Breaking Bones

Just when you least expect it, your life can change.  I was enjoying a morning of pickleball last week, went for a backhand shot, my shoe stuck to the ground while my body kept going, and boom, I was flat on my butt.  I used by left hand to ease the fall and knew immediately my wrist was broken.

 Wonderful friends helped me up, got ice, and eventually got me to Scripps Urgent Care.  In short order they x-rayed my hand and confirmed the break, then wrapped me up in a soft cast, and sent me home.  Thank you Marcos from Uber.  He was there for me in 3 minutes.

And things were going so well.  My rotator cuff has been healing nicely, and I was back to playing pickleball most mornings at a pretty good level.  But accidents can happen anywhere.  I could have taken a bad step off the curb or tripped over a sprinkler, or any number of other things, but i didn't.  It was pickleball, so I must evaluate the risks/rewards of playing  while I heal.  

I adhere to the philosophy that you should live each day to the fullest, and that's what I have always done.  But I do have to consider whether this is still the right activity for me.  I could be caught in a random shooting at the mall, or killed in an auto accident today.  In fact, getting injured in a car is probably the most dangerous thing I do everyday.

So as I heal I will consider all the pros and cons of continuing to play pickleball.  I let you know in about 8 weeks what I have decided. 

We All Need Role Models

 We all have someone we look up to, admire, want to be like.  It might be your mom or dad or a good friend, or it might be a teacher, sports or movie star, or maybe a great writer or thinker.  My mom is 98, and one of her complaints is she has no role models!  They're aren't enough people on the planet that have reached her age to show her how to live, how to grow old gracefully.

I had never thought about that before she mentioned it to me, but she's right.  We all have people our age or older, to show us the way.  If there's no one out there of your age, then YOU'RE the role model.

There is no right or wrong way to grow old, and younger people don't always know what's right for their parents.  I hear so many people in their 70's and 80's that have been advised by their children to go into assisted living.  This may be right for some, but certainly not all.  

Some older people give up driving in their early 70's.  Some are driving nicely in their 90's.  Older people for the most part, know when it's time to give up the car, to move into assisted living, to get a companion.  Older people should not be put in a one size fits all box.  

As we age, the number of people living into their 90's and 100's is increasing by leaps and bounds.  These strong men and women will show us the way.  They are already showing me that you can live a productive and fruitful life until you are 100 or more.  Lifelong learning is available to everyone.  Exercise is available to everyone, so is travel, and many other activities to make you happy.  Don't let anyone tell you you can't do something.  We will become the role models for the next generation.  As seniors live longer, they will show others the way, just as my mom and her group of women from 90-100+ continue to model for my generation.  They may not have many role models, but they're doing a great job of showing my generation how to live a long, happy life.

(Food for thought:  With so many people living to be so old, how should society use retired people that may live another 35 years and still have much to contribute to society?)

I Love Lorna's Italian Kitchen

 I took my lunch bunch to Lorna's Kitchen in December.  It's a small, very traditional Italian restaurant in a strip center in University City, on Governor Dr.  We went on a rainy day, and we were the only ones there for lunch.  Our very efficient waitress explained many of the dishes to us, and helped us order.  For six hungry women, we ordered three pasta dishes, a large caesar salad, and dessert.  We ate every bit of it, including several baskets of warm, crusty bread.

The highlight of the meal was the tagliatelle with bolongese sauce.  The sauce was not quite what any of us were expecting, but it was absolutely delicious.  It had spicy sausage, veggies, and a bit of cream.  Even our resident Italian, Regina raved.  We also had a baked mostaccilli with lots of ricotta cheese and rich marinara sauce.  The lasagna was light and oh so good.  For dessert, four of us ordered the homemade pistachio  ice cream.  The ladies were sick of hearing me rave about it.  I had it a few years ago, and always remembered how good it was.  It is loaded, and I mean loaded, with fresh crushed pistachios and I think just a hint of chocolate bits.  Two other women order the dulce de leche ice cream, which they also loved.

Lorna's is a casual restaurant in a strip mall.  Nothing fancy, but it is some of the best Italian food around.  If you find yourself in the neighborhood, drop in for lunch or dinner.  Or, even if it's a bit of drive, I think you will find it worth the trip.  We drove 40 minutes, and would do it again tomorrow.  I'm so happy the five women I took were happy.  They're a tough crowd, so I really have to keep on my toes to find, good, interesting restaurants month after month.  I do love doing it, and of course, sharing the meal with some of my favorite people.

