Time for another infrequent update.
I have begun the preparations for the Ablation treatment. I stopped taking the artificial thyroid hormone last Tuesday, and so far I've been OK. There have been a couple of rough days, but for the most part I am not making mistakes and feel physically OK so I am still working. Not driving though, that's a pain.
Tomorrow we start the next phase: starting the low-iodine diet. I want to thank everyone who's had ideas about how to get through this two a half week stage. My mom went down to the states and found a container of non-iodized salt, and we've found lots of recipies and substitutes for the things I do eat, so I think we should do OK through it.
The first radiation dose is not until the 20th, and will be a small dose for the uptake test.
So we are making good progress through this.
Thanks everyone for sending your wishes and ideas.
2011-09-12
2011-09-11
Fact Checking 9/11
Claim:
I [...] hate to fact-check you[,] but Wikipedia claims total motor vehicle deaths for the entire US was 42,196 for 2001, which works out to 811 per week, or 115.6 per day. Even if we round up, we'd have to assume that day to statistically have been exceptionally bad to account for almost an average month's worth of motor vehicle deaths through the entire country. (I couldn't find per-week statistics for motor vehicle deaths for the time period surrounding 9/11, as I'd expect them to be higher since nobody could fly for two days and many more people ended up on the road -- plus even more people were irrationally scared off of flying and ended up driving for weeks, or months, afterwards).
(Also I see that the total motor vehicle death toll for 2001 was lower than both 2000 AND 2002.)
What would be more interesting would be to see if you could correlate the increase in highway deaths to the costly and intrusive security theatre that the US has indulged in since then with a proportionate drop in flying, since if someone drives rather than flies, they are statistically more likely to be hurt (air travel is still has the lowest fatalities-per-passenger-mile-traveled) and compare THAT increased number to the 9/11 death toll (and then compare that number to the costs spent on security theatre, essentially calculating how much the US is spending per death to kill more of its citizens).
I'm not trying to disagree with you, I think it is high time the western world got over this stupid obsession. However in the long run, facts will beat hyperbole.
Update:
Wikipedia again: It is often reported that air travel is the safest in terms of deaths per passenger mile. The National Transportation Safety Board (2006) reports 1.3 deaths per hundred million vehicle miles for travel by car, and 1.7 deaths per hundred million vehicle miles for travel by air. These are not passenger miles. If an airplane has 100 passengers, then the passenger miles are 100 times higher. The number of deaths per passenger mile on commercial airlines in the United States between 1995 and 2000 is about 3 deaths per 10 billion passenger miles.
Yahoo! Answers, quoting WebMD: There are about 56 million deaths each year worldwide. About 1.7 million are the result of traffic accidents. That would mean the percent of deaths around the world annually as a result of traffic accidents is about 3%.
Assuming these figures are correct, then that gives an average daily death toll of motor vehicles as 4657 (call it 4700). So world wide, your argument probably holds.
SkyscraperCity: The Geneva-based organization said 1,292 people died in plane crashes in 2006 -- a drop of 11 percent on the previous year.
It occurs to me that neither value can seriously be compared unless we see the passenger-mile-traveled for both types of transport.
But I think I'm beating a dead horse here, so I'm off.
More people died in motor vehicle accidents on 9/11 than died in the terrorist attack that day.My response:
I [...] hate to fact-check you[,] but Wikipedia claims total motor vehicle deaths for the entire US was 42,196 for 2001, which works out to 811 per week, or 115.6 per day. Even if we round up, we'd have to assume that day to statistically have been exceptionally bad to account for almost an average month's worth of motor vehicle deaths through the entire country. (I couldn't find per-week statistics for motor vehicle deaths for the time period surrounding 9/11, as I'd expect them to be higher since nobody could fly for two days and many more people ended up on the road -- plus even more people were irrationally scared off of flying and ended up driving for weeks, or months, afterwards).
(Also I see that the total motor vehicle death toll for 2001 was lower than both 2000 AND 2002.)
What would be more interesting would be to see if you could correlate the increase in highway deaths to the costly and intrusive security theatre that the US has indulged in since then with a proportionate drop in flying, since if someone drives rather than flies, they are statistically more likely to be hurt (air travel is still has the lowest fatalities-per-passenger-mile-traveled) and compare THAT increased number to the 9/11 death toll (and then compare that number to the costs spent on security theatre, essentially calculating how much the US is spending per death to kill more of its citizens).
I'm not trying to disagree with you, I think it is high time the western world got over this stupid obsession. However in the long run, facts will beat hyperbole.
Update:
Worldwide, not US, but point taken.My response:
Wikipedia again: It is often reported that air travel is the safest in terms of deaths per passenger mile. The National Transportation Safety Board (2006) reports 1.3 deaths per hundred million vehicle miles for travel by car, and 1.7 deaths per hundred million vehicle miles for travel by air. These are not passenger miles. If an airplane has 100 passengers, then the passenger miles are 100 times higher. The number of deaths per passenger mile on commercial airlines in the United States between 1995 and 2000 is about 3 deaths per 10 billion passenger miles.
