The PolyBlog

My year in review part 1 – 2022 sucked canal water

December 30 2022

Each year, as January 1st approaches, I start thinking about the past year and my plans and resolutions from the previous January. I often have pretty ambitious plans, and up until a few years ago, I would say I did pretty well overall for any given year. I know I accomplished stuff, even if it wasn’t always as much as I wanted.

Yet, don’t get me wrong. I had impossibly long lists of options of things I wanted to do or at least work on, literally too many things to do in a single year unless I quit work, stopped sleeping, invented a really effective cloning technique, accessed time travel, or recruited henchmen and minions. And even then, it was probably too many things. That wasn’t accidental. The list isn’t meant to be a to do list in the normal sense, it is more of a master options list of sorts. In short, it is just a way of remaining ambitious so I don’t turn into a couch potato playing on my phone.

Last year at this time, I talked about the ghosts of previous years. I went back 31 years and looked at various docs from the 1990s, 2000s, and 2010s. (https://www.thepolyblog.ca/the-ghost-of-new-years-past/)

As I went through that review, I identified some things that were important to me, some of PolyWogg’s Rules so to speak.

– Dare to dream but live in the real world
– An unexamined life isn’t worth living.
– To thine own self be true.
– Better I be a dolphin swimming with sharks, than a shark.
– Some of the saddest words are “unrealized potential”. Who begins too much, accomplishes little; who begins too little, wastes a life.
– 20% of your effort gives you 80% of your results, the remaining 80% delivers the next 20%.
– Being busy is not the same as being happy. You may not always be able to be around but at least be nearby.
– Every encounter deserves to be treated as sacred. There’s no such thing as a casual conversation.
– Never assume someone will say “no”, don’t be afraid to vocalize your desires.

The scary part though is that as I moved into looking at 2020, 2021, and 2022, many of the main items on my big to do list and my yearly to do list remained the same. I wanted to learn to bake, help Andrea and Jacob with their stuff/issues, improve my website and get into some astronomy areas, plus something “creative”. That kind of still holds for this year.

Wrapping up 2022

I often try to think of metaphors to bind years together. I was watching some YouTube videos as well as reading a recent post from Chuck Wendig, and a sense started to gel that perhaps 2022 isn’t a year at all. Not a standalone year. If 2020 was the lost year, and 2021 was merely a watered down echo year, then 2022 was supposed to be the rebuild year. The year that everything returned to normal. But in Chuck’s post, he noted a metaphor from his wife that 2022 was the mental equivalent of defragging a hard drive. After two years of everything getting jumbled across the whole disk, saved here / there / everywhere, a mental defrag realigns all the files back into some form of contiguous blocks. Extending the metaphor too far, you could even argue that some of those blocks had missing data, incomplete files that ended up just getting truncated or deleted due to gaps.

As I started the year, I had my paradigm (my development model, generally), and my tools for planning, plus my PolyWogg’s Rules. And it let me set some big goals.

Under Learning, I wanted to get a 3D printer. And I did. Well, sort of. I bought it in May, and then it sat in my basement for six months. I got someone in one of the local groups to assemble it for me in November, and it’s ready to go, but I have another big project to finish first before I let myself get sucked into playing. I’ll give myself two stars out of five for that one.

Under Reading, a lot of what I planned was my own Reading Challenge group. But something untoward happened early in the year with my online experiences, and I divorced myself from much of the online engagement I had created. The net effect of that was to remove my access to the Reading Challenge and send me off on a search for new homes for my engagement. I found a bunch, but they were too remote for me…if I do them or not, no one notices except me. As life intervened, I dropped almost all of it. I’ll give myself one star for this one.

Under Astronomy, I had grand plans that started with simple sorting and would have ended with trying out new scopes. The sorting happened, at least in rough terms, but nothing else did. One star.

Under IT, I had plans to set up a bunch of stuff in the basement, none of which happened, although I have done a decent job of sorting some stuff. Two stars.

Under Finances, I had some health claim stuff that mostly got resolved (some pieces outstanding) and taxes to be done (mostly by Andrea). We also pulled it together enough to switch all of our investments over to a better advisor, bank a bunch of extra cash, and generally get things in much better shape. Four stars out of five, although I could be convinced it’s five out of five since we went way farther than I thought we would on the planning / organizing side.

Overall, for those five areas under my “Mind/Intellect” quadrant, it would average out to about 2/5 per item.

In the Heart/Emotion quadrant of my human development model, Family is the first item. Looking back, it seems almost laughable. My goals were simple — help Jacob and Andrea with pandemic adjustments, plan some weekly family night activities, etc. I was looking to slightly improve our personal connections, a bit more support to my family if you will. I was not expecting that almost the entire year would be adjusted to only focus on this item.

For those who read my blog posts in the last year, you’ll know that we started the year with Andrea dealing with some lingering breathing issues and some leg pain. It was not entirely clear what it was linked to, only suspicions. Until we moved into February when it became obvious that her lymphoma numbers had jumped. After five years since diagnosis with no treatment warranted yet, it was time to start treatment. So she did. Six rounds of chemo, March to July. She was off work, some parts of the chemo treatment went well, some parts didn’t. Lots of appointments. Lots of trips to the hospital, labs, pharmacies, other things. While overall things went “well”, as they say, the mental energy required sucked all energy out of anything else. Other projects? Fuhgeddaboutit.

