So now, for the last week, I've been getting comfortable with the idea I might have a bit more aggressive kind of lymphoma than what we were thinking. I'm getting comfortable with this fact because I have a high CD19 count (which means a fair amount of lymphoma cells in the bloodstream), somewhat high Standard Uptake Values on my PET scan...oh, and that little matter of a lymph node that may have quadrupled in two months.

But today, with the CT scans on disk from the hospital in Nebraska, I visit my local oncologist here in Billings. We sit down to compare the scans side-by-side.

And find no difference.

No eight-centimeter node. No much of anything, really; the scans look amazingly, boringly similar. And amazingly, boringly similar is good.

"I'm guessing it was a typo or something on the radiologist's report," my oncologist says.

Maybe. I haven't actually seen the radiologist's report from Nebraska, so I can't be sure. But really, who cares? The big news, the wonderful and glorious news is: there's no change. The cancer's not growing at an alarming rate.

That means I have exactly the same amount of cancer I had two months ago. And, as my new friend Andy points out on the Lymphoma.com message board, it's a different world we live in as lymphoma folks. Having the same amount of cancer as your last scan is cause celebré. Like winning the Super Bowl or something. In fact, I catch myself wanting to say, "I'm going to Disneyland."

So there you go. No change in the cancer. That means I have some time to consider my options, and right now, that means I'll be investigating a vaccine clinical trial from Genitope corporation. It appeals to my inner geek.

I'm just thankful that inner geek only has a 2.5cm para-arotic node.