Yahoo! Answers, quoting WebMD: There are about 56 million deaths each year worldwide. About 1.7 million are the result of traffic accidents. That would mean the percent of deaths around the world annually as a result of traffic accidents is about 3%.
Assuming these figures are correct, then that gives an average daily death toll of motor vehicles as 4657 (call it 4700). So world wide, your argument probably holds.
SkyscraperCity: The Geneva-based organization said 1,292 people died in plane crashes in 2006 -- a drop of 11 percent on the previous year.
It occurs to me that neither value can seriously be compared unless we see the passenger-mile-traveled for both types of transport.
But I think I'm beating a dead horse here, so I'm off.
2011-08-12
Ablation
Hi folks
Time for your infrequent update.
First off, the bad news. We have received confirmation that the three lymph nodes taken by the surgeon during the procedure have all tested positive for cancer cells. This is apparently not uncommon with this type of cancer, and doesn't actually change the immediate future.
The better news.
We have also received the schedule for the next set of procedures. The first step is a radiation uptake test, where they inject a small amount of radioactive iodine in me and then a day later measure my neck for how much gets absorbed. The purpose of this is to detect "atopic" thyroid tissue, ie thyroid growths outside of the "normal" thyroid. This would be a rare occurrence, but if positive would require us to stop this procedure and re-engage with the surgeon to have these removed.
Assuming I pass this, a week later I'll get the "ablation" treatment. This is a large dose of radioactive iodine intended to kill any small clusters of thyroid tissue still in my system.
To prepare for this I have to stop my thyroid medication starting the beginning of September and go on the low-iodine (effectively, low-salt) diet. Once I go off the medication I won't be permitted to drive and will have all kinds of side effects.
For the five days following the ablation I will be literally radioactive and will have to be relatively isolated. Although the risk to other people is low, the doctors want me to keep away from people in general and from children in particular.
After the ablation I will get a full body scan, which is where they feed me into a machine and try to decide if any of the mysterious dark spots are more cancer. This is probably where we'll get a feel for the mid-term prognosis -- if the cancer has been removed and we're waiting for re-occurrence, or if it won't come back and I'll have beaten it.
So during four of those five weeks I'll be on effectively a no-salt diet. If you have ideas about what might be edible without any salt (this pamphlet here: http://www.thyroidcancercanada.org/userfiles/files/LID_pamphlet_PDF.pdf illustrates what the restrictions are) I would like to hear them -- even if my finicky food eating habits make this might be even harder.
It is expected that I won't be able to work due to the side effects of not taking the thyroid medication during most of this procedure which will last about five weeks -- two weeks to prepare, a week between the uptake test and the ablation, then two weeks to recover. I'm working with my employer to structure things so that if I can be productive, I will, but without there being visible dependencies on what I am doing. Right now my return-to-work target date is October 10th.
Thanks everyone for your kind words of support through this, and I hope we'll only have better news as we proceed.
Time for your infrequent update.
First off, the bad news. We have received confirmation that the three lymph nodes taken by the surgeon during the procedure have all tested positive for cancer cells. This is apparently not uncommon with this type of cancer, and doesn't actually change the immediate future.
The better news.
We have also received the schedule for the next set of procedures. The first step is a radiation uptake test, where they inject a small amount of radioactive iodine in me and then a day later measure my neck for how much gets absorbed. The purpose of this is to detect "atopic" thyroid tissue, ie thyroid growths outside of the "normal" thyroid. This would be a rare occurrence, but if positive would require us to stop this procedure and re-engage with the surgeon to have these removed.
Assuming I pass this, a week later I'll get the "ablation" treatment. This is a large dose of radioactive iodine intended to kill any small clusters of thyroid tissue still in my system.
To prepare for this I have to stop my thyroid medication starting the beginning of September and go on the low-iodine (effectively, low-salt) diet. Once I go off the medication I won't be permitted to drive and will have all kinds of side effects.
For the five days following the ablation I will be literally radioactive and will have to be relatively isolated. Although the risk to other people is low, the doctors want me to keep away from people in general and from children in particular.
After the ablation I will get a full body scan, which is where they feed me into a machine and try to decide if any of the mysterious dark spots are more cancer. This is probably where we'll get a feel for the mid-term prognosis -- if the cancer has been removed and we're waiting for re-occurrence, or if it won't come back and I'll have beaten it.
So during four of those five weeks I'll be on effectively a no-salt diet. If you have ideas about what might be edible without any salt (this pamphlet here: http://www.thyroidcancercanada.org/userfiles/files/LID_pamphlet_PDF.pdf illustrates what the restrictions are) I would like to hear them -- even if my finicky food eating habits make this might be even harder.
