ALS (Amyotrophic Lateral Sclerosis): Letter From a Man with ALS

A Random Letter From a Victim of ALS

By: Fat Lester

The following are the contents of an email that a friend and colleague passed along to me. He is raising money for the Muscular Dystrophy Association (MDA) to help find a cure for ALS (Amyotrophic Lateral Sclerosis).

Out of nowhere (he does not know this man - hence the anonymity - nor does he know how the man obtained his top-secret email address. That said, he found the letter quite the motivational tool to summon his best efforts in attempting to solicit donations from family, friends and social media contacts, and as one of those whom he asked to help spread his message, I was given his permission to publish the contents of the letter he received from an actual ALS victim provided I keep the gentleman's identity private and include no information that could lead to his identity being tied to the substance of the message itself.

Without further adieu, here is the letter minus the greetings and signatures:

Dear Peter,

On January 25, 2012 I was diagnosed with ALS. From that evening on-my life has changed drastically. I have always been a very active person but due to the progression of the disease, my activities are limited. I left work shortly after finding out I have ALS to spend more time with my family and to acquire much needed rest. My symptoms were, and still are, muscle aches/twitches, headaches, stiff neck, noticeable muscle loss in my chest/back, cramps in my legs/feet and general fatigue.

My upper body is my weakest and biggest problem at this time. It is now getting difficult or impossible to do some of my everyday activities because I can barely raise my arms. Shaving, bathing, dressing, getting in and out of the bed are all a challenge and require assistance.

The people at MDA of Greater New Orleans have been a Godsend. They are so helpful and are always willing to help you with any issue you face. The staff at the MDA clinic that I go to every 3 months is also wonderful – they are friendly, knowledgeable professionals that will do anything to help.

I have a very supportive family and close friends that are always there for me no matter what my needs are. My wife and I have met some great friends, other pALS (People Living with ALS) and their wives. We get together often for dinner and other activities and find that these are the most wonderful relationships. We are all dealing with the same struggles, even though we are at different stages with ALS, but understand what each other is going through. This group bond that we have as made a huge difference in our lives.

If it weren’t for organizations like MDA I would not have had the opportunity to meet these pALS and receive the help we need. I know there are more hard situations in the future, but with all the support I have, I will get through it all.

Thank you for supporting the Covington Lock-Up, MDA and my family.

Since we're keeping the author of the message anonymous, there will be no signature or goodbye message included here. That said, if that does not touch upon a soft spot in your heart, one must wonder if you even have one.

That disease (ALS) is among the most debilitating and torturous illnesses in the history of mankind, and my heart goes out to everyone and anyone who has ever suffered from it, God rest their souls.

Amyotrophic Lateral Sclerosis (ALS)

The friend posted a blog about ALS, why he is motivated to help find a cure and why he feels that you and anyone else reading his blog should donate to the MDA Lock-Up event Thursday, May 23 in Covington, Louisiana. The friend will be "arrested" as a "repeat offender" and will need to post "bail" (your donations) in order to be granted release from the makeshift holding cell at the restaurant at which the event is being held.I will ask all readers of this blog though to please consider donating anything you can --- even if its just a single dollar --- to his "bail bond" as finding a cure for ALS is about as good a cause as one could conceive of to financially support.
If you can afford to help out, please do so, and know that his company, EGAN Medical Equipment, will be matching each and every dollar donated up to $1,000.

Mississippi Gulf Coast: Great Beaches, Better Prices

Mississippi Gulf Coast: Great Beaches, Better Prices

As those with whom I am closest are already aware, in early 2012 I made a fairly significant move from Covington, Louisiana to Long Beach, Mississippi. The move was motivated by a desire to reside literally ON the beach, and have the luxury of walking outside and fishing, sunbathing, etc.

For the first six months or so following the move, I was commuting to-and-from Covington from Long Beach, a round-trip that comes out to approximately three hours per day.

Needless to say, it wasn't long before I'd grown weary of the excessive drive time, not to mention all of the lost productivity that comes with it. I decided within weeks of the time I began residing along the coast that I would eventually be taking my talents and my business interests to Long Beach. A little over half a year later, that process is well underway, a commercially-zoned piece of property secured in downtown Long Beach to go with the beachfront condominium in which I've been residing was the missing piece. I am presently in the process of moving all of the inventory and equipment from Covington to my new "home town".

Long Beach is everything I had hoped it would be and then some. While the fishing isn't always great, it's not altogether bad either. There are days when the fish are biting and days when they're not.

Likewise, there are days when the beaches are full of local talent (and/or tourists), and days when the only females on the beach are their with their husbands and/or children.

