Was it COVID Brain Fog or Writers Block?

It’s time to let the creative juices flow once more!

It's been a while since I have done it.
Put words to the page and then I've spun it.
Sending to readers a timely missive.
Hoping my followers aren't too dismissive.

I'm not sure of precise causation
That caused two weeks of blog cessation.
What was it kept my fingers napping
Instead of on the keyboard tapping.

It started when two lines appeared
On the COVID test I'd commandeered.
The first line meant the test was working.
The second confirmed the virus's lurking.

Two Moderna shots then double boosted.
Yet still in my nose the microbe roosted.
With coughs and sneezes and feeling sickly.
Into quarnatine I disappeared quickly.

So empty moments were now my friend.
Hours  of leisure I thought I'd spend.
Writing blogs 'bout things that were popping.
I might have been sick but the world was not stopping.

My mind was all foggy, could not concentrate at
The things going on that I'd want to debate at.
But now it's much better and I'm seeing clearly
Here are some things I missed most severly.

There were hearings in DC that were causing a ruckus
They told how Trump and his friends were trying to f*ck us.
Thanks to Adam, Elaine and of course Ms Liz Cheney.
We were sure mesmerized learning about how insane he.

The planet is hotter, it's like a fire pit glowing
Who knows just what to our kids we're bestowing.
Heat waves, deadly storms, and still the President's action
Was blocked by refrains from coal's friend Hot Joe Manchin.

But up in the cosmos there was such delight
As the Webb telescope provided a sight.
Of the universe edges as they were at formation
I say it's Big Bang, some say God's creation.

Those topics I missed while my brain it was snoozing
So my silence for weeks I hope your excusing.
I'll do what I can to get back up to snuff.
For reading this verse, I can't thank you enough.

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You Are Batty If You Don’t Get Vaccinated

A rabid bat. Photo courtesy Chicago Tribune.

Did you read the news story? Earlier this month, an 87-year-old man in from Spring Grove died from rabies right here in Lake County. How did this happen?

He had been bitten by a bat. The bat was trapped and tested; the testing confirming the bat was infected with rabies. The man was advised to seek medical treatment, which might have been life-saving, but refused.

I don’t know the intimate details of why the man declined treatment. Perhaps it was due to his age and the nature of the therapy (multiple injections over a 14 day period.) But doesn’t his refusal remind you of something?

Suppose there was a “something” out there that could decrease the risk of your catching a highly contagious disease, a disease that might have serious health effects on you, and that you might transmit to your children, your parents, your friends, and your co-workers.

Suppose that “something” was an injection, or maybe two, with maybe an extra jab a few months later. Suppose the health risk of those shots was minuscule compared to the risk of the disease. Suppose it was the only thing in health care that was free! And suppose getting that the jabination might protect your loved ones, others around you, and the nation at large?

What in the name of common sense would prevent you from getting that “something”? Maybe you would wait a few weeks to see if there were any unanticipated harmful side effects in others. Maybe there would be a delay because it would be hard for you to take time off of work, or get child care when you went to get jabbed. But what if the “something” was available at virtually every corner–or that health care workers would come to you to administer it?

OK, there may be a few people with a legitimate history of severe allergic reaction to previous “somethings.” I can these those people hesitating. But other than that–why, oh why would you refuse?

Learn a lesson from the late bat-man of Spring Grove–refuse what is good for you, and you might just wake up dead.

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I Know What’s In The Vaccine. It Is Hundreds Of Years of Progress.

Dr. Edward Jenner performing his first vaccination against smallpox on James Phipps, May 14, 1796, oil on canvas by Ernest Board.Credit…DEA Picture Library/Getty Images

There is a lengthy meme circulating on Facebook that begins “I’m vaccinated and, no, I don’t know what’s in it.” I’m vaccinated as well, and I want to tell you that I do know what is in the COVID-19 vaccines, be it Moderna, or Pfizer, or even poor old Johnson & Johnson.

Have I read the list of ingredients? Have I checked for additives, preservatives, or carcinogens? No, because the vaccine contents that I know about won’t be listed on any label. The ingredients I speak of are the men and women, the giants of science, on whose shoulders the current tier of scientists and researchers stand.

Let’s start with the microbe hunters, who first identified and clarified the concept that there was a world of tiny organisms and that these might cause disease. Names like Antonie van Leeuwenhoek, Louis Pasteur, Robert Koch, and Ignaz Semmelweis. There is an essence of all of them in the vaccine.

Rosalind Franklin, James Watson, Francis Crick–the best known, but not the only, scientists whose work led to the understanding of the structure of DNA. Francisco Mojica, who added CRISPR to our lexicon as a way of manipulating DNA. There is plenty of them in today’s mRNA vaccines.

