The Story of Jingle Bells

Tis the season to repost the Jingle Bells story, at the traditonal start of the Christmas music season, the day after Thanksgiving.  It turns out that the song "Jingle Bells" was originally written for Thanksgiving. It was first published in autumn 1857.

It is not too surprising that this secular holiday anthem, with no religious content, was composed by a Unitarian church organist, James Lord Pierpont. But it may surprise you to learn that it was composed in a tavern:

The story in the lyrics is really about using a sporty open vehicle to pick up girls. Hence, the line in the last verse about the horse: "240 is his speed" (a fast trotting horse) - making the combination of horse and sleigh the 19th century precursor to a sporty convertible. Appropriately, the song was at one point recorded by the Brian Setzer Orchestra with "one horse open sleigh" changed to "57 Chevrolet." (presumably the 240 morphed to the 283 V8).

The composer apparently claimed success in the pickup process with one "Miss Fanny Bright", but he was married twice (first wife died) and neither wife was Fanny Bright, who was apparently only a casual fling (flung together from the sleigh into the snow). What lessons you may draw from this are unclear, but the composer's view was that with such a sporty and speedy vehicle "Crack, you'll take the lead." It would seem that courting may not have not changed as much as one might guess since the 1850s. 

Notice also that the phrase "Jingle Bells!" was intended as an imperative, exhorting the sleigh driver to alert others on the road to his rapid and reckless approach in an otherwise noiseless sleigh - good advice if you are courting in a Prius I suppose, but I don't think they make Prius convertibles. The singing of "sleighing songs" might have been sufficient alternative to the bells, or today's alternative of a loud stereo system.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Jingle_Bells . Also see the article on the composer, James Pierpont.

Nuclear Nostalgia and Re-Coal-ections

Just a mile and a half west of our house is the "Nipsco" Bailly coal fired generating station. The photo above is Google satellite map showing distance from our house. Nipsco ("Northern Indiana Public Service Corporation"), our local electric and gas utility company, just retired the plant at the end of May 2018. It seems like things may be just a bit quieter now, but it always has been a very quiet place anyway. Never saw or smelled anything from it, but it seems good to know it has closed.

Here is a Northwest Indiana Times article about the plant closing: NWI Times article

Nipsco still has two other coal fired plants: one in Michigan City (Indiana), about 8 miles east of us, with its distinctive parabolic cooling tower sticking out on the eastern boundary of the National Park. We cruised around the Michigan City plant on the evening harbor cruise on our anniversary last summer. Romantic, no? The other Nipsco coal plant is inland to the south near the tiny town of Wheatfield, just south of Kouts, where we used to go to church. We would see the stacks as we drove down highway 49 to Kouts.

The Bailly plant was 604 MW, including two units: A 190 MW opened in 1962, and a 413 MW unit opened in 1968, when I was a freshman in engineering school.

Around the time the second unit was starting up, Nipsco proposed building a 644 MW nuclear generating plant at Bailly, a Boiling Water Reactor, which apparently started construction in 1974, but met opposition and got cancelled.

Here's the wikipedia article on the nuke plant: Bailly Wik

Now, the Bailly plant site has only a backup gas turbine peaking plant, a peaceful neighbor down the beach.

If they had gone ahead with the nuclear plant, we could have it for our neighbor. I think I'd rather have a nuclear plant there, than a coal plant. A few, small, rare releases of a little radiation would be preferable to continuously emitting tons of carbon and other junk.

Lyn and I went to a presentation on the Nike missile program at the National Park visitor center last year. The National Park HQ was a Nike missile base back in the 1960s.. On the map above, it's just south of us, across hwy 12 (the clearing south of of 12, west of the road that goes from Dune Acres).

Nike missiles were intended to defend against Soviet bombers. Some Nikes even had nuclear warheads, so they only had to get close to a bomber to destroy it. Now that's a scary thought: Nuclear tipped missiles launching out over Lake Michigan.

Just south of that is the preserved Bailly Homestead farm of a pioneer local family. The Bailly generating plant was named for Joseph Bailly, a trapper and early settler.

And that's some local history from these parts. From an early trapper, settler, farmer, to nuclear missiles.

Seems like I lived through the coal age, the nuclear age, and the natural gas age. I start to feel like a relic, looking back on past, obsolete technology.