The change has done me some good. The increased sun exposure has led to significant weight loss on my behalf, which is likely the result of increased testosterone levels, a little-known side-effect of men soaking up the sun's natural rays on a regular and consistent basis.

About a month ago, a beautiful girl came into my life from literally out-of-nowhere, and as much as I tried to fight it I fell in love with her immediately. She couldn't help but comment repeatedly during our first couple of outings together that the physical attraction she felt for me was unlike anything she's ever experienced. While I may otherwise overlook such remarks as pure flattery, I've seen myself in the mirror lately and quite frankly I can see where she's coming from.

The sun exposure coupled with stress and a lot of exercise has me in the best shape I've been in since high school, and the combination of factors has me as happy as I've ever been in my 30 years on earth. I just thank God for the past six weeks (and in a more general sense the past 7 months), and hope and pray that the string of recent blessings continues.

Oh, one other thing worthy of mention is the fact that Long Beach is effectively a ghost town where the pre-Katrina homeowners cannot give away their property, so anyone looking to snatch up a nice house, apartment or condo on or near the beach may want to take a close look at Long Beach. I did, and as of today it ranks among the very best decisions I've ever made.

Northshore Gas Station Hit with Lawsuit

A woman who slipped and fell in the parking lot of a Northshore convenience store has filed suit, alleging that the store was negligent is failing to clean up "oil or other slippery substance" that was present in the parking lot of a Kangaroo Express in St. Tammany Parish.

Julia L. Moore, also of St. Tammany Parish, claims she broke her wrist while attempting to break her fall after she slipped and fell in the parking lot after apparently walking over the allegedly slippery substance. Naturally, she is seeking damages to compensate her for her pain and suffering resulting from her injury, as well as for medical expenses. Ms. Moore claims her injury required surgery, and it's safe to assume she's either sporting a wrist brace or a heavy-duty wrist splint these days.

According to Michelle Keahey of LouisianaRecord.com, the plaintiff is accusing the Kangaroo Express (officially known as The Pantry Inc.) of negligence for "failing to maintain safe premises, failing to remove oil or other slippery substance from the parking lot area of the gas station and convenience store, failing to clean up or remove a spill after being provided constructive or actual knowledge of the spill."

The defendant had the case relocated to Federal District Court in New Orleans, Louisiana.

Tchefuncte River Website Now Live

It is my pleasure to be able to announce today that TchefuncteRiver.com, a website about the Tchefuncte River, is now live.  The site was build in just a few days, but from the moment it debuted was already the best and most in-depth resource about the Tchefuncte.

The Tchefuncte River is a small but wide river in southeast Louisiana that runs through the border between Washington and Tangipahoa Parishes, continuing on through St. Tammany Parish all the way to the Lakefront in Madisonville, LA.  The river is at its widest in Covington and Madisonville, where boating and fishing on the Tchefuncte are extremely popular means of recreation.

I have been enjoying this beautiful and scenic river for the past fifteen years.  I fist started going out on the Tchefuncte with a group of friends from St. Paul's School in Covington, Louisiana.  One of my friends' fathers owned a boat, and a group of us would wakeboard, kneeboard and ski behind the boat during the summer months and on weekends during the school year.

I now reside in a one-room apartment on the Tchefuncte.  One day while searching for information regarding fishing in the river, I observed a stark and utter lack of information on the web regarding this pristine resource. I decided to pick up the slack myself, and worked tirelessly for several hours until the website had been completed.

TchefuncteRiver.com is now the official website of the Tchefuncte River, and your first and only source for news, information about the Tchefuncte, articles and photographs involving the river and any events set to take place therein.

Dog Swallows Fishing Hook, Survives

A recent fishing trip out on the Tchefuncte River in Covington, Louisiana nearly turned disastrous when my two year old male pit bull mix Tank found a jug from a previous fishing adventure that was attached to about three feet of twine with a #4 steel fishing hook at the end of it. The hook still had a dead, dried-up shrimp attached to it from a previous fishing trip that was somehow overlooked while cleaning out the boat.

Needless to say, the dog found the jug with the dried-up shrimp on the end of it and proceeded to swallow the shrimp (and the hook). A friend alerted me to the fact that my dog was trying to eat a fishing hook, but by the time either of us could maneuver our way to the opposite end of the boat (where the dog was stationed), he had already completely swallowed it and had moved on to swallowing the twine connecting the hook to the jug.

