The Simpson Blog

Baby Gordon belts out Temples of Syrinx. I haven't seen Rush in concert since the R30: 30th Anniversary Tour in 2004. I have tickets for the July 12th show at the Halifax Metro Centre, where they'll play the first of two nights in a city they haven't visited since 1987. I'm sure it will be a highly emotional experience for me. The show is the night after Amanda's hysterectomy and cancer debulking surgery, and the night before a weekend of morning show shifts on the radio. I'll be low on sleep and high on stress. I've been trying to familiarize myself with material from the latest Rush album, Clockwork Angels. Their material since Vapor Trails has been hard for me to like. I find most of it oversaturated, overcomplicated and unmelodic. It just sits on top of me like a heavy pile of noise. I hate saying that, but it just has not resonated with me. But at least one song on the newest record moved me, especially in light of recent events at home. I can

I made it to the Relay For Life in Dartmouth NS on Friday night in time to see Amanda enter the Survivors' Victory Lap that starts the event. I recorded the survivors leaving the start line, then this 12-year-old performer from Nova Scotia began singing. Makayla Lynn's song "Fighter" captured my imagination and got stuck in my head. I kept shooting as she kept singing and I imagined putting a video together. A few days later, here it is. In honour of Amanda and Gordon and all the other people who came out that night to walk all night. Celebrate. Remember. Fight back. See more from Makayla Lynn at www.makaylalynnmusic.com . Learn about the Relay For Life at relayforlife.ca .

Don't shave someone's head with a beard trimmer. More specifically, don't shave your wife's chemotherapy-thinned hair with a 20-year-old battery-operated beard trimmer. It's not efficient and it does not produce satisfactory results. Not long after my last post, Amanda's hair was falling out fast and got patchy enough that she decided to go all the way and buzz it short. She'd already had a pro cut her hair from long to short and it looked great. Her hatchet job with kitchen shears actually looked good. But the rate of fallout became too much to endure any more. She asked me to take it off. We were warned not to use a razor. The chemotherapy she's getting can reduce her platelets (meaning any cuts would bleed and be less likely to clot) and her white blood count (meaning a greater chance of infection). Step one was with an old trimmer I use for my beard. I've probably had it for two decades. It runs on a pair of AA batteries and has served m