I hope everyone had a great Breeder’s Cup weekend. I was true to form. Friday always seems to be a better day for me. This year I hit either win, exacta or both in all four Friday races and was well on my way to my best BC ever. On the other hand, on Saturday I was having a mediocre (that’s code for losing) day. I had a nice hit on the smallish exacta in Race 12, keeping me well on the plus side for the weekend. It was a really great way to end the biggest part of the racing year.

I’ve never known a summer to fly by so quickly. One morning the leaves were forming on the trees, a few mornings later they were falling off.

I suppose the brief summer was related to how little I got to enjoy it. In March I was diagnosed with a rare form of bone marrow-cancer. For a few months while I was taking killing doses of chemo I rarely got outside. Going from the couch to the refrigerator and back consumed so much energy I would need a nap to recover.

I won’t go into the details, other than to say I wouldn’t wish how I felt on anyone. It sounds kind of corny, but without horseracing I’m not sure I would have gotten through the summer, short as it seemed. I was able to post selections and write some opinion pieces. When I didn’t – or couldn’t – do anything else, I always had a racing form to look at, or Twitter to read, or a blog to write.

Racing kept me occupied. I don’t know what I would have done without it. I couldn’t eat very much – I’ve lost 25 pounds without trying. And if I did eat it was a small portion of something bland and uninteresting. Exercise was out of the question. Most days it was me on the couch either catching up on all the programs and movies I’ve taped, or watching a baseball game (I watched a lot of baseball), or betting races.

I’ve cut back on publishing selections. Just didn’t have as much energy as I needed to handicap every day. I also stopped participating in most of  the discussions on racing boards. Same reason. Chemotherapy kicks the hell out of you.

The good news is that the chemo seems to be working. I’m functioning a lot better, and the couch isn’t getting quite the workout it got during the summer. The bad news  is that I may have six more months of it. I’ve adjusted to the dosage enough so that I can go to the grocery store, putz around the house, things like that. I’m still not better than 70% on a good day though.

I’ve had a lot of friends stop by to see me and my family has been great. The support makes all the difference in the world. I want to say thanks for that.

Some of you may know that I’ve qualified for the NHC in January. No way I’m going to miss that. I have no delusions about winning. I’m just happy to be going.

For those reasons I’m only publishing picks for AQU on Saturday until after the NHC. I’ll still be publishing blogs and looking into racing issues, so please continue to check the site.

Thanks to everyone who follows my picks.