Was I the perfect father or husband for support? Nope. I didn’t suck, I wasn’t horrible, but I wasn’t the poster child of calm and support either. I did what I could, I suppose it is difficult to ask for more. But I found it really hard to balance work and family for the year. Many weeks I just felt pulled in too many directions, even after the chemo stopped, where I had to get Jacob to / from school, Andrea had appointments even for massage or physio, and I was trying to balance a busy work schedule around it.

In the end, I’ll give myself three stars out of five overall. I coped, I supported, I survived…I didn’t “thrive”. And some of that blows back too. Andrea could see me struggling with the stress, and if someone asks me, I talk about it. She doesn’t, she tends not to vocalize what she’s feeling, more able to articulate it in writing later when the immediacy is gone. Which is a vicious cycle for stress too. She wants to know what’s on my mind, but I can’t really talk to her about my stress without adding to her stress, yet she can’t articulate what she’s feeling, so I try to just push past it and talk it about where I can with others instead. In the end, I blog to release.

For Home, I’m a bit surprised looking at the list. I actually managed to hit most of the big items linked to organizing and purging. I’m almost completely done the basement, mostly in the last six weeks, and with Andrea’s help. I had hoped to finish all this two years ago and didn’t, last year and didn’t, this year? Mostly done. I’ll give myself four stars out of five.

Overall, for the two areas under my “Heart/Emotion” quadrant, I would give myself three stars out of five (heavy weight to the family side).

For my Soul/Social quadrant, it starts with my creative side and the Website Setup. Because I had some free time late at night, AND I revamped all my social engagement out of necessity back in February, I actually went pretty far in this category. I have reoriented both websites, added a new one for my niece, and maintained the other ones too. I actually went farther than I expected to last January, so I’m giving myself five out of five.

For Writing, I wasn’t surprised when the first 9 months of the year shifted in focus away from this side of my life. I did manage to add a fair amount of content to my websites, BUT I didn’t finish the HR guide that I recommitted to in November. I just didn’t have the mental energy to get there. I’ll give myself three stars out of five overall.

For Blogging related to reviews, I finished all my Book Reviews, added another 20 or so, AND moved almost everything over to a new format on my other site plus made new backups in OneNote that I’m pretty happy about. Five out of five, bumped by my joy and delight with the progress.

For Bloggables, aka other areas, it’s a bit hard to decide. I didn’t write about what I intended to write about. But I DID write a lot about mental health for the year. I’ll call it four stars out of five.

For Photography, the only thing I did was do a basic start on GIMP editing. I’m organized, but I’m only giving myself two out of five on that one.

For Volunteering, I had greatly reduced my commitments. I finished off stuff for RASC National, and still did the audit of the RASC Ottawa books. But I gave up star parties, offering only advice to the new person. My effort was more than I initially thought looking back, so I’ll give myself four out of five stars.

Overall, then, for the Soul / Social quadrant, I averaged around four out of five, being a bit generous.

The Body / Health quadrant is often high on my priority list and low on my accomplishment list. For official Health, I wanted to focus on some basic stuff. I had started Ozempic as an injection, but it wracked my stomach too much and I couldn’t increase the dosage to something particularly useful. I dropped some weight, but not enough. Later in the year, it started to inch back up. I had planned to switch to a new doctor until I met him and saw the way he runs his practice. Hour-long waits were not uncommon, jammed in a small waiting room like sardines. Jacob and Andrea switched, and I thought about it enough to fill out some forms, but in the end, I decided to stay with my current doctor. I hate her bedside manner, but by the end of the year, that wasn’t an issue — she left to do something else (permanent or temporary, I’m not sure), and I have a new one. Sign me up and call me happy. What really took the hit, though, was mental health. I thought 2022 was going to be the year that I moved away from pandemic “survival” into something resembling rebirth, and instead everything else got washed away to focus on either work stress or home stress. Call it two stars out of five.

I felt good at the start of the year for Fitness. I had the workout machine set up, I’d figured out the plan for the year, and then life went in the crapper and I stopped just about everything. Call it zero stars out of five.

For Cooking, I didn’t have huge ambitious plans. Some basic stuff that I wanted to do to expand my horizons a bit. Instead? Not much. We have an air fryer and have done a few new recipes, plus a new toaster oven, but overall, zero stars out of five.

For Activities, I had about 20 little projects, mostly creative outlets for myself, and I did absolutely NONE of them. Some similar ones show up under other headings, and while I could compensate in those other areas, these ones had no such luck. Another zero out of five.

Overall, for the body quadrant, I averaged zero out of five.

I had some ideas throughout the year, little mental boosts here and there. A series of additional “fun” things to help perk up my day — I did none of them. I worked on some reorg stuff at the start of the year, and it took me the whole year to get back to it. I planned stuff around some “themes” for projects, and then my life focus changed. Zero progress.

One small project, similar to that of the reviews, was to recreate my “TBR” pile of all the books I want to read, not just the ones I’ve reviewed. I’ve made a fair amount of progress on it over the course of the year, and I’m quite happy with that progress. I didn’t think it would be as much work as it is, I drastically underestimated it, and it may take me several years to plug away at it to the “final” version so to speak. But it’s some progress at least.

