Wrist Jolt

Behind my bed sits a vintage clock radio.  Modern in its day.  Red numerals.  Wake to an audio blare or to whatever AM or FM station had been preset.  I never liked it, but those red numbers behind me remain my official command to arise each morning.  Though that now happens silently.  The NFL offers a two-minute warning.  My current smartwatch signals a ten-minute warning in the form of a fifteen firm buzzes across my left wrist.  

Being smart, and a good buy at $40, it multitasks.  That includes a passive but ongoing assessment of the sleep it is programmed to terminate.  Home Sleep Trackers have been a great disappointment, at least the two Apps I've downloaded to my smartphone.  Highly inaccurate.  Prone to failure. Annoying to have the device next to me.  This watch may not be any more accurate, but it doesn't intrude.  It records a sleep time, has a mechanism for deciding when I am in REM without access to my eyeballs, and thinks it can decide when my nightly nap is light or deep.  Then it gives a time summary at the end.  Unlike the phone Apps, it does not offer a running timeline so I can match which stage at which hour.  Mostly, the morning wrist buzz occurs during light sleep, confirmed by the electronic bar graph of sleep stages.  However, apparently nearly every morning I have a deep sleep interval preceding that.  One electronic jolt occurred during that interval.  I could tell the difference.  The intensity of that buzz could terminate deep sleep.  The bar graph that morning had the blue deep sleep color as my final interval on awakening, a rarity.  

With considerable focus on professional sleep hygiene recommendations the past year or two, I might not need the dawn reminder, as my intrinsic sleep cycle ends my nightly session on its own at about the same time each morning.  Still, I like to see what happened before that.  My smartwatch records a doze-off time, probably accurate.  I try to keep that constant, though less effectively than I manage the arise time.  It will record nocturia X 1 as wake time.  It does not really capture middle of the night insomnia, which that clock radio's red numerals usually capture at about 3AM.

Yet it is reassuring that a simple electronic device can keep me reasonably on track for what has been a chronic vexing challenge.

Wandering Costco

I did not take a cart.  Despite a new corporate policy to confirm active membership, the door greeter accepted a quick flash of my card's COSTCO in bold red letters, waving me in without scanning any bar codes.  I had no intention of buying anything other than maybe a soft ice cream sundae at the snack bar on the way out.  With their kiosk ordering, I would not need confirmation of membership maintenance for that either.

On a mid-week mid-afternoon, few shoppers crowded the aisles.  My intent for going at all was to secure a quiet hour away from the distractions, or maybe allures, of My Space with its abundant neglected projects.  Nothing that I needed.  Costco's immense success, however, depends on a network of psychology grads who understand how to create want that transforms to need.  Bling in its most glittering forms greets shoppers at the entrance.  TVs with the biggest screens on display.  They were not set to broadcast Fox News or ESPN, but they all had brightly colored images on their flat screens.  Beneath the displays with prices in bold black numerals, shoppers could eye small stacks of very big boxes far too bulky to fit in a cart, which I opted not to take for myself this visit.  Much smaller, encased in thief-proof glass that sparkles from periodic Windex rounds, people could ponder how to display their material success with baubles that reflect ceiling LED light in the most dazzling way in the store and God's light when worn outside.  Cell phone displays were muted.  So was a section with eyeglass frames lining a wall next to a counter where experienced opticians will offer the best deals in bifocals.  I keep my membership exclusively for this benefit.

Continuing the main aisle.  Appliances to enable the homemaker's leisure.  Washing machines, refrigerators.  All better than what we likely have at home right now.  Hectic work schedules and smaller houses and condos have changed what we do in our homes.  We prepare food, we entertain ourselves, sometimes we work.  As kitchens become the hub for families and empty nesters, aisles of enhancements challenge one's credit card restraint.  Cookware, countertop appliances, display baskets, storage of the most attractive design.  Our square footage, or maybe even a whole room, allotted to our side hustles require soft chairs with high backs that swivel us from our desks to our shelves, then glide us across the room on casters.  Writing implements in colors. Shredders.  Papers to remind us of our failures to go paperless.  

Bling attracts the eye.  Pampering soothes the other body parts.  Bedroom decor, new lighting for the bathroom, made more sybaritic by other products awaiting us on their shelves.

Turning right brings me to clothing, men's for me.  Long pants as autumn approaches.  Light jackets.  Sweatshirts in green with an Eagle on the front.  Shirts in piles, some needing ironing, others in easy care synthetics.

