Pesach Prep

This will be my first Pesach in retirement.  I am already ahead of schedule with most chametz appliances already in the basement, shopping largely done or at least with a detailed list, cleaning less frantic than when squeezing into a few hours after work already mired by fatigue.  Pesach has been one of my demarcation points for years, a challenge to what I can do and a diversion from what I usually do.  I eat lunch every day, the only time of the year I can say that.  Coffee is rationed by the relatively limited volume and heat retaining capacity of my Pesach travel tumbler.  Yom Tovim being two days, I am electronically liberated, three days if shabbos precedes or follows one of the Yom Tovim which it cannot do on the Sukkot calendar but sometimes does for Pesach. 

My house gets cleaned, at least the lower level.  I cannot realistically take a multi-day trip or even a long day trip.  Food is special.  Menus are planned.  I try, with variable success, to serve as host for Shabbos Pesach, which invariably overlaps with Good Friday which has traditionally been treated as a secular workday off.  My planning skills get a workout.  For Seder, I have to arrange not only food but transport to my in-laws, a mixture of multiple courses with limited prep time competing for oven and stove space.  My muscles and stamina get their workout hauling stored dishes and utensils from our basement.  My patience gets a workout from washing them.  Even the refrigerator gets its annual scrubbing. 

And then for the next seven weeks, I count Omer.  For some things Pesach is really the beginning.

Facebook on Fritz

After avoiding FB for a month and returning rationed to three half days a week, my computer expressed no Fear of Missing Out by failing to load my homepage.  My login was not recognized.  My homepage would either have a Welcome Message, as if I were a new user or display two or three posts but no more.  All my other pages are fine.  Occasionally my home page will also scroll correctly.  My tablet and smartphone do not have this problem so I can access but not type effectively.  I suppose I can use the library's computer if I need to but do I need to?

One of my favorite biographies was that of Reb Yaacov Kamenetsky, perhaps the greatest sage who ever lived in my home town.  We overlapped there my final two years of high school but I never met him, though one of my rabbi's knew him as headmaster of his school.  It seems Reb Yaacov always rode in an American car produced by a UAW member on a Monday morning after a debauched weekend.  His car could be counted on to break down at some point en route from Brooklyn or Monsey to his summer camp in the Catskills.  He never cussed out the union people like I did with a similar car.  The unexpected time of breakdown were part of a divine plan in his mind to give him some down time without his students or some dedicated time with his driver or others in the car.

If i cannot be as full a FB participant as I had in mind, opportunities of better sites to visit are not at all hard to imagine, though maybe take a little dedication to pursue.

Bronx Detour

My first five years my family lived in the Bronx, where my father worked his entire career.   I remember nothing of living there, a little of visiting my paternal family through the 1950's, and staying a few weeks on school breaks with my maternal grandparents so that my mother could tend to my infant sister with less interference.  As I reached my teens, trips to NYC began near Yankee Stadium, as I mooched a ride from my father,  practices that continued through college.  Since then it has been a relic of my past, a drive through to get to New England on I-95 or into Westchester on the Major Deegan Expressway, which I think is numbered I-87.

On a long anticipated short holiday in Rhode Island recently, the route again took me over the George Washington Bridge through the Bronx into Westchester and Connecticut.  Traffic came to a virtual standstill along the Cross Bronx Expressway, far more severe than in any previous venture there.  As I passed under the overpasses, familiar names appeared on the signs.  Jerome Avenue, Nelson Avenue, Webster Avenue, Arthur Avenue, all places that my father used to travel nearly daily or when we visited relatives, typically with me riding shotgun.  I grumbled but endured the traffic which eased as we approached Coop City where another set of relatives settled, the northern limits of New York City and the onset of smooth sailing until another major tie-up in eastern Connecticut.  Pleasant few days in Newport visiting white elephant mansions, wineries and an historic synagogue's outside.  At least my synagogue lets me inside.  Then home.

By then I had gotten some experience with Google Maps to detour me through traffic standstills.  Mostly smooth sailing until that same spot on the Cross Bronx Expressway.  I decided to detour myself but getting from the left lane, which was not even free of semi's, to a right exit lane took two potential exits but I eventually succeeded.  It turned out to bring me to my old neighborhood with familiar street names but totally unfamiliar traffic patterns.  Thirty or more years must have elapsed since my father drove me there as his passenger and it was my first encounter as the driver.  The local streets moved about as well as the Expressway and basically directed me in a semi-circle to the next Expressway exit where I had little choice but to get back on. Yet for a few minutes, maybe more minutes than I liked, I got to see sidewalks with people on them, storefronts that now offered Halal Goat in place of Kosher Neck & Tenderloin, an electrical repair firm with small trucks that may still be owned and operated by direct descendants of the original Jewish owners, a deteriorating elevated transit line above me, the street where my mother. z"l, attended high school, some Hispanic owned businesses with Spanish signage, and less litter than had been imprinted in my mind from previous visits.  Superettes are now bodegas.  If you need clothing appropriate to a white collar job, that requires transfer to a different neighborhood. 