When I began my engineering career in 1972, I worked for the engineering/construction firm Bechtel, designing nuclear power plants. I worked on a plant in Georgia called Vogtle until the client ran out of funds and the plant was shelved for a few years, then on the San Onofre Nuclear Generating Station, units 2 & 3 (which we musically referred to as "SONGS"). Those units got completed, and operated for 30 years or so, but were recently decommissioned after a failed repair.

Then I worked on Korea Nuclear Units 5 & 6. Technology export was a big part of the project. We were training Korean engineers while we were designing the plant. I think those units are still running. South Korea is mostly nuclear powered, and in turn is now exporting nuclear technology.

My father in law also worked for Bechtel, as a project manager. He had completed some big coal fired generating plants, like Four Corners and Mojave. The coal age was ending, though. His generation, of coal fired generation, was ending. Nuclear was taking over. I thought nuclear was the coming thing. Seemed like a good thing at the time. We thought we were doing a good thing for the planet. Still think so.

But then the "Three Mile Island" nuclear plant accident happened in Pennsylvania.

I saw that nuclear power had a rough future in the US, and left Bechtel for the City of Burbank, where, among other projects, we "repowered" an old retired oil fired steam turbine using waste heat from an existing gas turbine, getting 10MW for "free" from heat that was otherwise just gas turbine exhaust. Unfortunately, after I left Burbank, they didn't much run it, but it did provide backup local generating capacity that facilitated negotiating for good deals on purchased power. Using that strategy, they could buy excess coal fired power from those distant plants in Arizona, Colorado, and Utah (some of them built by my father in law) cheaper than they could generate locally, even with the highly efficient plant I built for them.

When I left Burbank, I went to UCLA, where they had ambitions of building a similar "combined cycle cogeneration" plant, to also produce steam and chilled water from waste heat. We did build that plant: a 49MW cogeneration central chiller plant, that today is central to UCLA's operation. UCLA now generates most of its own power, replacing power formerly purchased from LADWP.

So, I spent much of my career building alternatives to coal-fired electric generation, with limited success.

Could nuclear come back, to save the planet from climate change? https://www.huffingtonpost.com/entry/opinion-nuclear-power-climate-change_us_5bbe08b0e4b01470d057b4c0

I don't think I will live to see that.

The sad missed opportunity, is that the one way Trump really could "Make America Great Again" is by convincing his loyal throngs that climate change is real, that the regulatory shackles should be released from America's nuclear industry, and America should lead rebuilding a nuclear world . A few of his tweets, and some key appointees, is all it would take. Trump's supporters would lap it up, and some of his opposition would agree..

He could find common ground between industrialists and environmentalists. And he alone possibly could find that common ground. Think of that: Trump could save the planet. I don't think any other president will be in the position to do that. But I think his window is closing, and he shows no sign of that sort of leadership. Instead, he's tilting at windmills, fighting a losing battle to save coal, and winning the battle to kill the planet.

Nipsco's stated plan is to turn to wind and solar to replace coal. They plan to phase out the other two coal plants by 2028. I hope they succeed. My guess is, they will end up with a lot of natural gas firing, or end up delaying the coal phase-out, but we can hope. There are a lot of wind turbines south of here. Gonna need way more. Might work. But this old nuclear engineer feels a bit like a fossil.

The Most Famous Singer You Never Heard Of

Thurl Ravenscroft:   The Most Famous Singer You Never Heard Of

Ever wondered who that distinctive bass is who sings that "Grinch Song" that you likely hear repeatedly every Holiday season?  You know:  "You're a mean one, Mr. Grinch . . ."  Feel like you should recognize him, but can't quite place him?

The song is from a 1966 half hour CBS TV cartoon Christmas special, "How the Grinch Stole Christmas."

The singer was actually inadvertently uncredited (basses just never get any respect - even though most men are basses).  His name was Thurl Ravenscroft.   Boris Karloff is the voice of the Grinch, but the song is sung by Ravenscroft.

Ravenscroft is also familiar, but not famous, as the uncredited, anonymous voice of Tony The Tiger (Kellogg's Frosted Flakes, "Theyy'rrre  Grrrreat). Notice the facial resemblance between Thurl and Tony.