One must traverse half a warehouse of stuff to arrive at what most people place in their carts.  Food.  Lots of food.  And mostly beyond Family Size.  For this tour sans my own basket, I started with the freezers.  At previous membership intervals, I could not pass up Kosher-certified tiramisu, my wife's favorite dessert, though modified with whipped cream where the mascarpone should be.  Not in the current frozen collection.  Neither was anything else, except for some packages of Beyond Burger which would be a challenge to stuff into my already occupied home freezer.  I like things I would not buy at Shop-Rite.  Best buy on lox slices.  I still have one chunk of homemade gravlax at home.  And cheeses with at least a Tablet-K.  Those are hard to find, so while my membership remains active, I'll have to return.  Big boxes of snacks that I don't need.  Did not enter the cosmetics, pharmacy, or bakery this time.  By now mid-afternoon.  A snack maybe.  Too late for pizza.  Not hungry enough for a sundae.  Just head home.  No money spent.

I'll be back.  Having scouted the place out, there are more wants than needs, by a significant multiple.  Eventually my gravlax will need replacement by commercially smoked and sliced lox.  Not had some of those cheeses in a long time.  Maybe tiramisu will return to the freezer.  And maybe my kitchen experience will get its next enhancement.  And depending on the time, pizza for lunch or sundae on the way out.  

No Appointments

Almost no appointments today. I have times assigned to myself.  Wake time done.  Dental hygiene done, Treadmill shortly.  None take very long.  The rest of my day remains unscheduled.  Nearly all should do's. Few must do's with none to please somebody else.  Future projects await.  Those need progress, some in small steps today, others in larger accomplishment. Deadlines not imminent.

Today's Daily Task List runs two columns, loosely prioritized.  Some purposeful as components of Semi-Annual Projects, others more recreational.  Segments for work.  Segments for leisure.  Optimism as first cup of coffee nears completion.  Next, treadmill.  Then no more appointments, not even with myself.

Holy Day Planning

Leap year on the Hebrew calendar.  It time shifts things.  Virtually no double portions for Shabbos Torah readings.  The various Festivals appear late on the American calendar.  Hanukkah starts with XMas.  The High Holy Days do not arrive until October.  They still need some attention.  As in recent years, I was asked to read Torah on Yom Kippur.  It requires minimal attention.  The person doing the assignments has an incentive to recycle who did what they did last year, or the previous ten years for some, much to the detriment of the congregation.  There's a certain sameness to the experience at my synagogue, though some newness at the alternate minyan we attend first day Rosh Hashanah.  I prefer some novelty, some notion of that people thought about how to make an experience better.  While in my capacity as Board Member, the Ushermeister asked my participation, and I offered him places to assign me, he hasn't.

There are parts of the HH experience that do not depend on the synagogue, some of which I control, others I don't.  As a courtesy to my sister-in-law, we visit her after first day of Rosh Hashanah.  Our children sometimes visit, a high priority accommodation.  And we can expect a Sukkah dinner invitation.

My personal traditions continue their expressions.  I've written to a college friend each HH for more than fifty years.  I connect annually to two others.  RH Dinner has its ambivalence.  It is usually special but not ornate, though if my children are joining us, I will need to expand the menu, or at least the quantities.  I like to make my own spiral challah with raisins.  There is always an apple with honey.  Usually a first course, if only gefilte fish from a jar.  As empty-nesters, chicken breasts for two, as host, maybe a whole roast chicken or a brisket.  Carrots are the traditional RH vegetable.  Wife makes rice kugel each year.  And my honey or apple cake.  Getting to erev RH services sometimes needs some planning.  Some years we don't make it.  

Wife leads services First Day at the Minyan where that is permitted.  Then an afternoon with my sister-in-law, now last surviving sib.  This year accommodate the kids as they set their own schedules for long distance travel and worktime juggling.  And Tashlich.

Sukkot is more my preferred Holy Day.  We ordered our Lulav and Etrog.  Sukkah construction right after YK, weather permitting.  One evening as somebody else's guest, another for my guests.

Simchat Torah evening I designate with Chabad.  They conduct a program for their kids, with their assistant serving as a modern Art Linkletter getting them to say the darndest things.

In all, the designated days span the better part of a month.  Mixture of fixed activities and traditions.  Some challenging, other parts chores to get through.

