10 Words For Now. Can You Add More?

Mr. McGuire: I just want to say one word to you. Just one word.
Benjamin: Yes, sir.
Mr. McGuire: Are you listening?
Benjamin: Yes, I am.
Mr. McGuire: Plastics.
Benjamin: Exactly how do you mean?
Mr. McGuire: There’s a great future in plastics. Think about it. Will you think about it?

Last week I posted of my fondness for Mrs. Robinson and The Graduate soundtrack album. But how can you think of that movie without remembering the one-sided conversation between young Benjamin (Dustin Hoffman) and neighbor Mr. McGuire? That single word, plastics, representing an entire decade, an entire generation.

So it was “plastic” in the 60’s. In the 70’s the word was “computer.” “Apple” describes the 80’s, and “Seinfeld” the 90’s. Back to tech with “social-media” in the 2000’s.

But is there a word now? Do you believe one word can be enough advice on which to launch a lifetime? One word to inspire your kids. One word to set them to a lifetime of happiness, or a lifetime of success, or a lifetime of doing good-and wouldn’t be nice if that could all be one life.

I’ve put together a list of 10 words, but I am sure you can do better. Add comments and share on Facebook, or email me at les.raff@post.com. Let’s find the best word for NOW.

MY LIST OF 10 WORDS

Voters
Renewable
Testify
Empathize
Driverless
Data
Molecular
Representation
Explore
Equality

Now let’s hear from you.
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Mrs. Robinson, Are You Trying to Seduce Me? The Soundtrack from The Graduate Makes My All-Time Album List.

It has been a while, but it’s time to add to my compilation of all-time favorite albums. My earlier list included one soundtrack LP from the ’60’s, The Beatles’ A Hard Day’s Night. Today I’m adding another. In 1968 I was too young to see Mike Nichols’ classic film The Graduate but old enough to catch the buzz about it. I knew my dad liked the movie and I bought the album as a Fathers Day gift for him. I don’t know how often he listened to it, but I do know that I listened to it, a lot!

Everyone associates the music from The Graduate with Simon & Garfunkel and indeed, all of the vocals are theirs. The album kicks off with their first hit, 1966’s The Sounds of Silence, but this is no S & G Greatest Hits album.

Mrs. Robinson is on board (and in bed,) but it isn’t the version of the song that gave Simon and Garfunkel their number one hit. For that, you need to grab their Bookends album. On this album, you will find Mrs. R. in an instrumental version and a short vocal variation. Other big hit songs? Nope. Instead, we have the absolutely lovely April Comes She Will, and Scarborough Fair/Canticle, with its haunting melody and counterpoint singing. There is also a little oddball number, The Big Bright Green Pleasure Machine.

That is about it for Paul and Artie. The rest of the album consists of instrumental pieces by Oscar and Grammy award-winning composer/pianist Dave Grusin. I’ve been a fan of Grusin’s music for a long time. I used his theme music for the TV show St. Elsewhere as the soundtrack to the first video montage I ever created, a tribute celebrating married life up to the birth of our son Michael. Grusin’s melodies are just right on this album as well.

Interestingly, the review of this album on the AllMusic Website rips this disc as a sleazy repackaging of old material designed to sell a few new songs. In fact, it castigates the album for being

“the earliest and one of the most successful Hollywood repackagings of “found” pop songs, a formula essentially based around coercing fans to purchase soundtrack albums filled with material they already own in order to acquire the occasional new track or two.”

But I loved the album, and when I was finally old enough to see the movie, knowing the soundtrack made it all the more enjoyable. You are trying to seduce me, Mrs. Robinson, aren’t you?

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Are 400,000 Men Enough to Prove a PSA Point?

many-men — For every 199 men screened for prostate cancer, another life will be saved.

I BELIEVE that men between the age of 55 and 80 benefit from an annual blood test for Prostate Specific Antigen (PSA) to evaluate for the possibility that they have prostate cancer.

I BELIEVE that the mixed messages for and against PSA screening from various panels, experts, and government agencies have resulted in confusion, lower rates of PSA testing, and an increasing number of aggressive prostate cancer cases being diagnosed. It is certainly what I see in our lab.

I HAVE BELIEVED research studies will confirm my views. Now I think one has.

The medical journal Urology has published a study by Dr. Paul Alpert of the University of California San Francisco School of Medicine. Dr. Alpert dug deep into the electronic medical records of Kaiser Permanente Northern California, a massive healthcare organization to determine whether PSA screening was beneficial.

The records of over 400,000 men seen at Kaiser from 1998 to 2002 were examined. First Dr. Alpert reviewed the records to determine if, and how often, the patients had PSA testing. He then analyzed whether those men were ever diagnosed with prostate cancer, whether they died from their cancer, whether they died from another cause or whether they were still living in 2014.

The study is difficult to read and digest. When I tried to read it on-line the embedded charts were swimming and diving before my eyes. To really dig in I needed to download and print a copy.

Dr. Alpert has given very precise definitions to terms like “Marker PSA,” “Prior PSA” and “PSA Interval.” He has divided the 400,000+ subjects into 42 distinct categories, based on age and time between PSA determinations. Alpert has then applied statistical evaluations to determine how the various categories compared. Still following me?