If you've been to a Disney park, you've heard him in the Haunted Mansion, Country Bear Jamboree, Mark Twain Riverboats, Pirates of the Caribbean, Disneyland Railroad and Tiki Room. (What a great name for an actor in the Haunted Mansion - Ravenscroft)

In this video, he talks about making the Haunted Mansion attraction: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Nhox48qhnxU

He got his start as one of The Mellowmen, who backed up Bing Crosby, Frainkie Lane, Spike Jones, Rosemary Clooney (Ravenscrift is the bass in her #1 hit "This Ole House", and also on Stuart Hamblin's original version) and other Big Band era singers.

Here's a Mellowmen album:  https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=TkXS1FKCjUY

The Mellowmen can be heard in several Disney films, including Alice in Wonderland. and Lady and the Tramp.

Ravenscroft is the bass in Bobby Vee's 1960 hit  "Devil or Angel."

It's astounding how many familiar songs, movies, Disney rides, TV shows and commercials Ravenscroft's distinctive voice is heard in, all without you hearing his distinctive and unforgettable name.  Now you know.  https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Thurl_Ravenscroft

Bin Laden has Won

18 years later, Al Queada has won.

It took a while, but the Al Queada, Taliban, ISIS strategy of sowing chaos  has worked.

Western democracy has been destroyed.

The USA, Britain, France, Germany, the European Union, NATO, all in tatters.  Ungovernable.  Division so strong that no party can govern, no course can get a majority.  The nations are so divided, little substantial unified action is possible or even attempted.

Putin (Biblical Gog to many) has conquered the West.  He has gotten all he could have wished for, and more. In some of the same ways: By sowing the seeds of division, discord and chaos.

The US is leaving Syria, Afghanistan is next.  Russia and Islamics have pretty much free rein.

Russia and Saudi Arabia have shown that they can murder and assassinate anywhere in the world with impunity.

Free trade is ending as the nations retreat into isolationism, embargoes, sanctions, trade wars. Treaties are shunned. International cooperation, even to the limited previous extent, all but abandoned.

The US piles up debt at an ever greater rate, putting the inevitable reckoning ever closer.  Instead of saving in the last several good years, like the Keynesian Joseph in Egypt, the US has emptied its storehouses, leaving no resources to deal with the next downturn.

The aim of Bin Laden, and of ISIS, was to draw the West into an apocalyptic conflict with Islam (see note 1).  It is working.

It is fairly easy to connect the dots from 9/11 to this collapse:

The immediate effect was to draw the US into two wars, in Afghanistan and Iraq, which drained it of resources, and either partly resulted in, or at least exacerbated, the 2008-2009 recession.

It also heightened fears of immigrants and foreigners. Security on travel at airports and borders was tightened.

Then, the collapse of Iraq, the resulting rise of ISIS, the overflow of problems into Syria, with US withdrawal, led to mass migration of refugees, to Europe.

The reaction to economic problems, terrorism and the refugee invasion was xenophobic closing of borders.  The open border EU was not ready for the influx.  Britain's reaction was to leave the EU, though that is mired in political division.

In Germany, right wing factions fractured Merkel's majority because of reaction to taking in so many middle eastern refugees and a weakening economic outlook.

The French have turned against Macron's Internationalist policies.

In the US, the same fears of foreign immigrants and terrorists, an aversion to Obama's proposal to take in thousands of refugees from ISIS, coupled with fears they could be sneaking in across the southern border, added to existing concerns about border security, to get the issue to the tipping point where it swung the Presidential election.  This issue, tied directly back to 9/11, has now stopped governance.

The extreme societal division over this xenophobia, has democratic decision making grid-locked.  In the USA Constitutional checks and balances have been abandoned in favor of rule by emergency declaration.

The nations fiddle, as the planet burns. Pacific island nations demand an end to coal, while Trump tilts at windmills.

Trump tries to contain the spread of nuclear weapons to Iran and North Korea, while letting the existing treaty with Russia lapse, and having already abandoned the international treaty with Iran. 

What this means, or what it may lead to, I have no idea.  Many of my fellow Bible students find prophetic fulfillment in this, but in conflicting ways, seeing it both as a precursor to Armageddon, and at the same time, a nationalistic victory for border security, morality, and support for Zionism.  They like to see Gog as poised to invade, while at the same time seeing the UK-USA as God's chosen forces saving Israel.  Possibly, though how both could be true makes little sense to me, and I have a hard time seeing current leadership as divinely ordained.