Preparing a Seminar

My turn arrives in one month.  This OLLI class runs about twelve sessions, with a different person presenting each time.  I gave my brief overview in the first class.  The instructor schedule assigned my class as the midpoint.

By now, I should be pretty proficient at this.  My mental, medical, and Jewish journeys have taken me to the podium many times.  Some informal, like medical residents presenting a case.  Others quite formal, like Medical Grand Rounds or presentations at my synagogue's AKSE Academy.  Progress has moved ahead from Kodachromes created by medical illustrators to PowerPoints made by me.  Sometimes I create a written script.  As proficiency accumulated, I've let the PowerPoint written slides serve as my prompts.

Rarely do I start with full familiarity.  I have a grasp of the medical topic or the background for a Jewish topic.  This time I have the basic concepts of what I want to convey about NYC, the OLLI Course topic. Fifteen minutes each about city workers, vagrants, vendors, and diplomats, though the vagrants merit more time with a reduction in the time allotment to the others.  I like history, and often sort my remarks in their historical contexts.  But I chose my current topic, a deviation from the other eleven this cycle, because everyone in the class has a bimodal connection.  As Seniors with some childhood connection to Metro NY, we all had reason to putter around The City in our youth.  We all have events that periodically bring us back, whether tourism, Broadway, or relatives.  Then differs from now. Who comprises the audience matters considerably.

I am making slow but steady progress, not far behind my completion timeline.  Keep it interesting, keep it relevant.  Work on fluency.

I've done this many times before.  Struggle a while.  Then it gels.

Quasi Work

My personal calendar gave me a challenge.  Returned to OLLI, the senior division of our State University for the first time.  By the vagaries of submitting course preferences, my schedule played out to three courses on Monday's, first, second, and third sessions.  On Tuesdays I only have two classes, first and third sesssions.  On Wednesday, only two, first and second sessions.  Due to Holy Days falling Thursday-Fridays this season, I opted not to enroll in any courses those days.  The class schedule has its quirks.  My middle class on Mondays, the one I desire most, only runs the second half of the semester, and is on Zoom.  My first class on Wednesdays only meets the first half of the semester.  And the final course on Tuesday, for which I am presenting one class, only appears via Zoom.

Tuesday and Wednesday drive-in for the in person classes, then drive home seems straightforward.  Monday proves more challenging, with a Zoom course sandwiched between two traditional classes.  I opted to create a faux work day on Mondays, at least until the final class adjourns.

I got up at my usual time.  Instead of dental hygiene, then coffee, I inserted dressing.  The day before I made a checklist, what to wear, what to take in a small backpack.  Laptop, charger, leather writing pad, the secure chest travel pouch I bought last year, a radio, a thermos of coffee, a lunch that I would make at home, the Torah portion I am preparing.  Since this would be my first day on-site, I needed extra time to pick up my ID badge, so off to the car a bit early.

I arrived well in advance of my first class.  While there I filled out some forms for access to the University's computer services and parking at the main campus.  Sipped coffee.  Then class.  An excellent lecture on the history of airline safety.

Downstairs to the lobby after class to being a 2.5 hour unstructured block.  Started with a stroll outside to the patio to work on the Torah reading.  Minor imperfections.  When I do this, I wear a kippah that I keep in my pants pocket, this time a blue suede one from a Bar Mitzvah.  I opted to leave it on the rest of the day.  America in general, and campuses in particular, have accumulated people who think it OK to verbally accost anyone they can identify as Jewish.  We are oppressors of everyone who has not thrived in America in their minds.  

But I really intended to work on some other projects.  I extracted my laptop, its charger, and my good leather portfolio from my backpack.  In order to have an outlet for the charger, I had to settle for a high table with high chair along one of the walls.  Plugged in.  Refill my insulated mug.  Ready to work.  The University has its own Wi-Fi.  I saved it with my ID and password onto this laptop last year.  Despite having forgotten both prompts, it connected me.  To connect with the University library system, I will need a more sophisticated entry point which requires renewal.  But once online, I could surf.  Not productive surfing at all.  E-mail, social media.  I thought a little about things I might like to write, but didn't write them.  Read a presentation from a Substack to which I have a subscription, but did not respond.  Returned to my backpack to retrieve my sandwich.  Too soon to proceed to the cafeteria.

