The Late Dan Head

Dan Head

I only recently realized that I hadn't seen any posts from an old friend, Dan Head, in a while on Facebook, so I went to his profile to see what was up.  There I found out that he'd passed away on August 14th in Eugene, Oregon.

Here's a post I put on his page for any of his online friends to see...

Oh, I'm so sorry to hear of Dan's passing.  I only just saw this now, when I went to look at why I didn't recall seeing any of Dan's posts for a few months.

Dan and I were friends since elementary school in Waldport, when, though he was a year older than me, we played on the same little league baseball team.

In Junior High we had art class together.  One of those classes without the usual lectures and tests and school work, giving us students lots of time to visit and chit chat and goof off together. We were in the same in-class social group there.  The teacher usually let students pick music to play while the class worked and I remember Dan usually picked Ted Nugent's "Intensities in Ten Cities," though I wasn't into that sort of music yet.

I still remember a particular painting he did in class, three silver globes clustered together, floating over some kind of landscape.  

In high school we fell into the same social group again, a bunch of us hanging out every morning before class in either the counselor's office, with its round table and office-style swivel chairs, or if he had a meeting, in the home-ec room.  Talking about inane teenage stuff, but as a group of book loving teens, often working in a lot of puns and wordplay into our discussions.  For a couple of years we had a game where one person would pound the table and say a general subject and we'd spend all day trying to make our puns fit the subject (e.g. "birds" would be an emu-sing day...)

While most of our group likes fantasy, swords & sorcery books, Dan and I were the only ones who enjoyed John Norman's "Gor" series beyond the first book.  Both of us read all twenty plus books available then, and everyone else considered us a bit sick for that.

Being a year apart, we didn't have many classes together, just a few electives, but they were fun for socializing.  Classes like TV Production were like junior high art, not very structured and much of the work was done outside class hours, so in class every day was social hour to visit, discuss books, discuss music and all that...

We were both in the small school Games Club that met a couple of times a month to play war games, either in school or at our teacher's house to play games like Diplomacy, Russian Campaign, Squad Leader and so forth.  Lots of fun, lots of socializing.  Mostly it was the same group of us that met in the mornings, but with a few younger guys as well.

Some of our discussions, especially about a particular H.P. Lovecraft story we both liked have had life-long effects on me.  Talking to Dan back then, at 14 years old convinced me to basically reject religious belief altogether.  Though I'm not sure any of us actually knew much of atheism them, except as something portrayed as evil and communist, which we weren't.  But that's relieved quite a burden off me for decades.

I think the last time I can remember seeing Dan must've been around 1988, when a large group of our social circle were back in Waldport for holidays or summer or something, and we got together with a former teacher to play games.  We stayed up late into the night, playing a board game, chowing down Diane's Nacho Cheese tortilla chips, guzzling soda, talking, visiting and laughing.  

Life was already taking us all in different directions.  But it's a good memory.

Just for reference, here's the profile picture he set on Facebook at some point in the last couple of years...  It's not my photo, of course, so no credit to me.

Guilt Over Complications of the Heart

This morning I'm feeling a bit guilty about something from last night...

In the evening, Leena came to me in a panic thinking she might be having a heart attack.  She said her Apple Watch was telling her something about "heart rate complications," and she knows she's at some risk as both of her parents have had heart attacks...

I guess while I know the Apple Watch has heart beat monitoring stuff, I don't know how much to trust it.  I asked her if maybe she'd had the Watch on too loose.  She didn't really answer, and I asked if maybe it was too tight?  Or maybe not aligned on her wrist properly or what.

Leena's not one for answering questions, as she doesn't like feeling like she's being interrogated and rebels at the idea of just simply answering.  She prefers talking and still kept saying stuff about "heart rate (or beat) complications".

Eventually I got out of her that she hadn't even been wearing the Watch.  She was holding it, and it was in some mode for configuring what gets displayed on the screen.  And it was giving her "heart rate complications".

Ah, that clarified things...  "Complications" in watchmaking means features on a watch beyond merely time keeping.  I only learned that a few years ago, through work, with our associating to a grey market luxury watch dealer.  I asked Leena if she was familiar with the term, since her family all has luxury watches, but she hadn't heard of "complications" in the horological sense.

Leena's older Rolex with a date "complication".