Other elements

So I gave myself:

2/5 for mind/intellect items;
3/5 for heart/emotion items;
4/5 for soul/social items; and,
0/5 for body/health items.

Overall that would be about 2/5 on average. And you know what? I’ll take it. Cuz this year was mostly about survival. The fact that it isn’t negative or that I’m not literally dead is probably a win.

One giant piece is missing from my list, and it’s hard to write. Not because it’s emotionally difficult; rather, I feel at a loss for how to nuance or describe it probably in the right context and perspective. It’s my career. I’ll look at that next.

Space by Sarah Creese (2011) – BR00220 (2022) – 🐸🐸🐸🐸⚪

November 20 2022

Plot or Premise

This is part of the “First Encyclopedia” series focusing on Space. It is aimed at young readers up to early middle grade. The book is high on pictures and low on text, with about 200 words on the universe, galaxies, the solar system, the Sun, the Earth and Moon, Mercury/Venus/Mars, Jupiter, Saturn, Uranus and Neptune, space exploration, satellites, and the International Space Station.

What I Liked

The section on galaxies includes the standard prose and big pics of the Milky Way, but it also incudes a pic of the Milky Way above mountains (a night landscape) and three break-out pics showing irregular galaxies (which looks more like a globular cluster, to be honest), a spiral galaxy, and an elliptical galaxy. They look a little closer to what you might see through a telescope than a big Hubble-quality deep dive, which is great. The section on stars is nicely done in terms of showing colours, mentioning if hot or cold, and magnitude (without getting into actual definitions of magnitude). The individual planetary sections are fine, nothing special, although Jupiter is better done than the rest, with good detail on the bands and storms.

What I Didn’t Like

The solar system section is a bit basic in terms of the overall composition of the solar system from the Sun all the way out to dwarf planet Pluto. It does include the asteroid belt, but more on structure would enhance the learning. I also found the section on the Sun really basic. However, I was the most disappointed with the section on the Moon. It shows basic phases, with real photos (not just sketches or artwork), but the photos are relatively terrible considering the quality of everything else. I have better photos with my smartphone and scope. Some of the overviews are dated, of course, no way around that, but under space exploration, they note the earth-based Keck telescopes; yet some of the photos IN the book are from Hubble, and it isn’t covered? It is mentioned in passing as part of the Satellite section.

The Bottom Line

A bit basic, but better than most for balance with some good sections

An ambulance ride does not improve mental health

November 15 2022

That’s just a fun fact that I wanted to share with you. I don’t know if riding in an ambulance is on the morbid side of your bucket list, one of those “well, I’d like to but not because I need to” activities, but well, I can check it off whatever list it was on. Sigh.

I blame the cook

So let’s have a small health recap. I have diabetes, under control with mild medication. I have reflux, also under control. Oh, and high blood pressure. And again, under control. I’m a maintenance worker basically.

About 18 years ago, my brother had a heart attack. That may not sound particularly relevant, but the behaviour that went with it was…he had pizza for dinner, over-indulged a bit he said, and then had bad heartburn later that night. He put up with it until about six in the morning and decided it wasn’t going away, so off to emergency he went. Nope, not heartburn. It was just his heart. Not surprising, given our family history for both my father and my sister. Plus own comorbidities for diet, etc.

Anyway, fast forward a month after that, and I was at home with Andrea. I don’t remember what we had for dinner. But at about 8:00 p.m., my digestive system started kicking up a fuss. Really aggressively. I took something, Gaviscon I think (my default save all for digestive stuff), and there was no change. Worst than I had ever had it before. It was discomforting, and a bit painful, probably a 4 or 5 for a scale out of 10. Not screaming agony, but it had my attention. Probably just digestion, I thought. But well, that’s what everyone thinks. Including my brother. And I knew that time was muscle, so I trundled off to emergency to be sure.

Of course, the inevitable happened. I went to emerg, and they tested me on a monitor, give me no results, and send me to triage waiting. I didn’t know at the time that of course the nurse basically ruled out the most likely signs of a cardiac event, but I didn’t know that, so I sat around for about 7 hours wondering if I was having a heart attack. Nope, I finally saw the resident and supervising doctor, they gave me a pink lady (lidocaine is the numbing agent of choice, it comes in a pink liquid form like a small shot of Pepto Bismal, and down the hatch it went). Instant relief, 7 hours later. They hooked me up with acid reduction meds, they generally work for me as a preventative, keep things under control, except once in a while I’ll have a bit too much of something, or over-indulge on something like pizza, and I get a bit of residual indigestion. Over the last almost 20 years, I have come to know what it feels like, and I take Tums if it is basic or I feel like I need to just burp a little, or I go to Level 2 for the Gaviscon. My father had similar issues and Gaviscon always worked for him too. Some people swear by the pink over-the-counter stuff, but Gaviscon works.

So, the last few weeks have been a bit stressful at work, getting into the new rhythm of the job, and I’ve eaten out more than I should. I’m also trying to do some other stuff around the house and fix my website, I don’t have a lot of bandwidth for planning meals, and I’ve generally been doing a crap job of eating healthy even without going out. Let’s say I didn’t go into Sunday with a stellar foundation. Can you see where I’m going with this?