It is expected that I won't be able to work due to the side effects of not taking the thyroid medication during most of this procedure which will last about five weeks -- two weeks to prepare, a week between the uptake test and the ablation, then two weeks to recover. I'm working with my employer to structure things so that if I can be productive, I will, but without there being visible dependencies on what I am doing. Right now my return-to-work target date is October 10th.
Thanks everyone for your kind words of support through this, and I hope we'll only have better news as we proceed.
2011-07-28
Welcome to 2011
Problem: Cisco's ASA-Launcher for a brand-new, just-breaking-the-seal-today, ASA-5510, doesn't work* . The asa-launcher just goes off into space; running it from the management web page results in a web page that pops up, tells you "don't close this web page", and does nothing else.
Solution, according to Cisco: a whole lot of random fiddling with sho ver and other commands, all of which accomplish precisely zero.
Solution, according to random web forums on the internet: downgrade the version of Java running on your management computer to 5.0 update 22.
That's crazy, what doesSun Oracle have to say about that?
Remember when Java was going to mean Write-Once, Run-Anywhere? Yeah, me neither. Java's never been like that. It's more of a Write-Once, Fuck-Around-With-It-For-Ever-Then-Get-Pissed-And-Give-Up, Run-Nowhere kind of pain.
Dear Cisco, it's 2011 for fuck's sake. It is far past time to be brewing something a little newer than this. And shipping a brand-new box with ancient firmware in it that basically can't be managed by a modern workstation? Amateur hour stuff. Why the hell do you think people pay you a ridiculous amount of money? Because they don't like money? I've wasted basically two hours on this crap. Which is probably nice if you are a cisco professional services engineer, but I'm not. My customers expect results.
--
* = ignoring the fact that the beautifully printed quick-start guide is incredibly wrong. When it says:
Solution, according to Cisco: a whole lot of random fiddling with sho ver and other commands, all of which accomplish precisely zero.
Solution, according to random web forums on the internet: downgrade the version of Java running on your management computer to 5.0 update 22.
That's crazy, what does
We highly recommend users remove all older versions of Java from your system. Keeping old and unsupported versions of Java on your system presents a serious security risk.(Not to mention all the other more modern crap that will get broken with a downgrade.)
Remember when Java was going to mean Write-Once, Run-Anywhere? Yeah, me neither. Java's never been like that. It's more of a Write-Once, Fuck-Around-With-It-For-Ever-Then-Get-Pissed-And-Give-Up, Run-Nowhere kind of pain.
Dear Cisco, it's 2011 for fuck's sake. It is far past time to be brewing something a little newer than this. And shipping a brand-new box with ancient firmware in it that basically can't be managed by a modern workstation? Amateur hour stuff. Why the hell do you think people pay you a ridiculous amount of money? Because they don't like money? I've wasted basically two hours on this crap. Which is probably nice if you are a cisco professional services engineer, but I'm not. My customers expect results.
--
If you have an ASA 5510, connect the inside Ethernet 1 interface to a switch {...}...you are supposed to understand that it means the management interface instead.
2011-07-18
Solved My Filtering Problem
Today I think I solved my iPhone-blocking filtering problem.
To briefly review: I receive something in the order of 300 messages per day, some of which are very large. I don't want to forward all of these messages to my blackberry (or, possibly in the future, an iPhone) because I don't care about the vast majority of these messages. They are generated by robot, and most of them will wait until I have a reasonable interface with which to read them.
To get around this issue, I have been using Blackberry (or more accurately, BES) filters to control what does or doesn't get sent to my handheld.
And none of the iPhone-toting people I found could tell me how to do this.
This came to a head recently -- in search of our own dogfood, my company has transitioned our corporate email to a new hosting system, and as a side effect of that I had to pave my blackberry to get it to register with the new service. And as a side effect of that I had to re-do all my filters, and I could not figure out why one particular co-worker's emails were never forwarded to the handheld.
It was annoying.
So the solution turns out to be ridiculously simple:
Use Outlook (or more accurately, Exchange) filters.
It works like this. I have some filter rules set up on my inbox so that messages I don't want on my handheld get moved to a second folder which I call Inbox-Filtered-Out. Anything left gets sent to the handheld by default.
The filtering rules had to be written differently, since the Blackberry can be set to not-forward by default. I basically have to write my rules so that things get filtered out by default, which is difficult; I have settled for a rule which catches the vast majority of messages and then exceptions them.
So my rule is:
I'm sure this will require some tweaking, but with this set up I can probably have an iPhone without too much risk of blowing a dataplan. Only problem is, my new 9100 will be with me for another 18 months or so before I am eligible for a new phone.
I'm really just embarrassed that it took me this long to figure it out.