Here are some random Heart Rate Complications screen shots I just grabbed via Google:

I thought it was all resolved last night when I went to bed.  But this morning, thinking about it, I feel guilty that when Leena first told me she might be having a heart attack, I didn't even think of it as a medical emergency, I didn't think to call 911, that she might really be having a heart attack.

We're lucky this was just a misunderstanding of an obscure watchmaking term.  What'll happen if we have a genuine medical emergency in the future?

 An Apple a Day Keeps the Doctor Away

Over the years I've found this cliche actually works out to be true.

For years I've eaten an apple a day as part of breakfast.  Not because the cliche, because they're healthy and I like sweet apples.  In India I ate ones that tasted like sweetened apple juice, which may have been imported from China.  Here in the U.S. I eat Fuji apples, which are pretty similar.

After I had my high blood pressure crash & burn that landed me in the emergency room in 2014 I set myself up with a primary care physician, Dr. M who we really liked.  The day of my first appointment with her was her first day at that practice, so she had a lot of time to spend with us answering questions and what-not.

And a few years later she moved out of New York City, leaving the large practice where we went.

They assigned me a new primary care physician, Dr. Z and I went to her a couple of times.  While Leena never joined me and didn't meet her, I liked her, she seemed like a pretty good doctor.  But then she moved out of New York City.

Following Dr. Z's departure I continued to eat an apple a day as part of breakfast and didn't go see a doctor at all, not wanting to start over all my history again with a new one.  Better to just skip the whole thing.

But last autumn Leena had an urgent need to see a doctor.  So, thinking back to when I first went to Dr. M, I remembered another doctor at that clinic who Dr. M used on billing and referrals until she was completely set up in their computer system, Dr. A, I set us up with Dr. A as our primary care physician.  Leena went to Dr. A and really loved her, recommending I go to see her about my long running high blood pressure.

Great.  I prepared some notes and how to introduce myself to Dr. A for my own appointment with her.  I told her I picked her at that clinic because she was the one Dr. M used for billing and referrals when she was still too new at the clinic to be set up in their computer system.  Dr. A acknowledged that and we continued on.

And now we recently got an email from the clinic that Dr. A is leaving in a couple of weeks.

I have to wonder, back at my first in-person appointment with her, when I told her why I chose her as my new doctor, did she already know she was on her way out?  Or did she get a new opportunity at some point after that...  

Thinking back farther, back in India, sometimes when we'd make a plan to go see Dr. S for whatever reason, Leena would usually tell me to eat something before we go.  Sometimes, I'd eat an apple, and then Leena would call the doctor's cell phone to confirm (Leena was an old school friend of the doctor's wife, also a doctor) and he'd say something like, "sorry, I'm stuck in Mumbai on some work," and we'd have to postpone, cancel or maybe go see Dr. P instead...

My only conclusion is that eating apples regularly somehow repels doctors.

Maybe it's time I switch to a pear a day...

A picture of Fuji apples I snagged off the internet...  (not my apples, not my photo...)

The Heart of the Matter

So, in November last year I finally went to a new primary care physician to discuss my long-running high blood pressure issues.  I'd been putting it off for a few years because I didn't want to get into things with yet another new doctor after my previous two both left New York City...  

But Leena had gone to her for a skin issue and really liked her, so she talked me into going.  I actually picked this doctor because I knew her name at the clinic since she was well established there when I first started going for another doctor in 2014.

So, Dr. A. talked to me, took some blood and later when we followed up via video call (coronavirus pandemic, you know...) she changed my high blood pressure medication and put me on a statin for cholesterol, which she described with "sky rocket".  The new medications were giving me headaches, but as they were lowering my blood pressure she didn't want to change them without my seeing a cardiologist first.

When I saw the cardiologist, Dr. T. he didn't believe me that the medications were causing the headaches, which started the day after I started those medications, but was willing to change the prescription to ease my mind at a minimum. 

Dr. T. was concerned about my state of health, my long running high blood pressure, that I got out of breathe when I was active, and my family history, since my father had a heart attack and quadruple bypass at 64 years old and one of my grandfathers died of a heart attack at 62 (granted, he'd been a lifelong smoker, which wasn't my case).  Dr. T. said things like my father's heart attack usually started showing signs about fifteen years in advance, and that puts me easily into the beginning of that 15 year range compared to my father's heart attack...