You must have heard of Edward Jenner, Jonas Salk, and Albert Sabin. Shall we call them the great-grandfather, the grandfather, and the father of vaccines? And what about all the scientists who have been striving for 30 years to create a vaccine against the Human Immunodeficiency Virus, the author of AIDS? Surely the blood, the sweat, and the brain cells of all these investigators are part of every “jab.”

That is how science grows. We take the knowledge of our ancestors and add on to it. We test new ideas, accept the ones that seem to work, discard the ones that don’t.

Accepted science changes! New data forces us to challenge each other, to consider new answers to old questions. And on top of that, nature is not constant. So while Newton’s Laws of Motion have stood the test of almost 350 years, the SARS-CoV-2 virus, with us for less than two years, mutates. It is not because the science is “bad” that recommendations about the vaccine and other matters related to COVID-19 need to be updated on a regular basis. It is because life, science, and the virus evolve.

So I will continue to put my faith in science–in the men and women who have made tremendous advances in our knowledge of the world around us. The vaccines aren’t perfect, but we have them because, as Isaac Newton himself said, we have been standing on the shoulders of all those giants.

Please forward or share on Facebook. If we can each convince one person to vaccinate…

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COVID-19. A year in the life.

One year. One long, never-ending, never-repeatable year.

One year ago I told the story of our shopping trip to Woodman’s, as a maskless, non-socially-distanced, throng filled the aisles and their shopping carts with paper towels and toilet paper and anything else they thought would help them in a long siege. Our year of Covid-19 had begun.

I sit here now, as one of the fully-vaccinated, physically undamaged, lucky survivors. No one close to me lost their lives, indeed, I have to think hard to come up with anyone in my circle who even tested positive.

We never closed the lab, though we limited our on-site staffing in the early days. We never stopped seeing our children and grandchildren, with drive-bys graduating to driveway and back yard visits, then in-garage celebrations, and eventually, small gatherings in the kitchen.

We voted (by mail.) We mastered many difficult jigsaw puzzles (and gave up on some impossible ones.) We wrote haiku and parody songs and scripted our favorite TV shows. And we binge-watched. Oh, how we binge-watched. Who knew there were so many dramedies coming out of Australia! We cooked.

We avoided one pet while gaining another, the dog who has grown and grown both in his own body and in our hearts. We have joined Boards, volunteered, and served on committees, now knowing enough to mute our microphones on interminable Zoom calls.

And what have we learned? The pleasure of welcoming our friends and neighbors to our socially distanced back yard, instead of trying to converse in a noisy restaurant. That many movies are just as good at home as at a multi-plex. That books can still take us away from our everyday life. That science will win out–but not always right away.

My thoughts go out to all of you who have suffered much much more. The fact that we have turned a corner may be no solace to those of you who have lost a mother or father, lost a job, lost financial security. Still, I pray we are all on our way to a better place and time.

Do I Stay or Do I Go?

This indecision’s bugging me…The Clash

I am standing at the service line, watching as my partner ranges to his right to go after a passing shot that has whizzed past my feebly outstretched racket. It is the first night of my tennis league, my indoor tennis league, and Month 6 of Life During COVID. And I am wondering what the heck I am doing here.

We have been pretty careful since March. Yes, we shop in grocery stores, and not just during the hours restricted to us AARP’ers. But everyone in the stores is wearing masks and we do a lot of sanitizing.

Yes, we have had friends and family to our house, but always on the back deck, well-spaced, and again with plenty of sanitation. (One exception–when it got too dark outside and friends came into our sunroom to finish a game of Password. I still regret that–and not just because my team lost.)

Yes, we have eaten at restaurants, but 3 times in 6 months isn’t too excessive. And 2/3 of those meals were outside dining.

So no, we are not perfect, but we have been trying to stay safe and healthy.

And now my tennis league has begun. Sure, the club has regulations. Masks are required in all areas except the courts. Locker rooms are closed, water fountains turned off, after-match beers while watching the 4th quarter of Monday Night Football are a no-no. And we must follow a circuitous pathway through the lobby to keep the incoming players from the outgoing players–something about as effective as the one-way arrows in the grocery store aisles in preventing close encounters of the virus kind.

And here I am, unmasked, in a cavernous room with stagnant air, where 11 other men are running, jumping, yelling, laughing, and expelling our respiratory contents as we circle each other. tapping rackets with our partners. In my head, I see images of coronaviruses, each as big as the Wilson 4’s we are playing with, floating in space.