The results, as encapsulated by Dr. Alpert, show “that yearly PSA screening is beneficial, reducing prostate cancer death by 64% for men aged 55-75,” and that “yearly screening is the interval of choice.” Other calculations in the study demonstrated that for every 199 men screened by a simple PSA blood test another life will be saved. Death from all causes was also reduced in men having yearly PSA screening.

I know not everyone will be convinced. I know that some will claim too many non-aggressive prostate cancers are diagnosed by PSA screening and that some men will be treated by surgery or radiation therapy who would do just fine without it. But urologists are getting better at determining which men really need therapy and which men don’t, and concentrating their treatment efforts on the men who will benefit from it.

So I BELIEVE EVEN MORE STRONGLY. I support annual PSA testing. I support organizations like SEA Blue. I tell my friends and family. And now I am telling YOU. Get screened. Or have your husband, brother, boyfriend or father get screened. 400,000 men can’t be wrong!

The above is the opinion of the author and not necessarily UroPartners LLC.
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Woodman’s Market. This Wisconsin Invader is Worth a Visit.

woodmans-market-opened-recently-in-buffalo-grove — Woodman’s Market opened recently in Buffalo Grove.

The woman in the motorized shopping cart was relentless, pressing the ever-so-patient shift manager with query after query in a non-stop cascade. I stood patiently behind her, hoping to ask just one question.
“Do you have Blue Bunny Ice Cream.”
“Yes, we do.”
“Where is it?”
“It’s in the freezer with all the other ice cream.”
“I hope your freezer aisle isn’t too cold. I get chilly. Do you have all four kinds of Dole Low Sugar Fruit?”
“I think we have three, we can look into getting the fourth.”
“I like all four, please write that down. What time do you close?”
“We are open 24 hours a day. The next time we are closed will be Thanksgiving Day.”
“I want this to be my one-stop grocery store. Did you say you have Blue Bunny Ice Cream? All the flavors?”
“Yes, we stock it. I hope we have the flavors you like.”
“And Canfield’s Soda, I like that too, but not the lemon-lime.”
“We carry Canfield’s.”
“What credit cards do you take?”
“Well, we take cash and Discover Card. No other credit cards.”
“I don’t have that, we’ll have to put all these groceries back, I can’t shop here. I need one-stop shopping”
“We do accept checks.”
“What deli meats do…”

At this point, I could wait no longer. I felt compelled to cut in. I excused myself and asked the beleaguered manager if they carried flashlights. He looked at me with relief in his eyes, though his response was a disappointing “I don’t think so.” I backed away and left him to his ongoing inquisition.

The site of this interrogation? Aisle 14 of the new, massive, grocery store that has been causing tongues to wag throughout Buffalo Grove and the surrounding ‘burbs. Woodman’s Market, a Wisconsin supermarket chain, has planted a grocery store big enough to house a fleet of 747’s and leave room for Passport and Customs Control.

We have made two trips to our new neighborhood supermarket in the past week. While big enough to be a warehouse store, it differs from shopping at Costco in that you don’t have to buy in bulk. Products are in packaging that is convenient for us empty-nesters as well as for the larger families shopping alongside us.

Because of the size of the store, an astonishing variety of groceries are available along the super-wide aisles. Have a favorite brand of tomato sauce? It will be on the shelves. Need to buy Dole Low Sugar Fruit? They have that too (well at least three out of four varieties, so far.) My 40-year quest for Unfrosted Blueberry Pop-Tarts? Thanks to Woodman’s, I had one for breakfast Saturday morning. Too bad that sometime in the last 40 years Kellogg’s stopped using real Smucker’s jam.

Prices are great. On our most recent visit, we loaded a cart with what felt like $200 in groceries only to have the final bill half of that. The “No Visa or MasterCard” policy wasn’t a hassle either. It took less than a week (the time between our two visits) to apply for and receive my first ever Discover Card–Double Cash Back for New Users!

We haven’t checked out the produce or meat yet. For the time being, we will leave that to our usual supermarkets, Sunset Foods and Whole Paycheck. But for every day stock-up, we have a new favorite store. Sometimes something good can come from Wisconsin. And oh, if you see that poor shift manager, don’t ask him about Blue Bunny Ice Cream. I’m afraid he might strangle the next person that asks him!

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Qantas and the Doctor. Was a Qantas Employee Sexist?

Every day at 3 pm the UPS delivery driver rings the doorbell of the lab. Since my office is closest to the front door and most of our staff is long gone by 3, I am usually the person to let him in. We chat about the weather, how busy a day it has been for each of us, and how bad the part-time UPS help is. He is always friendly and helpful, asking where we want each package delivered to. As he leaves he hands me his hand-held scanner and asks me for my signature. “Your John Hancock right here, Mr. Raff.”

He has mentioned my car with the “Doc” license plates. He sees the packages he delivers addressed to Lester Raff, MD. And every day he sees the nameplate outside my office door, the one that says “Dr. Raff, Medical Director.” But for him, I will always be “Mr. Raff.” I have never corrected his small mistake and after years of our banter, I would feel embarrassed to do so now. He does his job, we get our needed supplies on a timely basis, and all is well. It is what it is.