Dr. T. also scheduled me for a CAT scan, a "CTA Coronary Artery" at the hospital for a week and a half ago.  I went for that, which involved spending an enormous amount of time waiting my turn, and then feeling like I peed my pants when they injected me with the radiocontrast dye (I didn't, it just felt that way when the warmth spread through my body, getting to my crotch region...)

And Monday last week I met with Dr. T. at his office where he reviewed all the images from the CAT scan and some other ultrasound images done that morning.

He then told me that the scans of blockage scored me in the 89th percentile for men aged 51.  Um, ok.  I had to ask if that meant 89th percentile good, or 89th percentile bad.  He then clarified that it was bad.  So, these are like golf scores, a lower number is far better...  It turns out I have more blockage in my heart's arteries than 88% of men aged 51.

Well, I figure that's trivial to beat.  Later this year I'll turn 52, invalidating the whole statistic.  

Dr. T. recently uploading the results to the MyChart system so I could read it and here's an excerpt of the key parts.

1. The calcium score is 119 in the 89th percentile for age, gender and ethnicity.

2. There is no calcified aortic plaque.

3. Normal LM. 

4. 25-50% stenosis of the proximal LAD due to mixed plaque with a high risk feature of spotty calcification. Normal remaining LAD.

5. 50-69% stenosis of the ostial to proximal large high D1 due to mixed plaque with a high risk feature of low attenuation plaque.  50-69% stenosis of the mid D1 due to non-calcified plaque. Norma distal D1. Normal branch of D1. 

6. <25% stenosis of the proximal LCx due to non-calcified plaque.  Normal remaining non-dominant LCx. Normal OM1.

7. Normal proximal RCA. Mid RCA is ectatic with 50-69% stenosis in the mid segment due to mixed plaque with a high risk feature of low attenuation plaque and spotty calcification. <25% stenosis of the distal RCA due to mixed plaque. Normal RPLA and RPDA.

I sent this to my wife with this description, including links to Wikipedia:

Here's a Wikipedia article that explains the arteries in question.  

And here's a grabshot of the vector drawing in the Wikipedia article:

Note that the picture is reversed, showing the patient's left side on the right and right side on the left.  This is because the picture is drawn the way a doctor would see it looking at the patient.

In the picture you can see the LAD mentioned in the doctor's #4 item.  It's on the right side of the picture.  This is 25-50% blocked (I'm not sure why there's a range that size, whether it's because different parts of the artery are blocked different amounts, or because that's as accurate as the scan can get).

His #5 item refers to D1, which is on the lower right side of the picture.  This is blocked 50-69%.

His #6 item is LCx which is in the middle of the right hand side of the picture.  This is blocked less than 25%.

His #7 item is RCA which is on the left middle side of the picture.  This is blocked 50-69%

For now Dr. T. has increased my blood pressure and cholesterol medications as well as including a new one, a beta blocker.  He suggested (was it a suggestion or an order?) a no cholesterol diet.  And I'm to follow up with him later this month to see where to go from there.

He talked about maybe scheduling another procedure to look closely at the blockages with a camera inserted up in there, and possibly inserting stents.  I assume it wasn't an immediate life threatening emergency or he would've done more than sending me home with some medication prescriptions for now.

Dr. T. also emphasized my need to get a sleep study from a sleep specialist.  I was lazy about scheduling that, with the idea that it would be a lot less stressful to deal with one specialist's area of my body at a time.  

At home we're trying to deal with my diet.  I need to be more careful about not cheating as much, since now the damage that's doing is more concrete and less abstract.  But convincing Leena to change how she's cooking for me is harder because she doesn't want to believe she's been cooking food that's unhealthy for my heart as it is.  She wants to think she's been doing everything perfectly.

I also made an appointment with the sleep specialist for next week...

The Nature and Growth (and Shrinkage) of Modern Mathematics

The Nature and Growth (and Shrinkage) of Modern Mathematics

I've struggled with math since elementary school.  In the 1990's, in my 20's, a late mentor of mine, Dave Mitchell, suggested the book The Nature and Growth of Modern Mathematics by Edna E. Kramer might help me overcome some of that.