It does seem to make the need for divine intervention clear.  Very clearly, humankind is not capable of solving its problems.  

If you do not see divine intervention as a likely possibility, you should be aware that all sides in the conflict include some with Messianic visions that fuel their positions.  Not just three visions (Christian, Islamic & Jewish) but multiple views within each of those religions; sometimes even conflicting views within individuals.  There will be no compromising.  There is no common ground.  Many actively oppose peace, including some in ALL of those religions.  So, secular peacemakers have some substantial roadblocks.

Am I exaggerating the negative to write this Jeremiad?  Possibly.  Feel free to propose a non-miraculous way out.  Know that for every one of you who may be thinking that way, there's another thinking, "Yes! Apocalypse Now!  Bring it on!  He hasn't said the half of it."

I had drafted this blog last year, but had delayed posting it, because I don't have a conclusion or ending.  Just posting doom and gloom isn't usually my style.  But it is what it is.  Draw your own conclusions.  

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Note 1.  Many will notice startling similarities between the Islamic apocalyptic goals and Christian expectations:   https://www.theatlantic.com/magazine/archive/2015/03/what-isis-really-wants/384980/

The End of the Trial

The drug clinical trial I've been in since October ended suddenly and unexpectedly.  I haven't gotten much detail, but Wednesday of last week, the coordinator called us to tell us the drug company was ending the study early because the results so far don't justify continuing.

This was very disappointing.  It was the best hope for a treatment.  Without that, there is little in the near term for any treatment that might slow the progress of the disease.

So, it seems the drug was a bust.  I had tried to stay realistic about the chances of a miracle cure.  My own conclusion so far was that it didn't seem to be doing anything for me.  I held out hope that maybe I was in the placebo group, and might see real benefit in the second, open label phase, when I could get the real drug, but I don't yet know which group I was in, and the second phase is not going to happen.

We went in one last time this Wednesday for final wrapup tests and evaluations, but no infusion treatment.  They did a final neuro exam, took final blood and urine samples.  For some reason, despite the blood thinner I am on for blood clots in my leg, it was hard to get blood out of me this time.  I ended up with three needle sticks, one of which made a small bruise, but minor.  At least they didn't ask for another MRI, or spinal tap.

Sarah drove us this time, as she is on summer break.  First, and last, time.

So that's it.  No more clinical trial.  I saw an article in the news that a similar trial for Alzheimers was also terminated recently.  Apparently, the Tau protein approach to treatment is not working out. Not a miracle cure.

So, the best hope for a treatment is not working.  Disheartening.  But, that is why they do the tests - to see what works and what doesn't.

I asked if there are any other clinical trials, but they didn't know of any. 

I think I'm saddest about just not going in to Rush every month. That was the high point of most months:  Something to look forward to.  I don't have a lot of other things I look forward to.  Eating has become a chore.  Social activities are not fun when I can't talk.  I can't do much around the house. Travel by air is not fun.  It seems pretty sad that one of the few things I enjoyed was getting jabbed with needles, but, everyone at Rush is so nice to me, and makes the effort to understand my slurred speech, and I felt like I was actually doing something worthwhile, advancing science, helping research into PSP and other neurological disorders.

That, and fewer side trips to Trader Joe's.

Lessons from Chernobyl

We watched the HBO series, Chernobyl. 

I was reminded how the pressures to prioritize cost and schedule above safety and legality, and to lie about it, are always present everywhere. 

I saw it many times in my engineering career, where I was often the lone engineer in a meeting of managers who often had an (understandable) single minded focus on budget and schedule. It is very hard to speak up, in a room full of more powerful officials, with a message they don't want to hear. Fortunately, I generally reported to enlightened, supportive managers, even when other parts of the organization pressed me to compromise safety.

I also have to say that I never saw any of that in the nuclear industry when I was engineering nuclear power plants: If anything, the opposite.  Perhaps that was because I worked for a major engineering firm, that was all engineers, top to bottom.  But then, my first nuclear plant project ended when the client ran out of funds.