Yes, I know this isn’t a packed political rally. It’s not a motorcycle festival. It’s not a frat party or a drink at a crowded bar. But with my nearly Medicare status, and with my diabetes, my risk factors stand out in this group of highly athletic 30 and 40-year-olds.

So I begin to get afraid. And I ask myself, when is the fun worth the fear?

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The Speech Trump Should Have Given

Trump chooses Pence to head task force-Courtesy Chicago Tribune

February 8, 2020, Washington DC.

My fellow Americans:

I come to you today with the truth. America is under attack. The attacker is not your neighbor or my political foes. It is not China or Russia, South Korea or Iran. The attacker is a virus, tiny, insidious, and very hard to stop.

But working together we can slow it down, protect our country and our freedoms. As we face the most terrible threat of this century, I make you the following promises:

Our decisions will be based on science. I am in the process of assembling a team of the best and brightest experts in this country on infectious diseases and public health. They will form a Task Force, coordinated by my very able Vice President Mike Pence, but free to make recommendations based on hard evidence and emerging trends. Vice President Pence has been instructed to listen and report to me, and I pledge to let his reports be a guidance to me.
We may need to take drastic steps, such as shutdowns or curfews, that will have a severe, negative impact on parts of our economy and those of us whose livelihood is dependant on those industries. I will work with our Congress to establish a massive financial support system. I cannot now tell you how large the fund will be, or how it will be administered, but be assured it will continue until the effects of this virus are a thing of the past.
The Federal Government will take the lead in establishing a nationwide system of support for supplies and their supply chains. We will help the governors of all our states, red and blue, to be able to provide for the residents of their states, without rebuke or retribution.
Our eventual salvation will be in the development of a vaccine. I will work with our wonderful pharmaceutical companies to put their best scientists to work to create a safe and effective vaccine as rapidly as possible. When will it be ready? I cannot tell you–but I give my word that it will not be until our scientific agencies are convinced that it will provide the protection that is necessary.

When will we know we have successfully defeated our nemesis? It won’t be Easter: it won’t be Memorial Day. With hard work and sacrifice, perhaps we can fully celebrate our success by July 4th or Labor Day. Whenever it comes, it will be because we joined hands and worked together.

There is an election in November. I had believed you would re-elect me because of our wonderful economy, our wonderful country. Now I am confident you will re-elect me because I will lead you through this unprecedented attack. There is no need to panic, there is no need to fear. Our country is strong, and over the next few months, we will prove that again and again.

God Bless America.

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Empty Chairs at Empty Tables

Empty chairs at empty tables
Where my friend will sing no more.
Les Miserables

Sometimes accidents happen. We really didn’t plan to do it, but when it hit us in the face, we just went ahead and did.

Barb and I used to be semi-foodies. We never took pictures of our restaurant meals and post them, but we did have a line-up of favorite places to go multiple times a week, as well as a line-up of special places to go on special occasions. I would scour the Tribune and Chicago Magazine for hot new places to try. It was a major part of our social life.

COVID has changed all that–though we love the alternative of having friends and family having socially distanced celebrations on our back deck. We have dined in the parking lot of Wildfire twice, but other than that, restaurant dining has been limited to carry-outs once or twice a week, including treating our granddaughters with Superdawg every now and then (Fact-check: We like Superdawg more than our granddaughters do.)

Yesterday I had the morning off and Barb suggested breakfast outside at Walker Brothers in Lincolnshire, one of our favorite haunts in the “old days.” We arrived at the nearly empty parking lot, noticing lots of tables set up on the patio and under the trees. We were cut off by the hostess who asked us if we wanted to eat inside or outside with a caveat “If you eat outside you will hate it, the bees are terrible. We have lots of room inside, you will be safe.”

Barb and I looked at each other and pondered the situation. We were craving a good WB breakfast, but why take unnecessary chances? We debated while the hostess politely turned away. Finally, we decided the food would be no more dangerous inside than out, the seating areas were pretty empty, and we would have our masks on 90% of the time. “What the hell, let’s go for it,” I finally said.

And so we did. I had my bacon waffle, Barb her Healthy Start Breakfast. Service was a bit spotty, perhaps the waitress wanting to make sure we didn’t feel crowded. The food was good and we got our caffeine kick-starts (coffee for Barb, tea for me) but surrounded by so many empty tables the feeling just wasn’t the same. Everything was still very different.

Will we do it again soon? I don’t think so. While we decided we didn’t regret our choice of entering the restaurant, the risk, however minimal, may have outweighed the reward. And like everything we do during this craziness, that’s the decision we need to make every time. Even at our favorite restaurant.

VOTE! VOTE EARLY! VOTE AS IF YOUR LIFE DEPENDED ON IT!