Yep, we went out for dinner to Golden Palace on Carling Avenue. Some consider it one of the best Chinese restaurants outside of Chinatown, and swear by their spring and egg rolls. We had it a couple of times for take out, but we’re trying to “emerge” from our hermit shells a bit more, so we went on Sunday night. I confess, again, that my stomach was NOT doing as well as I might have liked, but I figured I’d take it easy on stuff, avoid spices, just have a nice simple meal and it wouldn’t cause too many issues. If I had a bit of gas, I’d take Gaviscon.

Dinner was great, and it is the first time we’ve taken Jacob to an actual Chinese restaurant (outside of more buffet-like places). We haven’t taken him to Chinatown but it’s on the list. We lost our favourite Vietnamese restaurant, and we all like Chinese, so thought we’d give it a go. Jacob loves their Sweet and Sour Pork so we had some of that, with a small portion for me…I’ve eaten it before, no worries. Won Ton soup is popular for Jacob and I, and if Andrea can’t find something more interesting, she enjoys it too. All good.

We wanted to introduce Jacob to something with Black Bean Sauce, even though he tells us that he doesn’t like black beans. We told him we don’t either, but the combo is good, so we went for a chicken option. It’s not something we normally have, can’t even remember the last time I had it. Could be 10 years at least. I still salivate over the first time I had it at Ben Ben’s in Chinatown way back in about 1993. It seemed fine, both at the time and in retrospect. I didn’t go crazy or anything on it, had a small serving.

My error might have been the beef and broccoli. I like beef, I like broccoli, and I love how it is served so crisp. The downside? It had a TON of oil on it. And I had it as my main dish. It went down fine, no issues, came home feeling fine. In fact, I was a little proud of myself that I didn’t over-indulge in anything, I kept under control.

Jump ahead to midnight, Andrea and I were binge-watching a show, time for bed, shut off the show, sat up and wham. A little bit of indigestion that had been sitting there hit me like a vise on my chest.

A two-inch swatch of pain right below both breasts, stretching basically nipple-to-nipple. And it was intense. I initially thought it was just partly positional. Nope, I could not get it to subside. And on a pain scale? It was hitting a solid six with pretensions at seven. Feeling like NOTHING I have felt before. Way different than what I felt almost 20 years ago, it did not feel like simple indigestion.

Initial denial

Hey, my name is Sadler, I have to start with denial. We got ready for bed, I was convinced that once I laid down, got comfortable, I’d be fine. It had dropped to about a five or so for pain and discomfort. And I knew it wasn’t likely my heart. Oh, wait, I skipped that part of the backstory.

About 4 years ago, I was having some weird chest pain that seemed positional. Which made no sense. But a couple of times I had it while exerting myself, raised with doctor, they sent me to Heart Institute for full review, all good. My heart came back totally fine. I’ve also done stress tests. All good. Which is not to say I’m good to go for life or there aren’t ongoing risk factors, but all things being equal, it may not be the first likely cause.

It took me about 30m to get ready for bed, tried Tums, tried Gaviscon, working slowly I thought. I laid down, tried to get comfortable. Back? Nope. Right side? Nope. Back again. Nope. And the pain was back, up to a 7 now. WTF?

Okay, I knew that wasn’t normal for any of the previous experiences, and as I said, this felt different. Soooo I was thinking…could it BE my heart? Doesn’t quite feel like it should be, but time is muscle, as they say. Well, frak. And I was in too much pain to drive myself or take a cab to the hospital to be sure, and if it was my heart, well time is muscle. Crap, frak, and double fraking crap.

Okay, I called it. I was going to the hospital and if it was my heart, I needed an ambulance. I didn’t want to go that way, but well, that was the most viable option. If it was indigestion, I probably didn’t need to go. If it wasn’t, then I definitely needed to go.

Andrea called while I got dressed, they took about 8-10 minutes to get there. Brought in portable heart monitor, everything showed normal. But the pain was still present. The 911 operator told Andrea to have me take aspirin (it helps break up clots if there are any) and the paramedics gave me some more. We were at the house about 15 minutes I think, and then I walked outside to the gurney, they loaded me into the Ambulance. We sat in front of the house for another 10 minutes or so, and then they took me to Queensway Carleton.

You know that bucket list thing I mentioned? It’s not so exciting. I was sitting up a bit on the gurney, but I’m kind of long, so there was no support for my head or upper shoulders. I felt every bump on the way, I felt like I was riding in the back of a pickup and needed to hold on. Every sway sent me to the side. It was fine, but I didn’t feel particularly safe, I must say. It’s a short run to the hospital from my house, maybe 5-7 minutes.

Triage

The triage nurse took all the details from the paramedic while I hung out on the gurney. It was not particularly comfortable, not only just the pain was still there (holding in about a 4-5) plus some general stomach-ache discomfort, but also because I couldn’t find a position where my legs and back were well-supported. They offered to move me to sitting up in a wheelchair which I probably should have taken, but I stayed put because I was more afraid the chairs would be too uncomfortable, unable to stretch out a bit.

They took blood to test for traces of cardiac arrest, ran another set of monitors through the portable machines. The blood test came back clean-ish, but there’d been some clotting issues, so they redid it with an IV entry in my arm just in case. I probably should have taken the IV, but I didn’t feel like I needed it and they didn’t push it. The second bloodwork came back clean too.