Fat Lester's Pit Bull Mix "Tank"

In a split-second decision, I decided against attempting to dislodge the hook, figuring that it would be better to have the hook loose in his stomach than stuck inside his throat or esophagus. He is a large dog (90 pounds or so), but it was a large hook, and the risk of exacerbating the problem only increased with the prospect of an amateur like myself attempting to dislodge a fishing hook from a dog's stomach.

Instead of trying to get the hook out, I immediately grabbed the jug and cut the twine where there was slack at the end nearest the jug so as to not tug on the twine and risk setting the hook inside my dog's stomach. From there, I rushed the boat back to the dock and immediately took the dog to the veterinary ER (emergency room) on Florida Street in Mandeville, Louisiana.

After admitting him to the doggie ER, the doctor proceeded to ask me for a full account of what happened, and I was more than willing to comply, providing her with every seemingly insignificant detail of the event. From there, she proceeded to x-ray Tank to confirm my statement that I was sure I had not inadvertently pulled the twine enough to set the hook inside the dog's body. Sure enough, by the good grace of God the hook was still in the dog's stomach.  It had not been set (piercing beyond the barb so as to lock the hook in place), and had not yet entered the animal's intestines. This, as luck would have it, would turn out to be his saving grace.

The fishing hook swallowed by Fat Lester's dog Tank

Because the hook was still loose inside the dog's stomach, the vet was confident enough about the situation to attempt an upper endoscopy to remove the hook. Given that the alternative was a pretty serious surgery to go in through the dog's belly, cut open his stomach and remove the hook, Tank's fate rested in the potential success or failure of the endoscopy procedure.

For anyone unfamiliar with the term, an endoscopy is a minimally invasive diagnostic procedure used to examine a patient's esophagus, stomach and duodenum using a thin, flexible tube known as an endoscope that can transmit images from inside the patient's body to a TV monitor for an up-close, zoomed-in view. The device can be equipped with additional devices that can do such things as grab or latch onto small objects inside the patient's upper GI (gastrointestinal) tract.

An endoscope is a piece of diagnostic medical equipment used to perform endoscopies (the procedure defined above involving the lowering of the flexible, camera-equipped tube into the patient's upper digestive tract).

Anyway, the doctor briefed me on the situation prior to attempting the procedure. She informed me that if unsuccessful, she would have to perform surgery in order to save the dog, and I granted her approval to take whatever necessary actions needed to be taken in order to save the dog. She assured me that she would not perform surgery unless the endoscopy procedure failed.

Much to my relief, about two hours after leaving the veterinary emergency clinic, I received a phone call from the vet stating that the procedure was a success, my dog was doing fine and was recovering, and that I could come by the next morning to pick him up and settle up on my bill, which came out to more than $1,300.00. She advised against going to pick him up that night, as he was fairly heavily sedated with buprenorphine and was better off spending the night under the supervision of caring animal health professionals in the event something should go wrong in the hours following the procedure.

We had no such bad luck, and the next morning at 9:00 I went back to the animal ER and picked up my dog, who by then had worked up quite an appetite and was extremely happy to see me.

Thanks Dr. Stockton for helping save my dog!

Dr. Donna Stockton: Veterinarian who saved Tank Dog

Hermain Cain Meets Fat Lester

I had the honor and privilege of meeting 2012 GOP Presidential Candidate Herman Cain at a Tea Party event in Mandeville, LA a few weeks back. Mr. Cain was the keynote speaker at the event, which also featured contributions from New Orleans radio personality John Osterlind, St. Tammany Parish radio personality Jeff Crouere and distinguished gentleman and businessman John d'Hemecourt of Abita Springs.

[Photo: GOP Presidential Nominee Herman Cain visits with right-wing conspirator Peter Egan Jr., aka: "Fat Lester"]

Mr. Cain delivered an inspiring speech in which he laid out his philosophy as a candidate for the United States Republican Presidential Nomination in 2012. He spoke of the government's reckless and ever-growing irresponsibility, and promised that if chosen to represent the Republican Party in the 2012 Presidential Election, that he would be the candidate who finally reversed course in hopes of righting the ship. The question implicit in the words "in hopes of" is not whether or not Herman Cain possesses the ability to lead the country back to greatness, but whether or not the unprecedented spending and borrowing that has taken place since the Democrats seized the House in the 2006 mid-term elections in the face of an already massive debt (present BEFORE they took office - they've increased it by an average of $4.07 billion per day SINCE they gained control of Congress). Each year that Nancy Pelosi was Speaker of the House of Representatives the Congress set a new record for national debt. That rise has increased dramatically since the election of Barack Obama as President.