Scott Adams wrote in "The Dilbert Principle," that engineers tend to be risk averse, because they have done the risk/reward analysis.  The risk is public humiliation and the deaths of innocent thousands.  The reward is a Certificate of Appreciation, in a handsome plastic frame.

By contrast, profit driven managers are by nature entrepreneurial risk takers, because, nothing ventured, nothing gained.  

But the same carelessness of harsh reality is ever present with all of us: Every time we exceed the speed limit, check our phone while driving, fail to take time to signal, roll through a stop sign. 

It is why California still has thousands of seismically hazardous buildings, which most cities and owners are doing nothing about. It is why Oklahomans put mobile homes in tornado alley. It is why those two Boeing 737-Max aircraft crashed.  It is probably why that new bridge in Florida collapsed, and why a lot of crumbling old bridges may, too.  It is why the space shuttle Challenger exploded.  It is why Volkswagen built diesels with emissions test cheating systems.  It is why the US is doing nothing about climate change.

Indeed, ironically, it is why we turned from nuclear back to fossil fuels - because it is easier to ignore the future global catastrophe of climate change, than the clearly serious, but, with the one extreme exception of Chernobyl, soluble costs and problems of nuclear power, without which, there is no hope of preventing catastrophic climate change.

It is easy to point fingers at Communism, and pretend we are different, but profit (and greed) driven free enterprise Capitalism is as much or more susceptible to the same pressures.  Corporations that exist, not to provide a service or a product, but only to make a profit, and that will not continue to exist if they do not make a profit, have even more incentive than faceless government bureaucracies to prioritize cost and schedule.

Democracy is no bar to secrets and lies.  The pressure to get elected, or re-elected, clearly takes precedence over truth.

Try to find out what the actual problem was with that bridge that collapsed on a roadway at Florida International University:  The documents are all secret.  It is all tied up in litigation.  Maybe, someday, some version of "the truth" may come out, but if that is in a court of law, it will be so spun by lawyers that engineers will be unable to learn technical lessons.

It is easy to imagine that we would have the courage to speak up, speak out, when we see wrong decisions being made.  But it is rarely clear cut.   The Chernobyl disaster was not caused by any one, single, big obvious wrong decision, but by multiple smaller, decisions, that each, on their own, could have been overcome.  Each on its own could be rationalized.  And just speaking up is often not enough. Speaking up is one thing.  Being heard is another. Those who do are often ridiculed as alarmists, exaggerating "worse case scenarios" (that will never happen).  Those who speak up out of turn are simply not invited back to the key meetings.  They are not promoted to positions of responsibility.  The choice to commit suicide (or, at least, career suicide), while probably not being able to fix the problem anyway, is a very hard choice to make.

It is human nature, everywhere, to live (and die) in denial of facts we don't wish to face. As Pogo said: "We have met the enemy, and he is us."

My Father In Law

My Father In Law, Dick Patterson, passed away a week ago Friday morning.

He had not been doing well since he suffered a debilitating stroke, February 2016, 3 years ago.  He was paralyzed on one side, and had cognitive impairment. (See note 3)  Since then, he has been a shadow of the man we always knew.  But he seemed happy, cheerful even, and content being well cared for by Cleo and the caregivers at The Palms, the retirement home where they moved after the stroke.

In-laws can be a sensitive issue for some people, but my in-laws were not at all like any stereotype.

Dick has always been much more to me than just my wife's father.

I actually knew Dick as my Sunday School teacher, back when Lyn was just the oldest of his young kids years before I had any designs on his daughter.  And he was a really good Sunday School teacher, from whom I learned not just about the Bible, but about how to read, study, examine, reason from, and understand the Bible.  He had a very rational, engineer's approach to reasoning from the Bible.  His approach was always to go to the Bible itself to understand it, not to depend primarily on commentaries or other people's answers.  His example was that you and I can understand it for ourselves if we just look at it rationally.  That approach has always stayed with me.

He was our church youth group leader for many years while I was a teenager and young man, well before I started courting his daughter..  As always, he was cool, calm, organized, efficient, but I think the key thing was, he listened, made sure to get participation, didn't lecture, he was a master at leading a discussion, to give everyone a chance to speak. And shy Lyn mostly sat there annoyed at listening to me, my brother, and Dick go on and on discussing things.  She still hates "discussion."