To briefly review: I receive something in the order of 300 messages per day, some of which are very large. I don't want to forward all of these messages to my blackberry (or, possibly in the future, an iPhone) because I don't care about the vast majority of these messages. They are generated by robot, and most of them will wait until I have a reasonable interface with which to read them.
To get around this issue, I have been using Blackberry (or more accurately, BES) filters to control what does or doesn't get sent to my handheld.
And none of the iPhone-toting people I found could tell me how to do this.
This came to a head recently -- in search of our own dogfood, my company has transitioned our corporate email to a new hosting system, and as a side effect of that I had to pave my blackberry to get it to register with the new service. And as a side effect of that I had to re-do all my filters, and I could not figure out why one particular co-worker's emails were never forwarded to the handheld.
It was annoying.
So the solution turns out to be ridiculously simple:
Use Outlook (or more accurately, Exchange) filters.
It works like this. I have some filter rules set up on my inbox so that messages I don't want on my handheld get moved to a second folder which I call Inbox-Filtered-Out. Anything left gets sent to the handheld by default.
The filtering rules had to be written differently, since the Blackberry can be set to not-forward by default. I basically have to write my rules so that things get filtered out by default, which is difficult; I have settled for a rule which catches the vast majority of messages and then exceptions them.
So my rule is:
- For all messages with normal priority:
- EXCEPT messages that are To: or CC: me; OR are from (explicit list of people);
- MOVE to Inbox-Filtered-Out.
I'm sure this will require some tweaking, but with this set up I can probably have an iPhone without too much risk of blowing a dataplan. Only problem is, my new 9100 will be with me for another 18 months or so before I am eligible for a new phone.
I'm really just embarrassed that it took me this long to figure it out.
2011-07-10
Collision on Tour de France
Everyone else gets an opinion, why not me!
This is the video that includes the collision between the TV car and the cyclists, resulting in injuries. Watch it through, then watch the slow-motion at 1:00 over a couple of times.
Here's the screen-grab at the 1:03 mark:
...and at the 1:04 mark:
Note that the side of the road has a flip-up pile of dirt in front of the tree that the car is avoiding. This forces the car into the road, and into the cyclists, who seem to react by turning into the car. The driver probably could have cut it a little finer, but we are talking inches here. So had the driver not avoided the flip-up, the car might have taken out the entire leading pack instead of just the few cyclists that were hurt.
Bottom line though is that the car should not have been on the same piece of road that the cyclists were on. I don't know what the "standards" for having team cars and TV cars in among the cyclists are, but it looks like one of those ludicrously dangerous scenarios that have only avoided serious incidents through sheer luck.
This is the video that includes the collision between the TV car and the cyclists, resulting in injuries. Watch it through, then watch the slow-motion at 1:00 over a couple of times.
Here's the screen-grab at the 1:03 mark:
...and at the 1:04 mark:
Note that the side of the road has a flip-up pile of dirt in front of the tree that the car is avoiding. This forces the car into the road, and into the cyclists, who seem to react by turning into the car. The driver probably could have cut it a little finer, but we are talking inches here. So had the driver not avoided the flip-up, the car might have taken out the entire leading pack instead of just the few cyclists that were hurt.
Bottom line though is that the car should not have been on the same piece of road that the cyclists were on. I don't know what the "standards" for having team cars and TV cars in among the cyclists are, but it looks like one of those ludicrously dangerous scenarios that have only avoided serious incidents through sheer luck.
2011-07-08
Health Update
Just a quick update on how things are going.
I have more or less recovered from the surgery. I find I still get tired more easilly than I did before, but Jenn has cleared me to drive on my own and I have been doing some of the errends and taking-kids-around that aleways needs doing and so far there have not been any problems. I am making arrangements to go back to work half days a few days next week to ensure that I really am up to going back full time the week after.
Doctor-wise we are still in a holding pattern. My meeting with the surgeon, which was supposed to happen on Thursday, has been put off two weeks because the pathology reports were not available. I don't meet with the post-op process doc until the 28th of July, so there is still some time to go before we get the shape of the next move.
I would like to thank everyone who's sent in well wishes during this process and especially those who have been generous in helping manage the kids and the house while I have been less able to.
I have more or less recovered from the surgery. I find I still get tired more easilly than I did before, but Jenn has cleared me to drive on my own and I have been doing some of the errends and taking-kids-around that aleways needs doing and so far there have not been any problems. I am making arrangements to go back to work half days a few days next week to ensure that I really am up to going back full time the week after.
Doctor-wise we are still in a holding pattern. My meeting with the surgeon, which was supposed to happen on Thursday, has been put off two weeks because the pathology reports were not available. I don't meet with the post-op process doc until the 28th of July, so there is still some time to go before we get the shape of the next move.
I would like to thank everyone who's sent in well wishes during this process and especially those who have been generous in helping manage the kids and the house while I have been less able to.
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