It was slow reading for me, and over the course of a few years I made my way through a few chapters.  Until early 2001, when I moved to Pune, India for a year.  Since I was only going for a year, it wasn't among the few books that I packed up to take there with me.

Then I ended up spending a decade in India before I moved back to the United States.  When I did move back to the U.S. I moved to New York City, and didn't have easy access to my large library in storage out in Waldport, Oregon.

With the coronavirus pandemic this year, I figured I'd buy another copy and pick up reading it again.  I found a used one easily enough but there's a problem with it.  In the 20 years since I last read it, the print has shrunk to minuscule, Holy Cow! unreadable size.   (yeah, yeah, I know, it's my aging eyes...)

As for math, I actually did excel at math twice as a boy, in elementary school.  But each time the teachers punished me for it and I learned my lesson, never again excel at math.

The first time was in 2nd grade at the Fellowship Farm School in Piscataway, NJ.  My best friend, Brian, and I worked ahead in our math workbook, enjoying, having fun.  But when our teacher. Mrs. Cooper, found out she punished us.  Back then standard punishment was having to stand against the wall in the hallway during class, and then stand against the wall of the lunchroom during lunch, only eating quickly after everyone not being punished had finished.  We faced this for a week.

I never again worked ahead of the class in math again.

Then the second time was in 4th grade, in a new school, Waldport Grade School, where I was a new student, having moved there in October 1978. Mrs. Elsie Apt gave us the assignment to write all the numbers from 1 to 10,000.  Not all at once, over a few weeks, with some days a set of 100, or 500, or at most 1,000.

Quite an onerous assignment.  However, at some point in it I noticed a weird repetition in the digits of sequences of numbers.  It didn't take me long to figure out how to exploit that to make the writing of all the numbers go quicker.  Especially where the digit 1 (one) repeats in the same position of 10 or more numbers (bearing in mind the maximum repeats is 1,000 but the lined pages only had so many rows...)

Even with other numbers, I could just go down the lines, write 0, 1, 2, 3, 4, 5, 6, 7, 8, 9 over and over till the page was full, then move to the next digit of all the numbers and repeatedly write something like 2, 2, 2, 2, 2, 2, 2, 2, 2, 2, then got to the 3's and so forth and so on...  

Of course, my skill at handwriting and related isn't so great that this wasn't obvious from the way I turned in the page. 

Sample of 210 - 219

Mrs. Apt considered this to be cheating.  And I had to rewrite a number of pages.  

So, despite learning something more valuable about numbers than the teacher probably intended, I got punished for it.  Lesson learned, don't excel in math!

On the plus side, that school year my mother was a volunteer whale counter for the Oregon State University Marine Science Center, so I wrote a lot of those number pages, plus other homework, from the top of the Yaquina Head Lighthouse.  So that's a hell of a good memory.

My Photo of the Yaquina Head Lighthouse from 2016.

Quora Question: What kind of guitar do you own, and which one do you want to own?

What kind of guitar do you own, and which one do you want to own?

This is my answer from a Quora question...

What Kind of Guitar Do You Own?

Late last year, 2017, I bought a brand new surf green made-in-Mexico Fender Stratocaster.



It’s the first time in my life I’ve touched a guitar. I’m 48 now. In 3rd grade I played the cello for a year, when my mother had a future planned out for me as a concert cellist (I think she was mostly attracted to the idea I’d have a job where I had to wear a tuxedo to work). Then we moved, wound up in a small town and there weren’t any cellos to borrow or rent for me to continue my lessons.

In 6th grade I played the saxophone for half a year when our whole class had half a year of band. I stunk at both instruments. Twinkle Twinkle Little Starwas always out of reach for me, and I minced the Little Lamb Mary Hadbeyond any reasonable form.

But I love music. It’s one of those things I spend an inordinate amount of my income on. And the last few summers I’ve been watching punk rock bands play concerts in Tompkins Square Park here in New York City. So I felt inspired to try and learn a little how to play, and I figured the first step was to actually get a guitar.

I’ve long liked the look of Stratocasters. They simply scream out “rock n roll!” (there’s others that do, too) and I figured since I never held a guitar before the contoured shape might be a little more comfortable to learn with. Since I’m obsessed with the color green, that was the obvious color. I debated whether I should spend more for a genuine branded Fender, or go for a cheaper Squier, but I read the Squier ones have less quality control, and I figured that with my complete inexperience paying a little more would ensure the godawful sound coming from it was my playing, rather than a defective instrument.