I guess it's no coincidence that Dick and my father were both engineers, as I too became:  I had two great examples to follow, totally different in many ways.  Dick was a Cal Tech graduate Civil engineer. My dad had a two year degree from LA City College, and was a mostly self-educated Mechanical engineer.  But Dick was very much into self teaching also.  My dad was a hoarder.  Dick was an extreme thrower.  My dad was a shy introvert.  Dick was a social leader, always organizing groups, doing things in groups. The differences attracted me, though, personally, I am much more like my dad. (I became both Civil and Mechanical engineer, and Electrical too)

Dick and his family were part of a group of families that went camping together, and invited us to join them, which we sometimes did:  Easter break on the beach in Baja.

Dick was always a leader in our church.  When I first knew him, they were in a little congregation in San Gabriel.  Then they joined ours in Eagle Rock, where he became one of the most active, enthusiastic, and consistent members, a teacher, speaker, motivator, and leader.  He encouraged me in many ways, by example, as well as by words.

When I started going with Lyn, Dick and Cleo welcomed me as part of their family, and always made me feel at home in their home.

After Lyn and I got married, Dick helped me get my first real engineering job, at Bechtel, where he was a project manager.  There, he continued to serve as a role model and mentor.  He encouraged me to join Bechtel's lunchtime Toastmaster's Club, which really gave a boost to my public speaking confidence, and also enabled me to talk to managers as equals, a real eye opening experience for a young engineer.

I have to tell the story of the first time I saw his office at Bechtel.  I ventured up to his executive floor of the Bechtel building and found his office, but it was practically vacant.  He was out at the moment, but I thought he must have moved to a different office, as there was no sign of anyone working there.  There was a bare desk, with nothing on it, a chair, a couple of guest chairs, and an equally bare credenza, with I think one thin binder. No trinkets. Not one piece of paper visible.  That was Dick:  Totally organized, orderly, totally self disciplined. (see note 1)  Some might think him OCD, but that would imply an irrational compulsion, and Dick was always totally rational.

Cleo used to joke that Dick would discard anything that wasn't in use, so she had to stay active, or Dick might throw her away.  No real danger of that.

After Lyn I were married, we continued to camp together as families, and with the group of friends.  Campfire singing was a grand tradition in that group, and Dick was the consummate campfire song leader.  He couldn't carry a tune with a bucket, but he sure could lead campfire singing.

He was also a very good pianist, despite his tin ear.  He applied himself with his usual orderly self-disciplined approach that overcame his unnatural relationship with musicality.

Dick was an experienced Sierra packer. His mother had lived in the San Joaquin Valley and had hiked in the Sierras. Dick's first job out of Cal Tech was with the LADWP in Independence in the eastern Sierra, where he packed with Cleo after they married. He helped lead Boy Scout pack trips.

He led my first backpacking venture, with Lyn pregnant with Evan, from South Lake, over Bishop Pass, to Grouse Meadows. I got altitude nausea; Rained most nights; but I loved it. With two small children, we didn't go again, until:

When our children were old enough to backpack, he became our llama leader.  Lyn and Dick came up with a plan to borrow pack llamas from our mutual friends, the Barratts, who raised them.  Dick helped train the llamas, and was our lead llama wrangler and guide.

For about ten or twelve summers, we spent a week or two hiking the high Sierra.  We hiked most of the John Muir Trail in bits and pieces.  I think I may still have one of Dick's packing checklists in my files: Always spare and orderly.  He was still leading llama packing trips in his 70s, even after a recalcitrant llama dislocated Dick's shoulder in the back country and he had to be helicoptered out.

In 1985, I had occasion to work with Dick on a small engineering project:  Our church building in Tujunga which we had bought in 1984, was under an upgrade order from the City of Los Angeles as an unreinforced masonry building.  I had some experience with testing firms in the area, and hired one of them to test the strength of the mortar.  Dick did the engineering to design seismic upgrades to the building. I think he did a very clever job of finding simple minimalist solutions. (see note 2)

He retired from Bechtel, but Dick was never idle.  He entered a new phase of his engineering career, doing residential structural engineering.  He got involved after the 1994 Northridge earthquake as a favor to a church member who was a mason and had requests to rebuild brick chimneys.  Dick, in his usual brilliant methodical way, figured his way through LA City Building and Safety bureaucracy to get plans approved. I think he was one of very few engineers getting masonry chimneys approved in Los Angeles.  Later, he broadened his private practice to all residential work.  I don't think he really did it for the money. He mostly just enjoyed helping people and doing engineering.  He never really charged what he was worth.  He said it was just vacation money. (See note 4) He was still doing residential engineering at age 88 the day he suffered a stroke, which tragically took away the ability to move from one of the most active people I have known, and took away the keen mind from one of the most brilliant men I have known.

