Thursday, October 29, 2015

Cliffs


16 comments:

  1. Howard is first.

    Beautiful photos on the front page.

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  2. Hi guys! My twelve weeks of PT as allowed by MEDICARE have finished. I spent much of this week resting and recovering - it's tiring! Also had what felt like a sinus headache for a few days, which laid me low. Feeling better now.

    Saw something from Charlie on Facebook the other day about his being free. Not sure I really even want to know what that is all about. *sigh*

    The Global Challenge, Fun Trivia's multi-month tournament, started the same week as I started PT. I've been playing, but on account of being so derned tired I've not been doing all that well. And it's only gotten worse this week. Guess it will take me a little onger to recover fully than I thought. Not as reziliant as I used to be.

    Engelbert has a new album that I need to buy. It's Country, so I'm not all that enthused. Still, one must support the side. He's in Australia at the moment. I don't know how he does it. He has more energy and enthusiasm at seventy-nine than I had at twenty-five.

    Sis and I have been watching Heart to Heart, which is enjoyable. I didn't watch it often at the time, so it's pretty much new to me. The storyline is slightly fantastic - a self-made billionaire, Jonatan Hart (Robert Wagner) and his writer cum socialite wife Jennifer (Stephanie Powers) solve mysteries, which usually end up involving murder. As I say, it's enjoyable, albeit they are slightly oversexed. That part is fun too. *grin*

    I read the latest Harry Dresden novel, Skin Game a few weeks ago and found it necessary to go back and reread the whole series. Almost caught up now, currently in volume thirteen. If I carry on as I'm going, I should finish the series sometime at the end of next week, which is silly, since then I'll have all those month to wait for the next book. *sigh*

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    1. >>I read the latest Harry Dresden novel, Skin Game a few weeks ago and found it necessary to go back and reread the whole series.<<

      As you may know, [i]Skin Game[/i] was a Hugo nominee this year, and I found my enjoyment considerably diminished by the extent to which things depended on previous events in the series. There was enough explanation to understand what was going on but not to really relate. That hadn't been true of the prevous Dresden novel I'd read, [i]Turn Coat.[/i]

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    2. That's true. I found all the in jokes and internal references irritating. Usually my memory for details is good, but too many of what were obviously allusions to earlier books and stories skated past me. I reread out of self-defense but found myself really enjoying the experience. To me Skin Game had the feel of the beginning of the wrap up, which probably accounted for all that darn self-referencing. It wouldn't surprise me at all if the next book turned out to be the last one.

      And, yes, nearly all the other books could fairly easily be read stand-alone. That goes even more for the short stories, though all together they make a very rich, well realized world. I'll miss it when it does get wrapped up. I like Harry. I think he would make a good and loyal, if sometimes exasperating, friend.

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    3. interesting point about Skin Game possibly being the next-to-last book of the series. That hadn't occurred to me.

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  3. Hi, Cat!

    Here are the fractionated US debt levels as a percentage of GDP. [Click] I see roughly the same type of pattern as in the UK case I linked to yesterday [Click]. Quantitatively different, of course; but qualitatively about the same.

    Various things (like work) have intervened and prevented (given me an excuse to avoid) starting my penmanship lessons, but simply paying attention has produced significant progress. Still deciding how I want to form certain capital letters--experimenting.

    Our kitty seems not to be much longer for this world, but she doesn't seem to be suffering and can still get about, although less and less. We don't know how old she is; she was a stray adult who found us. We estimate she is fifteen years old, or maybe more.

    --Alan

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    1. I don't see it supporting the contention that the total amount of debt is fixed -- you just shift it between sectors. In the 1980s, there was a slow increase in all types of debt. In the 1990s, financial debt rose at a faster rate while government, corporate, and household leveled off. Government debt fell in the last 1990s, which was followed a couple of years later by an upsurge in household debt and, slightly later, in corporate debt as the Fec cut interest rates. Taking advantage of cheap money looked like a good strategy at the time. Then we hit the Great Recession and the government poured huge amounts of money into the economy while everybody else found they couldn't sustain the amount of debt they had taken on.

