imagine1community

04 August 2023

We Need To Find A Way To Ban Plane Advertising

Advertising planes fly over the beach seven days a week in my neighborhood. I am three-quarters of a mile away from the beach. I have been spending a lot of time outdoors resting, when not treed indoors by global boiling or poor air quality.

Even at my distance from the beach, I usually see two or three advertising planes a day, even on weekdays, and more on weekends.

The most common small plane, according to the Intertubes, is the Cessna 172, which seems to require around 8 gallons of gas an hour.

My Honda Fit gets 33 mpg driving around on suburban streets, 40+ on highways. Let’s call it an average of 35 mpg.

Let’s say they’re out there flying for six hours a day: that’s 48 gallons per flight. If that’s a good guess, then one of those planes burns as much gas in under a week as my car does in a year.

One part of me reacts to this by thinking there’s no point in worrying about my own carbon footprint when this is going on.

Another part of me wants to figure out what businesses are flying the planes (the signs face the beach, not my backyard) and write to them all to tell them how I feel about this.

Another part wants to write to Governor Murray and Vin Gopal and suggest that they make this kind of advertising illegal.

And then there’s the part of me that’s feels like all of this is too much, because Long COVID.

But I will, I hope, revise this post into a letter to write to some of my elected officials, and I hope you’ll feel free steal whatever is useful and do the same.

If you do, please let me know. Thank you!

28 July 2023

Pacing and Recovery

You have to pace yourself, the doctors tell me, the occupational therapist tells me, the physical therapist tells me.

Learning to pace myself, it turns out, is a constantly evolving challenge.

I’ve started recovering physical strength, with the help of PT, and I’m able to handle daily life stuff withouth getting out of breath. Taking a shower, unloading the dishwasher, running a couple of loads of laundry. I can even manage some of the medical scheduling on my own — Catherine was doing all of this for me for a couple of months.

I walk Stella. Or does Stella walk me? A month ago, we left the house and walked to the end of the block and back. Now we go around the neighborhood park, a little more than half a mile. We stop a lot so she can sniff things: she paces me.

Last week, I went for my first two bike rides since before COVID, and started lifting again, with the encouragement of the physical therapist. And with a long list of limits and precautions. I saw several deer and a couple of turtles in the park, and I worked up a couple sweats, and it felt great.

I also went to the Apple Store last week because my phone battery was draining itself, and two hours later, I was exhausted, and I’m still not exactly sure why. A combination, I think, of social interaction, overstimulation from all that was going on, and just not being able to rest when I started to flag.

It took me four days to recover.

I have so much trouble with words, mostly finding them, occasionally understanding them. Writing emails is a cognitive challenge. Working on revisions to that overdue book chapter that is is a much bigger challenge. I read a novel a few days ago for the first time since before Covid. I picked it because it was short. I took a lot of breaks.

After I hit “publish” on this post, I’ll go lie back down on the couch.

Yesterday, I went to the beach for the first time this summer. It, too, was exhausting, physically rather than cognitively. I swam only where there were almost no waves, and even that was challenging. Being in the water made it hard to breathe, something that’s never happened before. There was a lot of walking.

I am flattened today. Today, I struggle to go up and down the stairs to the basement. I napped this afternoon, something I haven’t needed to do for a few weeks.

How long will it take to recover?

14 June 2023

Portals, Websites, and Apps

We really need a single nationwide system of storing health care data. Every doctor I’ve been to in the past three months has a different way of entering and storing data. I have to enter my whole medical history, including medications and allergies, on another form or in another portal.

It’s a mistake waiting to happen. Especially with brain fog.

And then there’s a different way for each doctor that I have to remember in order to reach the doctor to make or change appointments or to access the results of tests. They still have phone numbers, but many of them are unreachable in practice: I tried for two hours to get through to an office the other day before I gave up.

I mean yeah, what we REALLY need is single payer insurance, where the medical system is organized around health care, and not around profit.

And I’m not going to say that I’m “lucky” I have health insurance, because in the rest of the developed world, that’s a given, the costs are significantly lower, and the list of things that aren’t covered is a lot shorter.

Brain fog

I was already frazzled when I was trying to drive to the occupational therapy appointment the other day, and I did not know that Kessler Rehab has something like a dozen locations in Monmouth County, and I plugged the address into the phone and started driving.

I drove right past the cardiology office I’d been to the day before, so the route was familiar. It didn’t seem quite right, but covid brain fog, so I figured I was remembering wrong. But I arrived at the address and realized I was in the wrong place: it did not look at all familiar.

I called them, and then told me I was in the wrong location. I was already running late, so I entered Kessler in google maps again and started driving again and then realized the map was taking me to a different wrong Kessler location.

I pulled into a gas station, slowed down, tried to breathe like the occupational therapist is always telling me, found the RIGHT location, pulled a uey, and drove some more. I was half an hour late when I finally arrived.

“Give yourself some grace,” Allizey said, ever so gently.

29 May 2023

COVID Brain Fog

I have a helluva time with words. I used to get to “amazing” or “genius” in The NY Times Spelling Bee first thing in the morning. Now I look at it and I can’t see words and I just string plausible sequences of letters together.

I worked my way through several hours of Pimsleur’s Greek lessons some years ago. I am repeating them, because it’s not reading, but I routinely fall asleep. Is the effort or the boredom?

But I am fine with numbers. I can remember a two-factor authentication code with no problem. I fly through the Times “digits” game and I can do a 9x9 expert Kenken without hints about half the time.

Writing? Even just a email, or a blog post like this: Very, very hard. Reading with sustained attention, impossible. I am hoping the fancy new glasses change that.

28 May 2023

Covid Diary

I have been wanting to write about what it’s like with long COVID, but I don’t have much energy to be on the computer. I don’t really know where to start so I guess I’ll start at the beginning.

In January, I was in great shape. I was living in Germany without a car, so grocery shopping, weekend sightseeing, and all my day-to-day activities were done by bike, by train, and/or on foot.

In February, after returning from Germany, I went to an academic conference that I traveled to by bike, train, and bike, with luggage. I was one of few people at the conference who masked, and the day after I got home, the symptoms began. I was sicker than I’ve ever been, despite numerous bouts of walking pneumonia and bronchitis that exacerbated my underlying asthma.

I recovered from the acute infection after about three weeks, and the weird symptoms began. My vision is wonky, I get short of breath on climbing a flight of stairs or unloading the dishwasher, my feet often feel like they are on fire. My brain is deeply foggy. Working at the computer wears me out, whether it’s writing email, watching videos, or trying to have a zoom call. Reading? Sewing? My vision goes even wonkier.

The GP said take this new medication. The insurance company said “no.”

The pulmonologist said “rest.” For six months to a year.

The occupational therapist sent me to a fancy eye doctor who prescribed fancy expensive glasses that I am hoping to pick up soon. Maybe they will help with the fatigue, with writing and reading.

The physical therapist sent me to a cardiologist who prescribed a bunch of tests and said, get some exercise. The insurance company said, in a recorded message, “no” to I think one of the tests. Maybe more. Like I said, brain fog. I didn’t know the message was going to be recorded and I didn’t write anything down and it was not repeated and I hung up and wondered what just hit me.

I am still waiting to see the neurologist. I was “lucky” to get an appointment in the middle of June, after my GP referred me in March.

And that’s it for today. I am worn out. Maybe more another day.