All of this time — about 90-120 minutes, I was just hanging out at the hospital. But the paramedics had to stay until they got through all of that testing. Why? I have no idea. There were lots of paramedics hanging out, even for a quiet night. After a while, they were down to just 4 of them, just chatting. One veteran of 32 years was chatting with a newbie of 2 months. Swapping stories but mostly listening to the old-timer. I learned some interesting things, maybe I’ll use them in a book some day. But me? I just wanted some answers.

My pain and discomfort were down to about 3-4 when triage “accepted” me and they transferred me to the regular waiting room. It was dead quiet, only 2 people in the entire place. And the paramedics left.

About 20 minutes later, I was called into the back area to see the doctor for the night. He basically told me that they had pretty much ruled out my heart and he was instead much more interested in my gallbladder. I can tell you, gallbladder was not on my list of pool picks if we’d been running a pool. Heart had been relatively eliminated as soon as the paramedics ran the monitor at my house. I still wanted to go to the hospital though as I was in too much pain not to go. I’d thought of kidneys (hey, I’m diabetic, EVERYTHING makes me think of kidneys!), but didn’t seem likely. I know what kidney pain feels like, this wasn’t it.

Spleen was on my list. But it had been on my list in the last month anyway for some extra discomfort I had on the left side of my body at one point. Likely early indigestion stuff in the month. I’ll remain in denial about that for the future for a while longer. Pancreas? Liver? Ulcer? Gallbladder never made my list.

So after he told me that it was likely my gallbladder, I checked out the list of symptoms (as did Andrea, she was at home with Jacob but I had texted her). Yep, they look like a lot of related symptoms. Okay, huh. What was next?

First up, they had decided it was gastro, and would give me the lidocaine. You get it in a small cup with a straw and told to try to get it down as fast as possible, as deep in our throat as you can, to stop the numbing agent from working on your throat and tongue. That wasn’t awesome for someone with a HUGE gag reflex, and I started to feel nauseated. I had a vomit bag, but I never had to open it!

Secondly, while he tried to do a basic ultrasound in the examining room, he needed a full ultrasound and tech to review it. They wouldn’t be available until the morning.

Thirdly, I needed to do more extensive bloodwork looking at all my other organs outcomes, not just the heart that had mostly been ruled out.

He gave me an option to hang out at emerg for the next five hours until I could go to imaging, plus another couple of hours after that with them for results of everything. No thanks, that didn’t sound like fun. I offered to do the bloodwork so that would be done before the morning, which prompted some serious thought.

He looked at me, looked out into the bay. Looked at me, looked out into the bay. He then said, “Well, we could do that, but we only have 1 nurse right now and she has 25 patients to monitor.” Oh, right, okay then, tomorrow morning it would be!

I grabbed a cab home which seemed like more work than it should have been to order and come, got home, and the pink lady had fully taken effect by then. My discomfort was still there, like an upset stomach, but still thinking it was gallbladder, I followed the advice of some reputable organizations online that said to sleep on my left side so my gallbladder would be free to do its magic with no compression. It worked. Andrea didn’t even hear me come in. I fell asleep around 4:00 a.m. and slept solidly until 8:00 a.m. or so.

Because life continues

I had no real concept of time for any of the night before. We didn’t call the ambulance until after midnight and I was home in bed by 4:00 a.m.? How was that possible? I felt like I was there for hours and hours. I normally run Jacob to school, but I was not up to it this morning. I generally don’t say no to that, ever, I make it work. This morning? No, I was not going to be vertical in time. We let him stay home, as he was likely to be worried anyway.

I was a little stressed for the day. Sure, I was at the hospital, that trumps everything for my own work, of course. Except I wasn’t dying or anything. I was home. And I was supposed to act today, as my Director and other two managers were away, as was my #2 in my team. It was like the perfect storm. And with 4 hours sleep, I wasn’t running on all cylinders, that’s for sure.

My cellphone rang a couple of times before 9:00 and I knew it had to be the imaging department. I don’t get a lot of calls. And before work? Almost none. But I wasn’t ready to talk to anyone yet, I was still dozing. I’d had a conversation with Andrea about Jacob, but I don’t even know if I was coherent or not. I dozed until 9:00 but I had to get up…not for work. Not for Jacob. Because my bladder was trying to get my attention. 🙂 You know, normal stuff.

Talked to the imaging people, agreed to 10:00. No food for me, just as well, I didn’t know if I wanted anything. The ultrasound took almost 45 minutes to an hour. One star, would not recommend. I have increased empathy for the pregnant women out there…It never looks like they’re pressing that hard, but they had to work hard on me today to see the organs. Too much blubber in the way.

And apparently, the tech needs to concentrate. I was nervous, asking questions, babbling basically. Until she told me essentially that I was distracting her and she needed to reduce the chit-chat, plus I was moving while talking. A very nice way to tell me to STFU. Back to emergency, a bit of confusion checking me in as I already had the arm bracelet from last night, but they got me sorted, all good.

While I was in the waiting rooms in multiple parts of that journey, I was using my workphone to update various people about being half out of it for the day, everyone was concerned, solicitous and reassuring of course. I have a great work environment. But I still wanted a few files to keep moving. Cause life continues and I wasn’t in pain anymore.