Dick was a hard act to follow. Lyn idolized him. Living up to his standard was a challenge.  The attempt made me a better person.

What the stroke did not take away was Dick's personality, which was always kind, loving, optimistic, ever cheerful, and always interested in and concerned about others. He remained organized, concerned about punctuality, even when he couldn't really tell time. Still mentally organizing things into lists, even when, sadly, he couldn't remember what the things were.  He was way more to me than a father-in-law.  He was a force of nature (or dare I say, a force of God) that I was blessed to have in my life. I loved him dearly.

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Note 1)  Whenever I told this story in Dick's presence, he would explain that early in his career, he took a management class, which taught that a desk was for paper to flow across, not to store paper.  I'm sure however that thousands of people took that class, but I doubt that any of the others succeeded in practicing that as well as Dick.  I'm not sure he even needed that lesson.  If anything, it just reinforced his natural inclination.  I tried to follow that lesson many times, and really worked at it, but it's just not me.  I simply cannot do that.

Note 2)  Later on in my career, I went to UCLA, and became responsible for technical oversight of their very extensive seismic renovation program.  They hired some very sophisticated top structural engineering firms, with PhD engineers, and cutting edge computer analysis, to do what Dick did with paper and pencil.  I think his solutions may have lacked some of the cutting edge sophistication, but I concluded that we could have paid more than the construction cost in engineering fees, and not gotten a more suitable design.

(Note 3)  It is frustrating and sad that his stroke was very preventable. It was due to clogged carotid arteries in his neck, which can be checked very easily. After the stroke, when it was too late, he had surgery to clean them. If he had that surgery before the stroke, he could still be working today.  Given that he had heart surgery some years ago, it's hard to imagine why that was not checked before.  Get your arteries checked, before it's too late.

(Note 4) Dick never bothered with professional liability insurance, which some may have thought unwise, but Dick just preferred to do things right and keep his clients more than satisfied. I can't imagine anyone wanting to sue him.

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In Dick's honor, I feel the need to add an enumerated summary list, outlining Richard Patterson as I knew him.

1. A man of undoubting faith in the God of the Bible, who read the Bible every day, using the Bible Companion chart, perhaps reading the Old Testament 80 times through, and the New Testament 160 times. Who lived his faith, and practiced what he preached. Shared his faith with anyone who was interested, but never forced it where it was unwelcome.
2. A leader in all that he did, faith, work, play.  A teacher, example, mentor.
3. Consummately organized and self disciplined. He planned his work, and worked the plan. He made rules for himself, and followed those rules. Everything he did was organized. THE most organized person I have ever known.
4. An executive, who managed people, organized and delegated work, leveraged his effort to get things done, efficiently, and effectively. Listened, learned, applied it to the job. Got consensus. Made decisions, and then moved forward.
5. A brilliant engineer, who could do most anything he set his mind to.
6. Loved nature, walking, hiking, camping, fishing, the Sierras, and knew them, and shared that love and knowledge with many.
7. Liked tradition, order, there is a way things ought to be done. Do it that way. But surprisingly flexible: Could be persuaded that traditions need changing, sometimes.
8. Loved to compete.  He entered a contest to do his very best, which was usually good enough to win. Played as hard as he worked. Anything he did, he did his best.
9. A social person, who liked groups of all sorts. Liked to bring people together. Not naturally charismatic, but made up for that by his genuine interest in others, and by organized effort to put that concern into action.
10. Not by any means perfect; could be annoying in his ordered efficiency and decisiveness.
11. A kind and understanding Family man, and Family was inclusive. For all his self-discipline, he understood that others were not like him, and enjoyed people as they were.
12. Had an impressive ability to avoid and ignore drama and bickering, to cut through all that and just get on with getting things done.
13. Generous with his time and energy. Happy to be active and useful in any way he could.