Being a suburbanite except for my university and residency years, we had no neighborhoods.  I had forgotten that they still exist.  Living there probably has its indignities but it has its identification as well.  And I got to immerse myself in a brief refresher.

Too Impulsive

In the wee hours of the morning the toilet adjacent to the master bedroom failed to refill.  I let the leaking noise disrupt my return to sleep but then got up to try to fix it.  I assumed the flapper did not close the outlet fully but when I manually pushed the flapper closed the fill still did not occur.  I shut off the water and on arising in the morning thought about just getting a new flapper or calling the plumber.  Having a fair amount to do, I asked my wife to call the plumber who came and replaced not only that flapper but another at about $100 each.  Had I been more patient or had it occurred on a day other than my only seriously scheduled one, I could have done that myself for about $5, then called if my self-repair failed to correct the problem.  Wanting it done now just got the better of me.  And I had no other plans for allocating that $200.

SSRI Holiday

My daily pill container once had seven tablets.  Multivit not renewed after finally completing the contents of a one year supply of horse pills that took a lot more than a year to finish.  I've just never seen beriberi, scurvy or night blindness in all the years I took care of patients.  Some probably took a vitamin.  The majority did not.  The popularity of these escapes me, but also drew me in at one time.  Not expensive but not efficacious either.  Aspirin can be had at the Dollar Tree for $1 for a package of 60 tablets which is $6 a year, even less than the multivit.  The efficacy of this for people my age who do not have heart disease, which would be me if my stress test is accurate, does not seem to be there when studied in the manner of mainstream medical studies.  I've not had any adverse effects but people in the study groups have.  Just finished my weekly supply one week ago and never went back to reloading it into the weekly container on Sundays.  My need for an NSAID varies.  There are weeks when lumbago of some type makes this a scheduled medicine.  It has been my good fortune to go into remission, making this a prn medicine.  I keep a bottle between the front seats of my car but no longer put a daily dose in my case. And it delays my platelet donations which might be among the more useful things I do for people.  I could say the same about that prostate stuff the doctor prescribed a few years ago.  It alleviated symptoms which then stayed in remission after I stopped taking the medicine.  Usage has been minimal.  It is not a prn medicine so when I need it again, it will reappear in the weekly case, but hasn't for a while.  My PPI is still there.  The intent of these drugs is a two week course unsupervised medically for GERD.  And I have stopped it for brief periods only to have GERD symptoms come right back.  An EGD showed no Barrett's or other serious disorder, so the SSRI is for symptoms which have demonstrated themselves as either persistent or recurrent.  That one stays.  There is a statin.  My cholesterol level is well beyond dietary modification, as was my father's who developed symptomatic angina at an age slightly less than mine and a CABG at an age somewhat older than mine.   The medicine has been efficacious, at least by lab numbers if not by patent coronaries, when I am faithful about taking it.  The cost is not burdensome.  I had transient minor myalgia when my current high grade treatment was introduced but in recent years no adverse effects have been noted.  That one stays.  So does the ACE inhibitor.  My BP has been consistently above optimal when I have let it lapse.  There have been no side effects.  So my pill case in recent weeks has been depleted to three:  PPI, ACE, statin.

There remains one more variable, the SSRI.  I might have ADHD by childhood restlessness and inattention but I've never been treated or even tried a stimulant.  As a 60-something, I've succeeded pretty well and rarely if ever speculate to what loftier heights I might have soared had my attention span exceeded that of a Brussels sprout.  Or maybe I wouldn't have does as well.  What I seem to have, though, is compulsivity and hyperawareness.  I can be maniacal to detail, abrasive and impatient, particularly with people less astute than me.  INTJ's like me tend to be that way so it's not necessarily pathological but often not helpful either.  Maybe a dozen years ago I asked my doctor a therapeutic trial of an SSRI might improve this, remembering Peter Kramer's Listening to Prozac published a few years after the medicine became available but listened by me on audiobook quite a few years later.  While these drugs are antidepressants primarily, the have a role in tempering compulsivity.  Dr. Kramer described a patient whose personality, focus, and productivity soared on the drug with a setback on withdrawal and return of favorable results on retreatment.  That's a pretty fair prototype for me.  The pills had declared themselves safe, if not annoying at times. 

Starting with office samples of Prozac 10mg I avoided side effects.  It made me sleepy which is better than making me wired.  Paxil samples were easy to come by.  I lasted about three days.  It made me feel like I took something.  Then 20 mg Prozac by prescription for a while.  Eventually Celexa came out, better tolerated by office samples, then continued indefinitely by prescription with lapses.