Mr. Cain's speech was not particularly heavy on policy or specific issues per se, as can be expected for what ultimately wound up being something of a quasi-announcement that he would seek the GOP nomination for the Presidency. While technically at the time of the event his now-campaign was simply announcing the formation of a "Presidential Exploratory Committee", he left little doubt that he planned to enter the Republican contest as something of a "dark horse" candidate (no pun intended).

[Photo: GOP Presidential Candidate Herman Cain addresses the crowd at a Tea Party event in Mandeville, Louisiana]

The fact is that Herman Cain is not a politician, and has none of the baggage that all career politicians who have been in Washington for any significant period of time bring with them. Perhaps most significantly, the reluctance to implement the "radical" changes (as Chuck U. Shumer and Dingy Harry like to say) necessary to ensure the long-term economic and financial viability of the United States, the Federal Reserve Bank id its currency. The reality is that the last President in recent memory to positively impact the state of the government had a successful career in the private sector before seeking the governorship of the only state where Hollywood icons have repeatedly contested for (and won) multiple terms as chief executive. Those that have followed (and those that preceded) him have been career public sector elected representatives whose idea of running a business involves laundering taxpayer money to campaign donors who then reinvest it in that Congressman or Senator's "business" ventures, and look where they've taken the country.

Of all the names mentioned so far as possible Republican Presidential contenders, with the exception of Donald Trump who is only putting on a show for the sake of publicity and who is a RINO (Republican In Name Only) at best, none can boast the kind of private sector or executive-level success and experience in general that Herman Cain has achieved. Cain, the son of working-class parents in Georgia, grabbed the American dream by the (fill-in your choice of body part). He knows what working people go through in life, knowledge foreign to far too many in the Washington establishment in both parties.

Finally, in Herman Cain Americans have an opportunity to vote for a black man for President of the United States, not because he's black and it's long-past time the country elected a person of color if for no other reason than to break the taboo, but because if his resume, his mammoth intellect and his charisma are any indication, there's a very strong probability that Herman Cain may very well be the best and most qualified man for the job.

I've now met three four of the top six or seven names being mentioned in association with the GOP Presidential nominating contest, albeit one has been mentioned only as a potential candidate for Vice President as he has repeatedly proclaimed that he planned to seek reelection to his state's governorship and would not seek the Presidency - at least not before his 42nd birthday. This Southern Governor only became eligible to run for the Presidency since the summer of 2006. Anyone not know to whom I am referring?

I know this has gotten a little bit off topic since this is a post about Herman Cain. However, this latter candidate whom I have refused to name (in this post - c'mon, you should know this one) presents a couple of very interesting dynamics as a potential VP consideration. First off, in the ostensibly unlikely event he should team up with Herman Cain, they would represent the first major-party non-white Presidential ticket in the nation's history. Second, should this person join up with another candidate such as say Newt Gingrich, whom I have also met during the SRLC last year (2010 for those of you in Rio Linda) when he consulted with myself and about two-dozen other Tea Party leaders in New Orleans about the prospect of a potential Presidential bid, it MIGHT present a scenario in which I could potentially vote for a different ticket IF the Herman Cain campaign had not won any primary contests before Louisiana's, MAY feel compelled to vote for a ticket other than Herman Cain's. Unless and until that happens, at this point, he's definitely got my vote in the Louisiana GOP Presidential Primary.

[PHOTO: (from left) Peter and Pamela Egan, Herman Cain and Fat Lester]

About Herman Cain (Source: Wikipedia)

Herman Cain (born December 13, 1945) is an American newspaper columnist, businessman, political activist, and radio talk-show host from Georgia. He is best known as the former chairman and CEO of Godfather's Pizza. He is a former deputy chairman (1992–94) and chairman (1995–96) of the Federal Reserve Bank of Kansas City. Cain's newspaper column is distributed by North Star Writers Group. He currently lives in the Atlanta suburbs.

Cain was born and raised in Georgia by working class parents. He earned a bachelor's degree in Mathematics at Morehouse College in 1967, and while working for the U.S. Department of the Navy, a master's degree in computer science from Purdue University.

After completing his master's degree, Cain left the Department of the Navy and began working for Coca-Cola as a business analyst. In 1977, he joined Pillsbury where he rose to the position of vice president by the early 1980s. He left his executive post to work for Burger King – a Pillsbury subsidiary at the time – managing 400 stores in the Philadelphia area. Under Cain's leadership, his region went from the least profitable for Burger King to the most profitable in three years. This prompted Pillsbury to appoint him president and CEO of Godfather's Pizza, another of their then-subsidiaries. Within 14 months, Cain had returned Godfather's to profitability. In 1988, Cain and a group of investors bought Godfather's from Pillsbury. Cain continued as CEO until 1996, when he resigned to become CEO of the National Restaurant Association – a trade group and lobby organization for the restaurant industry – where he had previously been chairman concurrently with his role at Godfather's.