Halfway Done With Clinical Trial

Wednesday I got my seventh infusion of fourteen in this ABBVie Arise clinical trial.  It was a light day for other tests: No blood draws or ECG.  Just neuro and psych exams.  It has gotten pretty routine.  Took a couple tries with the needle to get the infusion started in my arm, but not a big deal.  Then just waiting three hours for whatever is in that black IV bag to infuse into me.

I started getting screening tests to qualify for this study in August; got the first infusion in October; with infusions and tests continuing until this coming October.  Seven infusions done. Seven more to go. Halfway to somewhere.

Thankfully with the light schedule today, we didn't have to leave home in the dark of night and were able to get up at a halfway decent time (5:30 alarm this morning).  The weather wasn't great: Not as cold as it has been (only 31F), but freezing rain forecast for this morning.  Lyn was apprehensive about driving in the freezing rain.  As it turned out, the roads were icy until we got on the expressway, but after that, the worst part for Lyn was being sandwiched between two semi's on both sides of us, both throwing out spray that coated our Mini's windshield.

Google Maps suggested an alternate route in Chicago to avoid traffic on I-90, but then changed its hive-mind and said just stay on the expressway, which was a relief to stay with familiar routes.  Having Google tell Lyn what to do instead of me is great, as it is hard for me to speak loud and clear enough for Lyn to understand.  I just crank up the phone volume, and let Lyn get impatient with Google instead of with me. If I could just get Google to answer Lyn's questions, that would be great, as I often can't get words out fast enough to answer her.

I also got six Botox injections in my jaw during the morning when I saw my doctor.  No, not for cosmetic purposes: Looking younger was never a big goal for me.  This is to try to control excess saliva that, among other inconveniences, increases difficulty speaking.  The excess salivation (Sialorrhea) is a symptom or side effect of the PSP, which causes loss of control of the oral muscles that normally control salivation.  This was my second such Botox treatment.  The first didn't do much, so they tried a stronger dose this time.  Three little shots on each side of my jaw with a tiny needle. Surprisingly, to the outside of the jaw. Slight burning sensation, but not really painful.  I'm hoping the stronger dose has more effect.  Takes a few weeks to take effect.

Getting back to the clinical trial, I have no idea whether it's working.  I also don't know whether I am getting the drug, or the placebo.  I think I will find out at the end of the trial, sometime, hopefully.  The doctor said she had heard that the trial overall is going well, but I haven't seen any announcements.  I continue to be optimistic.

My condition is just a little worse overall than it was a year ago.  I think my speaking and walking skills may have declined a little, but it's hard to measure.  On the other hand, the double vision problem I was having a year ago seems to have mostly gone away.  So, I'm not dying imminently, as far as I can tell. Sooner or later it happens to everyone, but we're still buying green bananas.

At the next infusion, in March, I get another MRI, to see if my brain is shrinking.  That will be a longer day.

Of course, assuming this trial shows the drug works, I would hope to continue getting infusions in the two-year "open label" extension study.  So, I actually hope the infusions are nowhere near half done, and will continue.  We'll have to wait and see.

When we were done at Rush, after 3 pm, the weather had warmed up just a bit, to about 37F, and the light rain was no longer in danger of freezing.  We made our usual side trip to Trader Joe's on Roosevelt at Michigan Ave in Chicago.  Tried a different route, taking surface streets instead of I-290.  Seemed good, but always an adventure trying different routes in an unfamiliar big city.  For some reason, Ms. Google seemed not to realize the entrance to Trader Joe's is on Wabash, and was recommending making a U-Turn on Roosevelt at Michigan Ave., which we humans thought unwise, so we improvised.  Just like in California, Trader Joe's always has tiny congested parking lots.  Hard to imagine they succeeded in Southern California with that formula, but in the Chicago Loop it seems normal.

On the way home, Ms. Google recommended avoiding a traffic jam on I-90 by getting off for two miles and taking the parallel surface street.  Not sure that was worth all the lane-changing stress that caused Lyn, but she did it.

Home a little after six in the evening, to a great salmon dinner (the cats' favorite) that Sarah had ready.

Speaking of Sarah, she is also now making frequent trips to Rush, to get injections in her knee, to hopefully keep her running on it.  Rush seems to be the place to go for cutting edge treatment.