Eventually I packed my electronics, took my lunch back to the patio, where I ate it.  An old friend of 40+ years happened by.  We each had covid in the last year, so exchanged notes. Not a lot of work got done, creating some minor guilt.

Early afternoon class, an excellent intro to the Big Bang.  Kippah still on.  No apparent reaction from anyone else.

Home right after class.  I had two top notch sessions, OK lunch, satisfaction of planning what I wanted to do, no serious focus on doing it.  A lost opportunity.

There will be a Monday of this type each week until my half-semester course begins.  The 2.5 hour chunk of time needs to be allocated in a more specific, accountable way.

Fall Reset

Return to school has come and gone without me.  As I toured Tennessee in late August, Virginia Tech, U of TN, and Vanderbilt had already moved in for the fall semester, leaving me unable to find a parking space near the bookstore at two of them.  When I returned home, Labor Day weekend got set aside with a higher priority, surviving highly symptomatic Covid-19.  I missed the in-person first week of OLLI.  Practicalities for my Designated Driver forced my follow-up EGD from the fall to the winter.  My vegetable garden did not have significant yield.  The Holy Days come late on the secular calendar.  It's been a tough transition.

While delayed a couple of weeks, I'm sufficiently recovered to engage in autumn activities.  This being a Presidential year, I voted in the local primaries, will learn more about the candidates, national and local, on my screens this week, and affirm that my preferences are sound.   I am ready for my mid-September Torah reading, then begin polishing the YK reading.  I have to greet electronically three old friends.  My kids plan to visit for RH.  I will need to assemble challenging dinners for RH and the Sukkah.  OLLI invited me to give a presentation which will need priority focus.  Exercise collapsed with travel and illness.  That needs restoration with judicious pacing.  

The final quarter of the calendar year brings a reconing of my semi-annual initiatives, some going well, others disappointing but salvagable. 

And throw in some recreation, fishing, maybe golf, drawing, photos.  Football has not engaged me as the NFL and colleges resume, but I should consider a live game.  And perhaps a day in NYC.

While our calendar year begins in January, our activity transition remains in proximity of Labor Day.

Voter Misgiving

Real Vote.  First one of the election season.  A primary.  Other than school board elections, my state only votes for anything on even numbered years.  My county has a dominant party, at least where the population clusters, so the primary determines who will hold office in my own districts, statewide, and in Washington.

Open seats this round.  A lot of them.  Term limits give us a new Governor.  There's a certain musical chairs to vacancies with our Lt Governor wanting to be Governor, Congressman wanting to be Senator, term limited County Executive wanting statewide office, state senators wanting statewide office.  Then their slots need to be filled. My state rep decided he was in over his head.  No shortage of people wanting his place.  New County Executive.  President of County Council wants to serve as County Executive, so her position becomes vacant.  It was a long ballot, though not an onerous one.

As a voter, I have become different.  The October 7 attacks by Hamas happened over there.  The responses of different American constituencies happened over here.  Some of the alliances made me very uneasy.  I voted Jewish.  I met or knew all the Jewish candidates.  The Governor wannabe was the most capable.  The other two I trusted.

Fundamentally, people have two generally valid ways to select representatives.  One is whose proposed agenda matches my preferences, the other is who would I hire.  My inclination has been to go the latter route.  I know that no candidate is a clone of mine.  During a term of office, events of various types will arise.  The person who can handle the twists and turns succeeds better than the rigid ideologue.  There are exclusions.  Fists in the air with river to the sea is an exclusion.  Not that I fear the outcome, but I can anticipate other policy branch points.

After due diligence, I came to the poll with a single remaining dilemma.  One candidate, the favorite, had proven herself a capable state legislator with a personally progressive agenda.  She would set it aside to secure majorities for legislation that she sponsored or that others sponsored but she found merit.  No question of her competence as a crafter of law.  That's fine for the senate of a small state, one of about two dozen people.  It may be very different as an at-large representative in a body of 435 much more diverse individuals and regional interests.  Her very real skill at creating alliances may be overwhelmed.  I can see her posing with The Squad, voting with that group, people who I would evict from my party were it practical to go that route.  As I tapped the icon on the screen, I sure wished that the man who opted for the state capital instead of Capitol Hill, a person highly capable and in alignment with my mind, would have selected a DC career instead.  Alas, he has a physician wife, newborn son, young step children and preference as an executive rather than one of a large body of people.  He got my vote for Governor.  The capable state senator got my vote for US Rep, though with great misgivings.