Cain hosted The Herman Cain Show on Atlanta talk radio station News Talk 750 WSB, a CNN radio affiliate until February 2011 and serves as a commentator for Fox News Business and a syndicated columnist distributed by the North Star Writers Group. In 2009, Cain founded "Hermanator's Intelligent Thinkers Movement" (HITM), aimed at organizing 100,000 activists in every congressional district in the United States in support of a strong national defense, the FairTax, tax cuts, energy independence, capping and cutting government spending, restructuring Social Security, and defending the U.S. Constitution. Source: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Herman_Cain

Louisiana DWI Law Double-Standard

In the State of Louisiana, a driver has the legal right to refuse a breathalyzer test should he or she get pulled over by an officer of the law, and should that law enforcement officer attempt to issue the test.  HOWEVER, upon the enactment of HB-445 into law, the penalty for refusing such a test (which is technically legal to do) is the loss of driving privileges for a year for a first-time offense, and two years for any subsequent incidents.

As I found out recently, the standard of openness and transparency so embraced by the state so long as it involves a driver refusing to take the test, is not uniformly applied to situations in which the administration of a breathalyzer test would work to the driver's benefit.

While returning home from a night out with friends in New Orleans, I was pulled over by a St. Tammany Parish Sheriff's deputy near Claiborne Hill in Covington.  I was speeding, and I was caught.  I had not been drinking that evening, a fact the officer called into question.

The officer asked where I was coming from, where I was going, and what I had been doing.  I answered him as straightforward and honestly as I could.  I told him where I had been, what I'd been doing and where I was heading.  Unfortunately for me, while true, my story didn't seem believable.  While it was evident that I was not intoxicated (I hadn't even been drinking --- not even a little), the officer nonetheless put me through an extensive field sobriety test, which I passed with flying colors.

Clearly, something about this situation wasn't registering.  How could it be that a single, 29-year old-man could be driving home alone at 1:00 in the morning from a night out in New Orleans, LA, and NOT be drunk?  This at least was how the deputy decided to view the situation.

Eventually, he decided to let me go home on the condition I leave my car in the Walgreens parking lot at Claiborne Hill.  I had to call a taxi, as both of my brothers and all of my friends within an hour's drive whom I was able to reach by phone were in fact intoxicated, and none of them was anywhere close to being in better shape to drive the car home by myself.

Sure, the cop could have been an even bigger dick.  He could have arrested me anyway, brought me to jail and booked me, only to release me shortly thereafter when results from breath and/or blood tests confirmed that I was in fact sober and free of any and all mood-altering chemicals.

The real irony in Louisiana's zero-tolerance DWI policies mandating twelve months of driver's license suspension for refusing to take a breathalyzer test is that police are under no such obligation to administer the test when doing so would confirm a driver's sobriety.

Throughout the course of the ordeal, I requested not less than three times that the officer administer a breathalyzer test.  All three times, he refused.  The third time I asked, he said that he was "doing me a favor" and that he "(did not) want to hear another word about it."  I interpreted this as his way of telling me that despite the fact that I was (and still am) 100% sober, he could arrest me anyway, and that if I wished to avoid such fate I should stop asking for a means of proving to him that I had not been drinking.

It seems to me that if Louisiana is going to have a law mandating the loss of driving privileges for an entire year for anyone who refuses a breathalyzer test, it would only be fair to grant the citizens the right to take a breathalyzer exam upon the citizen's request if the officer administering the traffic stop suspects the driver of driving while intoxicated.

Field sobriety tests are subjective, often convoluted and frequently require gymnastics that simply cannot be performed while wearing certain types of shoes.  Some are extremely difficult to perform regardless of whether or not a person is sober.  A citizens' right to a breathalyzer exam solves this problem by requiring the officer to administer a test which would quantifiably confirm or remove all suspicions as to a driver's prospective sobriety should the driver request the exam.  If citizens cannot refuse the test without consequences, than law-abiding drivers who have not been drinking should have the right to a test if an officer suspects he or she has been drinking.

What is good for the goose is good for the St. Tammany Parish Sheriff's Office.  While I fully support tough laws aimed at getting drunk drivers off the road, such laws must be a two-way street.  If the test can be required of the driver when it could potentially lead to self-incrimination, it should be required of the officer in circumstances when the driver is indeed sober and willing and able to prove it.