So why do I bring this up? Have you followed this week’s Twitterstorm, non-Trump category?

Siobhan O’Dwyer, an English physician, whose airline ticket correctly identified her as Dr. was called “Miss” by a Qantas airline flight attendant at the boarding gate. This was offensive to Dr. O’Dwyer. She tweeted that she didn’t go to University for eight years to be called “Miss.” After being called out by thousands of tweeters for being egotistical she followed up by saying “it’s not about the title, it’s about the fact that this wouldn’t have happened if I was a man.”

Dr. Siobhan, I can sympathize with you. I too had four years of medical school. Then came a four-year residency and 35 years of practice to figure out how to do what I was doing. After all that time, most people do address me as Dr. And it does irk me when I get a written invitation from a close friend or relative addressed to Mr. Raff.

But the UPS driver? He’s just a busy guy doing his job. Just like the Qantas flight attendant probably was. Maybe he had just come off a long trans-Pacific haul. Maybe his shoes were too tight. Maybe he just made a mistake. Not demeaning, not sexist, just a human error before a busy flight. Sometimes a cigar is just a cigar!

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photo credit: Stefans02 <a href=”http://www.flickr.com/photos/144594988@N02/44409447141″>War Thunder / Flying At Dawn</a> via <a href=”http://photopin.com”>photopin</a> <a href=”https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/2.0/”>(license)</a>

Who Gets Prostate Cancer? It Could Be You Or Someone You Love

prostate-group — Ben Stiller, Colin Powell, Robert DeNiro, Harry Belafonte, my Dad, John Kerry, Roger Moore, Mandy Patinkin, and Frank Zappa have all been afflicted by prostate cancer.

Who gets prostate cancer?

Comedy stars get prostate cancer.
Generals get prostate cancer.
Good Fellas get prostate cancer.
Singers get prostate cancer.
Presidential candidates get prostate cancer.
James Bond gets prostate cancer.
Broadway stars get prostate cancer.
Mothers of Invention get prostate cancer.
My dad got prostate cancer.

The famous and the powerful. The funny and the musical. Somebodies husband or father. All can be struck with the disease that will affect 1 out of 9 American men in their lifetime. For men, prostate cancer is 2nd only to lung cancer for cancer deaths. It took my father, and it will always be a risk for me.

So every year I run the run, raise as much money as I can, and give support to the SEA Blue Chicago Prostate Cancer Annual Walk and Run, Us Too International’s annual Chicago fundraising event. SEA stands for Support, Education, and Advocacy. These needs stand shoulder to shoulder with the need for research into prevention, early detection, and improved therapeutic options for prostate cancer.

Most men screened for prostate cancer will not have prostate cancer. Some of the men with prostate cancer will not need treatment for many years. Many, many, men will survive their prostate cancer.

But I know it can be a deadly disease. I lost my dad to prostate cancer, and in his honor, I will run September 9th in Lincoln Park. Won’t you help me remember him, or honor someone you have loved? Please click here to make a donation. Every dollar is appreciated. Every dollar can help make a difference.

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My Saturday Morning Choice: McCain over Meyer

meghan-selina — Meghan McCain and Selina Meyer

My plans changed twice this morning. First the weather. The rain put a damper on my plan to train for next week’s SEABlue Prostate Cancer Awareness 5K run. So I chose my other option, to climb down to the basement and beat up my heart on the elliptical machine. One-half hour, the killer interval setting.

Lately, my entertainment when pumping away has been streaming an episode of Veep, the profane comedy starring Julia Louis-Dreyfus as Selina Meyer, the single-minded, self-important politician who transitions from V.P. to POTUS to just plain frustrated over a course of six HBO seasons. It is raunchy, it is foul, and it is just plain hilarious. And according to my one political insider, it is damn accurate.

But on my way to the basement, I noticed the TV in the kitchen was tuned to NBC, where the memorial service for Senator John McCain was about to begin. I stood and watched the preliminaries, all the dignitaries, the past Presidents, Vice-Presidents and Cabinet members. Warren Beatty and Henry Kissinger. Henry Kissinger! And of course the grieving family, especially the three generations of McCain women; mother Roberta, wife Cindy, and daughter Meghan.

So when I went to the basement to get my miles in, I opted for pathos over comedy and tuned into the memorial. Meghan McCain filled my eyes and ears as I pumped away. Bathed in a daughter’s love, the full measure of the man–the father and the hero–came across louder than any viciously funny one-liner that I would have heard from Selina on Veep. My accelerated heart rate was due to more than just my physical exertion as tears repeatedly came to my eyes.

I listened to all the others; Bush and Kissinger and Lieberman and Obama. Their reverence for McCain was obvious, their subtext just as obvious. It saddened me to think of our current state of discourse; it made me wonder who still among us will be able to command such respect, such bipartisan respect, in the years to come.

John McCain may have been as profane and at times outrageous as Selina Meyer, but unlike the TV character, and unlike so many real-life pols, he had character and a shining vision for our country. I never met him, I never voted for him, but I will miss him.
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