The tally will not happen for a few more days.  Then a general election, where surprises are few.  At least for this particular office, we can have a do-over in two years.

Recovering from Covid

Covid took something out of me.  As I reach the final 24 hours of my Paxlovid prescription, one more foil blister tonight and tomorrow, I still don't feel great, but functional.  The breathing improvement must come from viral control.  Its trajectory suggests medication driven.  Sleep better.  Fatigue could be better.  Most distressing, perhaps, my mind has not reclaimed its pre-illness acuity.  If I were to do a formal Montreal Mini-Mental I'd probably score OK.  Some of the Executive Function elements of focus and organization still seem lagging.

We are in a primary voting interval in advance of the formal election day.  I have the capacity to vote.  A non-profit that values my input wants some of it.  I can respond, though organizing my presentation seemed more difficult during illness.  The response will get edited and sent later today.  I can do household tasks, though with less stamina.  And I set up my new smartwatch from the written and app directions.

Focus has challenged me.  Creativity has not gone very well.  The ability to edit and revise my work before submission still seems less capable than before the illness.  Motivation to do creative things has not recovered in a meaningful way.

I am assuming the deficits are from the Covid virus.  They could also be from its treatment, trading one immediate respiratory rescue for a longer-term but more subtle lapse in cognitive function.  For now, neither is disabling, just less than it was not long ago.

New Smartwatch

 

My first watch, gifted to me at about the age when I began to read words and equate times with TV shows, had Li'l Abner's countenance on the dial.  I did not know who Li'l Abner was, but at the time the adaptation of the strip had just reached Broadway.  Within a short time, that comic which appeared in the New York Daily News, Sunday's in color, would become priority reading.  I learned that the Presidents of the decade include reading it in their morning schedules but for very different reasons.  I do not recall if that was my last watch with a popular theme on the dial. 

All subsequent watches served a more utilitarian purpose, to let me know the time.  I needed to know this for a variety of reasons, initially to not miss my preferred TV shows or when to return to class after a break.  As standardized tests became pervasive, doing my best on them required a certain amount of pacing.  The room in which I recorded answers with a No. 2 pencil did not always have a clock in easy line of sight.  No sponsor ever prohibited a watch, some even included this it its things to bring to the exam.

I always bought cheap watches, Timex or similar generic.  Some had leather straps, some metal expansion ones.  Each would leave an indentation on my skin.  All had a plain face with Arabic Numerals.  Sometimes all 12, sometimes only 12-3-6-9.  I do not recall any with Roman numerals, though there might have been.  I rarely had to get a new band.  The watch would usually need replacement first, sometimes by a baseball smashing the crystal, more often by the wind mechanism failing.

When digital battery watches came out, I took an instant liking to them.  They were cheap, almost disposables, at least the on sale brands that I bought from the local discount stores, probably beginning in the 1980s.  Numeric dials were fine, but I especially liked the accessory buttons that set a timer or an alarm or backlit the numbers.  Those have short lifespans, though I learned quickly how to change the button batteries.  Despite their utility and economy, few stores sell them anymore.

Like most innovations, what we now call Smartwatches carried a high price tag as novel products.  Once patents expired and mass production moved to Asia, a very functional product could be had for a song.  E-commerce transferred their availability from my usual stores to Amazon.  My first one took some effort to set up, but served me well.  Its vibration mechanisms began to fail after a couple of years.  The charger eventually malfunctioned.  I ordered a replacement that looked like its charger, but they are not interchangeable.  It did not fit.  Just as soon spend the $40 and have a new, slightly upgraded timepiece for a couple of years.

It arrived.  Not easy to use.  Came mostly charged, or at least enough to program.  This was easy for a 20-something, not so easy for a septuagenarian.  Even putting the band on took some effort.  Reading one sentence at a time in the manual I got the app onto my phone and the Bluetooth to recognize the watch.  Could enter my age, email, height and weight.  Choose a dial face that I can change later.  I did not have to set the time.  I assume it will reset if I ever cross time zones, as I did on the road trip. My pulse is nice to know when finish my treadmill sessions, now on hold due to illness.  And I really find the countdown timer useful for all sorts of things, from the kitchen to coping with insomnia.  And for only $40, almost disposable.  I think next time I need something from Amazon, I'll add a new charger that fits my old watch, though I really don't know if the failure comes from the watch or from the charger.  Then I'll have a spare.