Amazing. If only all of us could have friends and supporters like this ! 

A couple of weeks back Janet had an evening call from friend Alison who said she was outside on the frozen (this is Manitoba after all) river and could Janet make it out to the balcony. It was around seven o'clock and quite dark.

"So I grabbed my parka, gloves, boots, hat, and a flashlight and ventured out. Down below were Alison and her husband, Bruce, and Agatha and her teenage sons, Andy and Scott, chanting "Hugs and Hope, Hugs and Hope, Hugs and Hope, We love you Janet."  Thank you Bruce for the photos.

"Needless to say it was quite the spectacle. They were having so much fun. And I was waving my flashlight around so they would know where I was and that I was enjoying their "serenade" of light. And the timing couldn't have been better. I've been feeling really down since I started radiation. I've had some side effects which have made life even more difficult. And I have to go every weekday for treatment. It's unrelenting. So the light show really raised my spirits."

"It made me laugh in wonder at the creativity of my friends and at the joy they felt in bringing me joy. I've had 10 treatments out of 28 so I'm making progress. If everything goes as planned, I should be finished by March 26th."

"A few of you have commented on my new sign off "Hugs and Hope". I decided that hope is one of my most powerful weapons in the fight against LMS. And the more I can think about hope the better. So I end every email with "Hugs and Hope" as a way to keep reminding myself that no matter how bad it gets I'll never give up and I'll never lose hope. Hugs and Hope to all my Dragon Slayers, Janet."

And, would any page about Janet be complete without  ... (I found these on the internet under a heading, "The World's Ten Worst Puns") :

1. Two vultures board an airplane, each carrying two dead raccoons. The stewardess looks at them and says: "I'm sorry, gentlemen, only one carrion allowed per passenger.

2. Two boll weevils grew up in South Carolina. One went to Hollywood and became a famous actor. The other stayed behind in the cotton fields and never amounted to much. The second one, naturally, became known as the lesser of two weevils.

3. Two Eskimos sitting in a kayak were chilly, but when they lit a fire in the craft, it sank, proving once again that you can't have your kayak and heat it, too.

4. A three-legged dog walks into a saloon in the Old West. He slides up to the bar and announces: "I'm looking for the man who shot my paw."

5. Did you hear about the Buddhist who refused Novocain during the root canal? He wanted to transcend dental medication.

6. A group of chess enthusiasts checked into a hotel and were standing in the lobby discussing their recent tournament victories. After about an hour, the manager came out of his office and asked them to disperse. But why? they asked, as they moved off. Because, he said, I can't stand chess nuts boasting in an open foyer.

7. A woman has twins and gives them up for adoption. One of them goes to a family in Egypt and is named Ahmal. The other goes to a family in Spain; they name him Juan. Years later, Juan sends a picture of himself to his birth mother. Upon receiving the picture, she tells her husband that she wishes she also had a picture of Ahmal. Her husband responds, They're twins! If you've seen Juan, you've seen Ahmal.

8. These friars were behind in their belfry payments, so they opened up a small florist shop to raise funds. Since everyone liked to buy flowers from the men of God, a rival florist across town thought the competition was unfair. He asked the good fathers to close down, but they would not. He went back and begged the friars to close. They ignored him. So, the rival florist hired Hugh MacTaggart, the roughest and most vicious thug in town to persuade them to close. Hugh beat up the friars and trashed their store, saying he'd be back if they didn't close up shop. Terrified, they did so, thereby proving that Hugh, and only Hugh, can prevent florist friars.

9. Mahatma Gandhi, as you know, walked barefoot most of the time, which produced an impressive set of calluses on his feet. He also ate very little, which made him rather frail and with his odd diet, he suffered from bad breath. This made him . what? (Oh, man this is so bad, it's good). A super callused fragile mystic hexed by halitosis.

10. And finally, there was the person who sent ten different puns to friends, with the hope that at least one of the puns would make them laugh. Unfortunately, no pun in ten did.

And, a couple more . . .

A) I’ve been reading something very interesting — Stephen Hawking’s latest book about anti-gravity.  I just can’t put it down.

B) Thanks to fossils, archaeologists have been able to determine that there once a genetic mutation millions of year ago, causing the creation of a five-legged dinosaur.
As far as we know, this is the first evidence we have ever seen of a reptile dysfunction.

C) What do you get after playing the lute for 10 hours straight? Minstrel cramps.

D) I tried to come up with a pun about famous German philosophers, but I Kant