goin' with skin C thing
She is headed for the grievin' side of brown


You can't hide your fryin’ lies
And your guile is a thing despised
I thought by now you'd realize
There ain't no way to hide your fryin’ lies


On the other side of brown Yervoy is waiting
with surgeon’s knives and scars no one could heal
C drives on through her life so agitating
'Cause C makes her rue the rays you said would heal


She rushes to doc’s arms; they talk together
He whispers that life’s only for awhile
She swears that soon she'll be wearin’ black forever
She pulls the rays and leaves him with a smile


You can't hide your fryin' lies
And your guile is a thing despised
I thought by now you'd realize
There ain't now way to hide your fryin' lies


She gets up and pours herself a strong one,
And stares out at the stars up in the sky.
Another night, it's gonna be a long one.
She draws the shade and hangs her head to cry.


She wonders how it ever got this crazy.
She thinks about your ploys you used to fool.
Did she buy lies or did she just get lazy?
She's so far gone she feels just like a fool.


My oh my, U sure knows how to mutate things.
U sets it up so well, so carefully.
Ain't it funny how your new lies didn't change things?
You're still the same old churl you used to be.


You can't hide your fryin’ lies
And your guile is a thing despised
I thought by now you'd realize
There ain't no way to hide your fryin’ lies
There ain't no way to hide your fryin’ lies
Doc C, you can't hide your fryin’ lies

Wrote It In A Blog Song

Just dreamin’ about busting out of The Hotel Melanoma, with my rendition of The Marshall Tucker Band’s “Heard It In A Love Song”…


http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=MUL68ZeclcA

I have nine years lived in Hotel M, long enough
For the food to get old
We've been together so long now
We’re both green with mold


If I ever settle down
You're not my kind
And it's a good time for me
To head on down the line


Wrote it in a blog song
Wrote it in a blog song
Wrote it in a blog song
Can't be wrong


I'm the kinda man likes to get his way
Like to start scheming about
Tomorrow, today
Always said that I’d leave you
Even though it's blow
Where's that golf club bag of mine?
It's time to go


Wrote it in a blog song
Wrote it in a blog song
Wrote it in a blog song
Can't be wrong


I'm gonna be ‘screening
At the break of dawn
Wish I could sun
But I don't need no more tans lagging a bomb
I'll sneak out your door
Couldn't stand to stay ‘til die
I'd stay another year if I saw a teardrop in doc’s eye


Wrote it in a blog song
Wrote it in a blog song
Wrote it in a blog song
Can't be wrong


I EVER had the tan thing, but what I had
I had to leave it behind
U’s the hardest thing
I ever tried to get off my hide
Always some skin ‘screener on the every side of this kid
I was born an anglo and a freckler
And I guess I should have hid


Wrote it in a blog song
Wrote it in a blog song
Wrote it in a blog song
Can't be wrong

You're No Good

It’s just another day at The Hotel Melanoma, filled with news of younger mole mates in fights for their lives with stage 4 melanoma. Scans and scanxiety, searing pain, aggressive and brutal chemotherapy, fear, grief, hope, anger, acceptance and defiance. And another day for older and luckier folks like me to ask “why?” Oy.


The Hotel Melanoma version of Linda Ronstadt’s “You’re No Good”…



Feeling better now that we’re through
Feeling better ‘cause I'm over you
I've learned my lesson it left some scars
Now I see how you really are


You're no good, you're no good, you're no good ray C, you're no good (I'm gonna say it again)
You're no good, you're no good, you're no good ray C, you're no good


You broke young hearts so gentle and true
Well you broke some hearts over suntans baked through
I'll beg for their fitness on bended knees
I wouldn't blame them if they said to C


You're no good, you're no good, you're no good ray C, you're no good (I'm gonna say it again)
You're no good, you're no good, you're no good ray C, you're no good


I'm telling you now ray C that we’ll beat you some day
Forget about me ray C cause I'm ‘screening those rays


You're no good, you're no good, you're no good ray C, you're no good (I'm gonna say it again)
You're no good, you're no good, you're no good ray C, you're no good
You're no good, you're no good, you're no good ray C, you're no good

When Will Pale Be Loved?

Breaking news, film at eleven, but life ain’t fair. A guy my age can look like a sun-weathered old saddlebag and audition for a gig as the Marlboro Man. But a woman “of a certain age” who’s spent too much unprotected time in the sun in pursuit of that ‘healthy tan’ just looks older than she’d like to. Let's hope that our society’s conceptions of beauty are slowly changing-- back to what they were in the 19th Century and before when a suntan was distinctly “lower class”-- and some day soon no young woman will think she has to alter her natural skin tone to be considered pretty.


I’ll sign off with some new lyrics to Linda Ronstadt’s rendition of The Everly Brothers song “When Will I Be Loved”…



I've been treated
When skin heated
When will pale be loved


I've been put down
I've been ‘fused rounds
When will pale be loved


When I spy a new tan
That is one land mine
C always breaks my heart in two
It happens every time


I've been Code Blue
I've been fried too
When will pale be loved


When you have a new scan
That don’t look so fine
C always breaks your heart in two
It happens every time


Oh, I've been treated
When skin heated
When will pale be loved
When will pale be loved
Tell me, when will pale be loved