This month, I thought it time to hit the reset button.  Avoided my shul on shabbos, withheld Facebook, withheld Celexa (citalopram), bringing the pill case to its current three.  Facebook hiatus a very good thing to do with return next month in a highly scheduled way, much like I did for Sermo six months back.   My shul in its current circumstances still annoys me but I will return in a scheduled way and maybe return to tossing blogbarbs at the Rabbi and Executive Committee.  Not having the SSRI, though, took a real toll and has been resumed.

I found myself mentally a little sharper without it, sometimes hyperaware, sometimes hyperfocused.  I also found myself unusually impatient, overreacting to minor glitches like losing something which may also hint that I didn't pay attention to detail as well, too eager to move on to the next activity.  I was not as nice a person, much as Dr. Kramer described his patient in his book when on and off Prozac.  I exercised less but tolerated the effort the same.  My appetite seemed unchanged but weight might be up about a pound.  Insomnia unaffected.

Before/After assessment shows that I like myself better when toned down a little, so the pill case for the evening doses has returned to four.

EZ Pass

My commute while working was always toll free but as I retire and drive to different places, that perspective changes.  Driving downstate on a weekday has two stops each way of $1 each.  Going to Baltimore has an $8 tab though a single stop.  In the coming few weeks, I plan a much longer trip which will take my over the Jersey Turnpike, Commodore Barry Bridge, George Washington Bridge and whatever awaits me through southern New England.  That's a fair amount of money, not many stops, though with long lines expected at some of them.  Might a $15 one time investment in EZ Pass make my travels easier?  After some exploration, it depends.

One project I have handled faithfully is taking the first $5 bill received in change each day, putting it in an envelope which is then opened and counted on January 1 and July 1. The proceeds are spent on myself.  Last half-years stash reached $145 of which I have spent $7 at almost the midpoint so $15 might be an appropriated allocation of this mad money.  It would be great to have this convenience on my upcoming road trip.  But what about beyond?

So I went to the state's EZ Pass kiosk on I-95 last weekend.  They charge $35, $15 for the device, $10 for upcoming tolls, and $10 for the convenience of doing it there.  Not worth the last $10 and the GW Bridge alone costs more than $10. No go.  Went back on line.  Almost signed up:  Device $15, initial account $25, which I can augment before I go as the tolls will exceed that considerably.  The snag occurred on keeping the account active.  As it is now, I drive to Baltimore about once a quarter, downstate about every two months.  That's $12-15 a quarter.  Occasionally I will go into Pennsylvania, though rarely on a toll road, and into NJ a few times a year.  So if I have the state add $15 by credit card each time my account drops below $10, I should be good to go whenever I want pretty much wherever I am likely to travel on a whim.  The state did not give me that option.  Instead, the supplements are $25 increments as the account drops below $10/  Other than special planned trips, I probably don't spend much beyond $25 on tolls in a year.  So the only advantage of EZ Pass would be to avoid long lines near a city.  There just aren't enough stops to justify that over simpling keeping some cash in the car and in my wallet for spontaneous trips and getting some extra from the cash machine before more expensive trips.  I am rarely in a hurry.  EZ Pass at $25 per account refill seemed excessive.  Maybe if the wanderlust of my first full summer of retirement expands, I can always enroll later.

Fishing Season Initiatives

Thus far my cumulative catch totals zero.  Not that I plan to dine on anything I extract from the local waterways if my skill improves, but I have enjoyed the quiet time outdoors, advice from other fisherman nearby, and advancing skill for which there is little doubt.

While between classes at OLLI, I tied my first successful nail knot, using a straw from WaWa snipped into a small segment.  My dexterity and close vision leave a lot to be desired so I connected two shoelaces, though if I can keep track of which nylon monofilament connects to the reel and which connects to the hook, I can probably do this with real line in the very near future.

My equipment does not need replenishing.  I have an ultralight rod and standard rod, each with spinning reel, though the ultralight green one could use some minor duct tape to hold a slipping line guide.  My lines coil when casted, likely a consequence of never replacing them and storing on the reels for extended times.  I have a fly kit, even have waders, thus the desire to master the nail knot and the blood knot.  I have a standard rod with casting reel, one that backlashes with each attempted cast.  A skill worth improving.  I do not have salt water gear.  A macho looking rod and reel for this would run about $100.  And I like driving downstate to the Indian River Inlet which attracts many anglers, but some of them have mid-sized pond rods.  Ample variety of hooks, lures, weights, bobbers.  My State Park card is permanent and my age no longer requires a state license.  Ready to resume once the days warm up a bit to where I am comfortable and the fish become less selective about what looks like food.  Very soon.