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photo credit: arbyreed Empty via photopin (license)

COVIDERATA (discovered deep under Stonehenge)

Coviderata

Always remember to cover your nose,
Or your mask is malarky.
You might never again shake someone’s hand,
but you may kiss the air around their cheek.
George Carlin was half right,
those more cautious than you are not maniacs,
but those less cautious ARE idiots.
Take care in crowded and indoor locations,
the person on your left might sneeze,
and his elbow is pointed at you.
With Facetime and Zoom you can be blessed.
But 5-hour meetings are tiresome, especially with your grandmother.
If pro soccer is canceled this year and next,
why would America care?
Gray roots are fashionable. If you live in England they are grey.
The loss of a school year for our children,
works best for the braniacs
who don’t need second grade.
If you have products to sell don’t be gouging,
for Karma will find you in time
and Yoko can be a bitch.
Injecting unproven pharma
can be a prelude to embalming,
but might interest some people.
Most of us are in this together,
Unless you have fled to New Zealand
or to Gilligan’s Island with the Professor.
Funny COVID song parodies have had their time,
but are no longer timely
and rarely funny.
If the NBA can play in a bubble,
can Little League play in a Sno-Globe?
Vaccines = good,
especially on a triple-word score.
Be at peace with your friends, your family, and the uninformed;
just remember there is always an “Unfriend” button.
This is what happens when no one hosts the Oscars.
Ricky Gervais would have saved us,
or maybe Kevin Hart.

Be happy, and never again eat a bat.
You are a friend of the universe.

With appropriate apologies to
Max Ehrmann, Desiderata, Copyright 1952.

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Virus Visions. Does the Past Repeat?

I am sitting in our sunroom, beams of light pouring through the jalousie windows. Our cat and a visiting pup alternate turns lying in the sun, neither willing to share space with the other. It is a crystal clear and brilliant day. I should be outside enjoying it before the crushing heat returns. But my stomach has been doing flip-flops for the last 24 hours or so, and I feel more comfortable on the sofa, book in hand, gazing out onto the street.

Barb designed this room for days like today; one set of windows facing our backyard; the second opening onto the pond, where only one of four of our newly hatched cygnets has survived the demonic snapping turtles in the water below; the final set of windows giving a view of the street, where we live at the back end of the loop the neighborhood’s main thoroughfare makes as it meanders through the subdivision.

I can people-watch unseen as I flip the pages of my novel. It’s a day made for strolling and all our neighbors, nearly homogenous in their ethnicity, are out. Many proceed as family units–mom and dad on bikes, baby in an attached carrier, young daughters struggling to keep up astride their two-wheelers, bouncing side-to-side on the training wheels. Pairs of neighborly couples stride along, 6-foot distances narrowing, then swelling again as someone remembers. In-line skaters, dog walkers, and loud phone chatters weave in and out to complete the tapestry.

The novel beside me is one that Barb gave to me from her stack on her nightstand after I finished reading the last book in my library pile. The Great Believers by Rebecca Makkai alternates between modern-day Paris and Chicago in the 1980’s, the Chicago scenes taking place in an area that would become known as Boystown. It is the story of a great pandemic, though the disease at the story’s center is not COVID-19, the virus is not SARS-CoV-2.

It was early in my medical career when we first became aware of a deadly illness that was striking gay men with the unusual disease combination of Kaposi’s Sarcoma and Pneumocystis Pneumonia. Medically, it struck home. I had given a presentation on KS in med school and pneumocystis was the organism that had ended my father-in-law’s battle with leukemia.

I remember the heated arguments over whether or not this disease, soon to be named Acquired Immune Deficiency Syndrome, was an infectious disease and if so what the transmitting agent could be. Then came the discovery of a virus, originally titled HTLV-III and eventually renamed HIV. Methods of transmission were identified. Rock Hudson became a symbol, Ryan White a hero.

To protect ourselves in the morgue we began wearing chain mail gloves while doing autopsies, at least until my Laboratory Director discovered a unique and clever way to avoid our performing post-mortem exams on known AIDS cases. He told the hospital medical staff that we pathologists would be glad to do those autopsies, as long as the clinicians “scrubbed in” and pointed out the areas in which they had the greatest concern. Autopsy requests melted away just like the T-lymphocytes that had disappeared under the onslaught of the virus.

I recall the controversy over blood testing for the disease, as well as the emergence of AZT, the first drug to have some success in slowing down the progression of AIDS. And I remember the lost medical school classmates, members of a repressed class that was decimated.

And now, as BLM reminds us, once again a repressed class is being decimated, both by a virus and by inequality. It is time to move beyond looking out the window. For me, it will be in a medical context. How about for you?

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