They did the bloodwork and sent that off, back to the waiting room. Finally got called around noon to go over to an examining room. And the doctor gave me the diagnosis.

Something I ate

My gallbladder appears fine. No signs of stones. No signs of anything.

Liver? All good.

Spleen? Not distended.

Everything across the board? All good.

So despite it looking exactly like the description of a gallbladder attack, as the night doctor had suggested, the body and tests say otherwise.

Which means it was likely just something I ate. Most likely either the excess oil on the beef and broccoli or perhaps the pork was too fatty. Not likely the black bean sauce, but we can’t rule it out. Or maybe there was MSG in the meal. Or maybe it was just the accumulated load of the last few months, years, decades on my body.

The solution is pretty basic — totally bland diet for about 3 days, slowly reintroduce other stuff, and adjust my diet over time. Be more careful about what I eat.

I was back home around 2:00 and ate some soup and toast that Andrea made for me. Then I did some work for about an hour, although I don’t know for sure, I wasn’t doing well on tracking time. Andrea went over to the pharmacy with Jacob for me to get some ginger ale, more aspirin (the other batch had expired) just in case, and some Pepto Bismal for a possible future re-occurence.

A small mental downturn

I could mentally kick myself that I ended up taking an ambulance to the hospital for what was basically indigestion, but it was really painful, so if I hit that level again, I would need to go anyway. And I don’t want to hit myself too hard at the risk of not going the next time I think something could be my heart. Which of course they all hammered me hard on, congratulating me on NOT just dismissing it but coming in to have it checked out immediately. The paramedics were talking about all these people they’d brought in for actual heart attacks where the person was having a heart attack while continuing to do chores around the farm, cuz the chores needed to be done. I don’t think I’d be that crazy, but then again, I was working on my phone all day.

I’m generally okay with signs of changing lifestyle and diet. But what is kicking me around a bit are two things.

First, it wasn’t like I had over-indulged, big and heavy, or anything. I ate basic portions, didn’t over order. I ate responsibly, if I’m looking for a description. That doesn’t mean I haven’t done OTHER things wrong and maybe this was the accumulated impact of the last little while in particular. But it’s a bit hard to “avoid” the trigger the next time if you didn’t see what you ate as a giant red flag in the first place. Andrea agreed, I hadn’t gone hog wild or anything. So that’s a bit disconcerting for the future…how big a trigger will things be? If oil on beef was a trigger, what else might be vs. a full aggressive change in diet? If I have to do the latter, it can be done. But I need some semblance of scale too, and I don’t really have one yet. The only way to know is to try certain things in the future and see how my body reacts. Which is a weird place to be, honestly. There have been other nights where, for example, I’ll decide to have an extra slice or two of really good pizza. Should I? No, but it has never been more than mild indigestion, and I was willing to pay the price. This time? I had a small indulgence (the oil) and I got a five-alarm fire in my stomach? Hard to set up a good warning system other than just trial and error in moderation.

Second, and this is a bit harder to adjust to, there’s no treatment option for the future. My gallbladder was fine. If it had been that, they could have removed it. But it’s not. So it’s just that my stomach reacted. If it happens again, I asked if there was something else I should be taking besides the Gaviscon which is my nuclear option usually. And it didn’t help. So what else is above Gaviscon? Basically, nothing.

If it happens again, I just have to ride it out. If it is bad enough that I need the lidocaine, I can go to emerg. But there doesn’t seem to be a Rx option for something like my acid reflux meds, but more of a “responsive side”. I can do everything I can for the preventative side, maybe that’s easier or harder, but it can be done. But not having an option for treatment at home if/when it happens again? Yeah, that’s not fun to think about.

I should celebrate it wasn’t my heart. I know that.

And I didn’t have to have surgery to remove an organ. Another plus, all my original organs are still inside my body. All original equipment.

But the thought that I could eat something with a bit more spice or impact than I’m expecting, that I might end up in a full-on level 6-7 pain experience, that I either go to the hospital for the lidocaine or I just ride it out, that’s not a great mental thought process I want to spend much time on.

It may be “just indigestion”, but it sure kicked the crap out of my body over the last 24 hours. I’m exhausted physically, mentally and emotionally. Hopefully, moderation is sufficient and I don’t have to be anal-retentive or paranoid. I can handle what it means at home, not sure I want to handle what it means when I travel to inlaws or at the cottage or visiting friends. As I said, it’s just a mental health thing. I’ll adjust to the new normal eventually, but trial and error is rarely my preferred method of learning.

Weather and Space by Helen Young and Chris Oxlade (2010) – BR00219 (2022) – 🐸🐸⚪⚪⚪

November 12 2022

Plot or Premise

Part of an Interactive Explorer series, this book is aimed at kids, and includes flaps, pull tabs, wheels and acetates. The book is divided into two, with Section 1 aimed at the weather. It covers weather extremes, changing climate, floods, droughts, winds, big storms, thunder and hail, and extreme snow.

What I Liked

I was mainly reviewing the text to see what they shared about space in Section 2 for younger grades. Overall, it covers the night sky, star maps, suns and stars, the life of a star, constellations, galaxies, planets, the moon, smaller bodies, and exploring space. All are good topics for those new to space.