I bought a bunch of beginner books, and I signed up for Fender Playwhich has some good beginners’ lessons, that I’m struggling with.

I bought Rocksmith 2014 as well, so I could plug the guitar into the computer as a controller. I got started with that, but my desk chair isn't comfortable to sit on with the guitar and play. My wife is going to give me her old laptop, so I’ll install it on there when she goes overseas for a few months. Then I can put it on the coffee table and play sitting on the floor.

So, I’ve been practicing off and on for over half a year now. I still can’t play any songs. I can’t even play any chords that use more than two fingers on the frets. I can’t play many of them that use just two fingers.

With riffs that use just one string I can’t get my left hand’s fingers up and down the fretboard accurately to actually play note after note after note correctly.

One issue I’m having is I’ve gotten terribly fat the last few years, so the guitar hangs at a funny angle over my belly. That means I have to twist my wrist further around the neck to reach the strings further up on the neck.

Maybe what I need is a live tutor, someone who can start off by seeing how I’m holding the bloody thing to help me correct myself, and then start off with solutions to my obvious problems. I don’t know.

I haven’t been practicing as much since my wife returned from her previous four month trip home to India. I feel a bit foolish picking it up and fumbling around while she’s in hearing range. She’s not very patient with other people trying to learn things around her, either. And when she sees me with it, she assumes I’m free to do chores and run errands.

Maybe I shouldn’t have waiting so long in life to try and learn. Not when my fingers are stiff and achy, about the same age when arthritis started to get debilitating for my father.

And Which Guitar Do You Want to Own?

Well, there’s a few… From punk rock concerts I’ve been to lately, I’ve noticed the majority of the guitar players, especially the ones I liked, were playing various guitars with humbucker pickups rather than single-coil.

I want a Stratocaster with one (or more) humbucker pickups, as they produce more of the sound I’d like to get, if I could actually play it. They have a few green options, plus I could pay more for one from their Mod Shop that would be nicely customized for me. Now that they introduced the Player line, I’ll probably buy one of those.

I was thinking I’d like a green Gibson SG as well. There aren’t many green options out there, unless I look around on eBay. Most of those in any sort of affordable range have only one pickup, but I’m not such an advanced player that that should affect me. The few others are whoppingly expensive professional models.

And while not green, some of the 2018 SG models, the Standard HP 2018, are absolutely gorgeous… I could see myself getting the blood orange or even the hot pink fade. They’re a bit more than I’d like to spend, though, given that I can’t actually play the thing…

On the other hand, I’d long admired, but dismissed for myself, Gibson Les Pauls, despite a number of musicians whose work I like playing them. I remember a friend long ago who said they were extremely heavy, so as a raw beginner I didn’t want to find myself fighting the extra weight of one when I already can’t play. But I went to a couple of punk rock shows in June and some guitarists were playing Les Pauls, including several groups with two guitarists, a Les Paul player next to an SG player and I found myself drawn towards watching the Les Paul player quite a lot more. I mean a lot more.

Looking around online, I sure like the green Slash Anaconda Les Paulis beautiful (and green!). But its price is more than I should actually spend on a guitar I can’t play, no matter how good I think I’d feel holding it and failing to play (I suppose a less expensive Epiphone version is an option). Maybe I could hold it, pretend to play and put on a Guns & Roses CD or something…

Of course, no purchases until my wife goes on her three month trip home to India in a couple of months. I’ll buy whatever I buy on a credit card she doesn’t know about (I’m not talking about screwing around with credit cards, I’ll still pay it off once I get the bill) and my story is basically that I found it/them on Craigslist being sold by “Mrs. Jepsen”. Her husband had passed away and their adult kids weren’t interested in his guitars, so she was selling them… A little more practice and I’ll get the finer points of the story down convincingly…

And bearing in mind our teeny, tiny New York City apartment doesn’t have much space for “stuff” to accumulate… Although, I think if I get more I can buy wall mounts to get them up off the floor so my wife won’t get too mad.

Middle Age Motherfucker!

While getting my life on track following some health issues last month, it dawned on me that I'm totally a middle-aged man now.  On Facebook I saw a post by a college buddy's wife and we swapped some messages and we're both in the same boat now.  So, I banged out a ranty email about this to another college buddy...