      Not to say there is no connection between government and private debt, but the connection is indirect and not one-to-one.

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    2. Fec should be Fed, of course.

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    3. Aw, Alan. I'm sad for you about your kitty. So good of you to take her in as an adult. How long have you had her?

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    4. Regarding your avoidance of penmanship lessons, Alan, please don't be too hard on yourself. As an artist, I suspect that once you have chosen the forms for your capital letters, your practice will pick up again. Right now, however, you need the energy to inwardly mull. And that counts too.

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    5. Miyoko went and got some more antibiotic ointment for the kitty's eyes (an infection came back), and the doctor prescribed some special food, that reviews say can help a lot. Very finely divided, can be mixed with water and given with a syringe. She took to the first dose well; maybe she will come around. We must have had her (or vice versa) for a good dozen years. She obviously wasn't feral--she knew what a kitty litter box was for. She was afraid of men, but asian women were OK. Caucasian women definitely not so much, but better than men.

      I'm not beating up on myself for getting off to a slow start--I am working on it in my own way. Figuring out C and E, also H and K. ABDFGIJLMNOPQRSTUVWXYZ figured out. Started considering a change to fancier initials. Working on grip(s) and numerals.

      --Alan

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  4. I only saw the last two years of the series (after getting back from China), but their Mercedes made it into my life when our Yugo died, and we couldn't agree on a replacement--I wanted a Volvo sta wag, but he thought it looked like a coffin; he wanted a big delux sedan, which since the purpose of my car was to do craft shows, I couldn't see happening. When I reminded him of the Mercedes station wagon in Hart to Hart, he went for it.

    Loved that vehicle. Gave it up after moving here, when I couldn't find anyone to fix it.

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  5. Well, I went for my annual physical today and I rocked it!! :-D

    I have lost enough weight that I am in a new category and that was a nice surprise. Got my flu shot, got my ears cleared out of wax, and got a cream for my skin. I won't have blood test results until maybe tomorrow or definitely Monday, but I'm not worried. My doc was thrilled that I brought in an Advanced Directive. [Alan, she gave me a form to use to send it to the registry.} She was delighted that I also brought her a lavender button with a new ICD-10 code on it that means "Acute Stress Response." As you may have heard on NPR, doctors and hospitals used to have about 30,000 diagnosis codes, but the new system, which was implemented on October 1st, has more like 300,000! It's mind-bloggling. My dear husband is one of the software engineers who prepped the new system before the Go-Live event. Those last two weeks of September were rough on the software team, and he worked until after 10pm some nights! That was when the buttons arrived for the software team. LOL! The code Y43.0 not only means Acute Stress Response, it also means Combat Fatigue, Psychosis, and Stupor. Yep, that sounds like the software team during those critical weeks! ;-) And it now describes the doctors learning to use the codes. :-D I gave one to my doc's nurse when she took my vitals. Then my doc came in saying, "I really like that button you gave my nurse!" So I said, "I have one for you, too" and she exclaimed "Goody!!" A big hit! The male nurse who came in to take my blood did the smoothest job of it that I've ever experienced (!!!) so I gave him one too. The doc went out and came back and said that the whole office is envious and wants buttons now, then paused with a laugh and said, "That's probably a very bad sign!" HA!!! Best visit ever! :-D

    As for the blood test results. I think it will be blood sugar, cholesterol and liver test, for starters. We'll see how those turn out.

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    1. Oops! It's not Y43.0, it's F43.0!
      You can look up codes here:
      http://www.icd10data.com/ICD10CM/Codes/V00-Y99/Y90-Y99/Y93-/Y93.E2
      There is even one for "stabbed while knitting or crocheting" or for a laundry related injury! LOL!

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    2. More complicated is not necessarily better, by a long shot. But try telling that to the suits who can dictate it without having to work with it. (Betraying my bad attitude, I fear.)

      Alan

      Our kitty just came walking in to visit with me a bit--more like normal. Maybe the special food is helping. She hasn't been grooming herself like normal, which I take to be a not-good sign

      --Alan

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  6. Nice to have you back among us, Catreona! :-)

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