What I Didn’t Like

The added features seem out of place in the book — the text is written for middle-school level or a bit below who would find the features childish, while the “features” are more suited to early grades who wouldn’t understand the text. For the space section, the order makes no sense. We start off with big areas, come into the sun, back out to stars and DSOs, back down to the solar system moon, and back out to small bodies.

The Bottom Line

Poor design and odd choice of organization for the space section

Observer’s Handbook, 2023 by RASC (2022) – BR00218 (2022) – 🐸🐸🐸⚪⚪

November 11 2022

Plot or Premise

The RASC Observer’s Handbook is the Royal Astronomical Society of Canada’s annual guide to help amateur astronomers with their hobby for the coming year. James Edgar is the editor of the annual edition. In the interest of full disclosure for my review, I am an active member of RASC Canada and have interacted with the editor online infrequently over the last few years.

Review

The guide is an obvious challenge to produce, as the level of the observers who buy it varies so widely. You have newbies who may not even have a telescope yet, but who might get it for Christmas as a gift. If so, they may find it a bit technical. Dry even. It is heavy on info and light on pictures, all black and white except for the gorgeous cover. You have a knowledgeable moderate astronomer who already knows how to do most things and wants lists or tables, a reference guide, and perhaps a few special topics to learn about new aspects. And then there are the hard-core astronomers who could likely write a technical manual on optics, wavelengths, gaseous anomalies, or a whole host of other aspects of space. Some of them want REALLY technical specs on things, and scientific discussions of some of the topics, way beyond the average user.

The handbook is divided into 13 sections and the main interest for me in the review is if the newbie to a moderate user can find useful stuff quickly and easily, and in digestible chunks.

All three groups may benefit from the Introduction (pp 1-18) which lists observatories around the world, major star parties, and planetariums. There is also a list of internet resources, although I haven’t found the list as helpful as it once was…I would prefer a more curated list that suggests site A or B with details on what you can find there. However, the major bonus in the intro is the section on “Teaching and the Observer’s Handbook” by Lauri Roche who heads up the national outreach committee. While the article is aimed at teachers, a newbie looking to learn could follow the same advice and order suggested.

The next section is entitled Basic Data (pp 19-38). It’s a good start but the newbie is likely to be turned off by coordinate symbols and terminology, or astronomical precession, but gravitate towards handy sky measures (diagrams that tell you how to hold your hand out in front of you to measure sky distances in degrees — such as your full fist from pinkie knuckle to thumb knuckle at the side being about 10 degrees). The next part of the chapter deals with elements of the solar system, and nothing screams “read me!” like the title “Heliocentric Osculating Orbital Elements for 2023 referred to the Mean Ecliptic and Equinox of J2000.0”. If you accidentally find yourself in an introductory high-school or university physics class test, and you need a cheat sheet for measures and formulas, pp 29-32 have you all set up.

Do you have Time (pp 39-48) for the next section? Of course, you do. Personally? I don’t. It is dense and technical and while there is some good stuff in there, the average astronomer needs to know about 2% of it. Maybe. They’d benefit from knowing it all, sure. We all would. On the other hand, if it isn’t your jam, it WILL serve you quite well as an insomnia cure.

The next section on Optics and Observing (pp 49-93) is probably one of the most important topics for people to understand early. It goes through telescope parameters, exit pupils, magnification, dimming effects, night vision, and eyeglasses, all of which basically tell you how well you are going to be able to see something. Every year, I review the sections to see if it is any clearer, no pun intended, and I feel like the eyeglasses section seems to be presented a bit more simply than in past years. Does the average person need all that info or will they use it? Not unless it turns their crank. I’m personally more interested in what it all means, or how you can adjust for some of it. The average user with no particular eye issues, they tend to be right in the middle of the pack with no discernible problem. For those at either end of the spectrum — near-sighted or far-sighted — they probably need a simple paragraph to tell them what to do. Personally, I’d like some discussion of outreach and what to do when the masses come to look through the scope. Applied optical issues, if you will.

There’s the default required article on binoculars. I confess I am not a big fan of binoculars as beginner observer instruments. I love the theory, but in practice, I see a lot of people struggle to hold them steady and to coordinate what they are seeing in a way that is enjoyable. I don’t know how many times I’ve seen people hand binos to kids and expect them to suddenly “see the sky” in all its wonder. Instead, most of the time, they say nice things, and most of them are lying their butts off. They can’t see anything, and most of them can’t even get it to focus let alone hold it still long enough to point in a specific area. And if they have any eye issues? Fuhgeddaboutit. I much prefer to give newbies a scope trained on a specific object and the only thing they have to do is look and adjust the focus for their eyes. However, one failing that I find with a lot of information out there about binos are the models discussed. Some of them start at $500 and go up to $2000 as if everyone can afford that price point. That’s not a starter price for newbies, that’s a price that tells them they can’t afford the hobby. Some of the info in the section is out of date, referencing articles from 1998 and 2000 without any obvious realization that the market has changed dramatically. Alan Dyer wrote an article for Sky News in the summer of 2020 that goes through and rates a bunch of big-name entry-level ones that are available at different price points up to $300. It is a far superior article and goes through all of the issues in much more accessible terms.