Middle Age Motherfucker!

It sure hit me last month, like a BB to the nuts(1).

I ended up in the emergency room two weeks ago because my blood pressure was through the fucking roof.  I had a headache like never before, and decided to go to the urgent care clinic up the street.  The doctor there checked my blood pressure and said the risk of a stroke was severe and sent me straight to the ER, no walking, either ambulance or taxi for the two blocks (we chose taxi).

He gave me a pill for it, and some notes to take to the ER...

The pill worked, so the ER doctors didn't "do" anything except monitor me for five hours, then prescribe some blood pressure medicine to take daily, pretty much for life (or until I make lifestyle changes that'll make me healthy enough I won't require it.)  The doctor there also gave me advice including following up with a primary care physician, especially since I'm now 45 and entering middle age and can expect upcoming age-related health issues.

Two days later, when the headache receded enough that I could look at the computer and phone screens without cringing in pain I began what I'd put off for twenty years, finding a primary care doctor.  You know small town life, well, Waldport only had one doctor (whose son was one of my classmates) and once I finished college and started working the big city, Portland, the choices were too overwhelming that I never got a doctor or went for visits.  Now in NYC, the choices are even more so. In our insurance company's listings there were hundreds of primary care doctors within 10 blocks of our apartment...  The hospital had a referral service so she started listing them and I stopped her after the second clinic, then called that clinic who had one doctor available that afternoon, and now she's "my doctor".

Actually, luckily, after the first visit we really like her.  Leena really, really liked her.  We told her about how I got to the ER and what was done since and she talked a bit about diet, said I was definitely overweight and needed to lose some pounds, and took some blood samples, and EKG and measured my blood pressure several times and we talked quite a bit...  Since the problem and medication were still new to me she didn't want to change much, except for me to avoid obviously bad foods...

Last week she called with results of the blood tests and said my cholesterol is very high and put me on the famous Lipitor (another nail in the end of youth coffin for me...)

We have a two week follow-up with her later this week and she gave me a preview on the phone, that she wants to talk a lot more about food...

I saw a Facebook post from Craig's wife, and he's going through the same shit.  Overweight, high blood pressure and all that.  And similar problems, he felt fat, but whenever he talked to people about eating better and shedding weight, they just said "what? you're not fat..."

I get that all the time, even now after the doctor's appointments my coworkers are telling me I'm not fat, I'm not overweight, the doctor is stupid.  Never mind that I knew I was fat ten years ago, when I bent down to put my socks on and couldn't breath because I suddenly had a gut in the way...  I was getting out of breath walking up steps and everyone's all "you're not overweight..."

So, yeah, I'm on three prescription medications now, my blood pressure is high and my cholesterol is very high.  I'm a middle-aged man.  What the fuck happened?

How about us all sucking down a bottle of Oregon Springs(2) and walking down to the Market Casket(3) to buy some junk food...

Anyway, Leena's sprung into action.  She has a mission now, get me back to health.  She was learning to cook in January, but with lots of oil and salt, so now she's researching online and learning to cook healthier foods to help lower my blood pressure and cholesterol.  She found out how to get to the nearest fish market to bake salmon for me instead of frying beef, and she's learned to cook some vegetables so they actually taste good (hint, lots of garlic).

The fresh salads are also a reminder of lost youth...  As a kid I always used massive amounts of French salad dressing to choke down a salad and the grown-ups used olive oil and balsamic vinegar.  This week I found myself looking at a salad and trying oil and vinegar so it wouldn't be plain old, boring vegetables....  And I kind of liked it...  Until I thought about that thing with the kids and grown-ups.

In two weeks I'm noticeably less chubby, my watch is loose on my wrist and my feet are slipping out of my sandals.  So, it's a start...

notes:
(1) the first day of our sophomore year he was showing his new BB gun, pointing it at me.  I said "hey, don't point it at me" and he said "it's not loaded" then preceded to pull the trigger, with a bunch of BBs shooting and bouncing off the door, just below my crotch (good thing he lowered it...)

(2) we drank a shit-ton of Oregon Springs vodka back then...  it was the cheapest liquor we know of at either of the Klamath Falls liquor stores.

(3) just a funny nickname for the grocery store near our college campus, the Market Basket.