By contrast, the articles on filters, limiting magnitudes, hints for observing Deep Sky objects, and keeping a logbook are quite excellent. Yet then I hit the ones about weather forecasting for astronomy. The big sources are listed, sure, but there is literally nothing about apps to use. 90% of people under the age of 40 would go to an app before they would go to a website URL and no mention of other ways to get the same information. When I get to the last piece — a primer on astrophotography — I was fully expecting a faint reference to anything involving a smartphone. I was pleasantly surprised to see it updated considerably. It’s a bit basic for its advice, and maybe undersells what you can do, but it is far better than most advice on AP out there that treats smartphones as barely able to do anything more than an Etch-A-Sketch could do.

The next section is the money shot for the handbook — The Sky Month by Month (pp 94-121). If you want to know anything about any of the objects in our solar system for the coming year, this will have it for each month. But this is where it gets a little fuzzy for the handbook. It covers what’s happening in the solar system, which is great for everyone, as the book is sold worldwide. Yet that strength may also be a small weakness.

If I’m observing, I would really like to know month by month about everything that is happening that month, not just the solar system objects. I want to know about major constellations or Messier objects that are well-positioned for viewing that month. That wouldn’t work everywhere in the world, though, so it isn’t included. I feel a little silly quibbling about its absence, but I don’t want another list somewhere else, I want an integrated one.

What can I do? I can cross-reference other sections, or other guides, with this list and make my own. Except the Handbook isn’t available in an e-format, as the risk of piracy cannibalizing sales is way too high to allow it to be shared electronically given that it is a major source of revenue for the Society. If I could buy an e-version, I absolutely would, and copy and paste the relevant sections with other guides into a monthly guide for my neck of the woods.

There is a long section on Eclipses (pp 122-147) and as much as I love the premise, it seems like a lot of real estate for four eclipses where generally all you need to know is WHEN they are and WHERE they are. There’s a bunch of extra technical info in there, but for the average user, likely way overkill. Lots of online websites could scratch an itch for that level of detail.

In every handbook, I am happy to see the Moon (pp 148-179) having detailed coverage. Too often in my view, guides jump to the planets immediately and overlook the majesty of our moon. My only quibble is the extra real estate spent on lunar occultations. This is where the moon passes in front of a star. Uh-huh. It does that all the time. A solar eclipse isn’t exciting because the moon blocked a star, it’s because it blocks OUR star, Sol. I don’t get the excitement around occultations at all. Planets, maybe. One star in the sky? Not so much. Personally? I’d love a quick overview of what is good to see on each day of the moon’s cycles. This rille or that crater, for example. It would be rather static, but we have observer programs for the moon with almost none of the content from it livening up the section in the handbook to spark some passion.

The Sun rises for the next section (pp 180-206). I find it amusing that the section takes up less space than the moon, although I have no idea why I would think it should be longer. Most of us can’t view the sun without additional tools, some users can find it static and boring, and well, many of us are night owls. I do find it interesting that there are details on the ephemeris for the sun, yet no info on it for the moon (the point on the horizon at which either one rises or sets, totally dependent on your PoV and location — but incredibly useful for knowing where to aim your camera or scope before they rise, and to position yourself accordingly so that there isn’t a tree blocking your view!). There are some really good apps to tell you both.

Planets and satellites [pp 207-236] show up in the next section, followed by Dwarf and Minor Planets (pp 237-251), and Meteors, comets and dust (pp 252-269]. The sections are nothing spectacular, but decent reference materials about what to expect to see or plan to see for each of the areas, and some tables to help with planning. The big items that I think are useful are the cross-references on the planets to which month is good for viewing and similar details for comets.

The next section on Stars (pp 270-304) is one where I really want an e-version that I can copy and paste and edit. Some of the lists are available on the website, which is helpful, but it is a weakness of the paper format in some respects. Or if I can’t have the eversion, give me an app version that I can click on and filter the list differently.

If I had my true preferences, I’d love to see a Sky at Night portal built into RASC that if you’ve bought the handbook, or become a member, you get a login and password that would let you go to the site, put in a date range, and it would dump out the info on month-by-month, planets, the sun and moon, and stars, with multiple filter options. I have the guide, but I find myself using online tools far more than the paper book.

And then we come to the last section about Deep Sky Objects (pp 305-346). I whined and moaned about some of the other sections being too technical, too dry, and not enough kindling to ignite passions, and then we get some gems in the last section. Info on certificate programs, clusters, the Messier catalogue with seasonal listings, Alan Dyer’s guide to the finest NGC objects, challenge objects, wide-field wonders, and bright galaxies, not just ANY galaxy. Lists and mini-observing challenges. Practically a “build-your-own” observing schedule for the year. And they have added Kemble’s Fifty-To-The-Pole Program that I had never heard of before this year.

It is exactly this kind of guided approach to a section that some of the other sections would benefit from, in spades at times. Many of the technical sections are feeling tired and worn, and in a need of a refresh as to who the intended audience is for the guide. If we go back to the top of the book review, we’re back to that basic challenge — each reader has their own capacity and the range for the Observer’s Handbook each year is huge. They literally can’t please everyone. I feel like this year’s version is less technical, but still not enough of an outreach / learning lens applied to it. Then again, it is meant to be a reference manual. A handbook, not a tutorial.

The Bottom Line

A solid annual guide, although some sections are feeling a bit dated