Cellular Agriculture Could Help Save Our Planet

 Right now we are an animal agricultural country.  Cows, for example, account for 9% of greenhouse gases!  1/3 of our planet is dedicated to agriculture.  Can you imagine a future when animal protein is made from farming cells?  Cellular agriculture would require 99% less land and 96% less water.  Imagine how that would help our planet.  At the moment, animal agriculture is funded by the government, so it's hard to imagine cellular agriculture coming to pass in our lifetime.

The big problem is humans concept of eating protein produced from cells, not animals.  Many people have tried products like "Impossible Meat."  Someone must like it because there's lots of it in stores, but many people (including me) don't like it.  At the moment, the cost of producing a meat product from cells is about $50 a pound.  That sounds like a lot, but with the cost of animal products increasing dramatically, it's not as bad as it sounds.  Over time, cellular meat cost will decrease, and animal meat will increase. (click below to view charts describing cellular agriculture more completely)

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Cellular agriculture

Description

Description

Cellular agriculture focuses on the production of agriculture products from cell cultures using a combination of biotechnology, tissue engineering, molecular biology, and synthetic biology to create and design new methods of producing proteins, fats, and tissues that would otherwise come from traditional agriculture. 

It's a fascinating topic.  Check it out online.  I listened to a TedTalk on the subject, which got me interested in finding out more.  It's amazing what science can do.

When Is It Really An Emergency For Your Pet?

 This is just a funny story about how we non medical types can see a little blood and think we need to rush our dog or cat to the vet.  It was December 26.  I was just leaving a lovely party that Regina hosted for some neighbor friends, when I get a call from one of my neighbors.  She sounded panicked.  Her dog was bleeding from the rear end, and she didn't know what to do.  I was on my way to a bridge game, and cancelling was something I didn't want to do.

My neighbor Phyllis  sounded so scared, I decided taking her 1 1/2 pound dog to the vet was my first priority.  I cancelled bridge, raced home to take my mom home (she was visiting and was going to play bridge too).  I picked up my neighbor and her dog Precious, and off we went at 7pm on a holiday weekend to the emergency vet in Carlsbad.

My friend was so scared for her little Precious, she was not thinking clearly.  So, I called the vet as we drove, to see what the wait time, etc, would be.  As we're talking to the receptionist at the vet, she's asking a lot of questions.  Is the dog in pain?  No.  Is the dog acting normal?  Yes.  Has the dog been spayed?  No.

The answer to the last question set off an alarm in my head.  The dog (about 1 year old) is in heat.  I said to Phyllis, I think your dog is in heat.  She was positive that was not the case, that there was something terribly wrong, and told me to keep driving to the vet office.

We got there and the receptionist/ assistant took one look at the dog and said that she was sure the dog was in heat.  Phyllis said, "But she's been bleeding for three hours."  I said to Phyllis, "Do you remember, back in the day, when you got your period?  You bled for a lot longer that three hours!!"  With that comment, the two young girls at reception started laughing uncontrollably.  At that point Phyllis decided this was definitely NOT an emergency, and home we went.

Who Is J.R.?

 He's a Parisian contemporary artist/photographer who, as he says, "Owns the biggest art gallery in the world:  the walls of the whole world."  He began as a graffiti artist in Paris many years ago, and has evolved into one of the most unique creative minds I have seen.

J.R. does not create anything by chance, he gives meaning to everything.  Whether he is expressing a political or social comment, he presents his point of view to the general public.  For example, in 2008, in Brazil, he paid tribute to female victims of violence, by covering each panel he painted in Provincia, Rio, with female faces and named this piece 28 Millimeters, Women Are Heroes.  At the conclusion of the project, he made the documentary, Women Are Heroes.

Early in his career, J.R. had fun framing his photographs on the walls with paint.  It brought attention to his work.  When the collage was removed, traces of spray paint remained on the wall.  For him, "The city is the best gallery."

J.R. mainly uses black and white for his collages.  It is rare to see any color.  As a photographer, he is known for his huge collages on paper.  He is a technical artist, who likes outdoor art and putting his works high up for all to see.

J.R. likes to showcase the poor, the discarded, the people no one pays attention to.  He did a project at a supermax prison in California, another project at the border of Mexico and California.  So impressive.  I can't wait to see what he's up to next.  Like Banksy, you never know where his work will show up next.

I urge you to watch "Paper and Glue" on MSNBC if I have peaked your interest in J.R.  It's very good.  Produced by Brian Grazer and Ron Howard.

My Saturday Was Interrupted By A Tsunami Advisory

Last Saturday I had planned to do three of my favorite things.  Take a long beach walk (with Fran), play pickleball with Ocean Hills friends, and play a few hours of bridge with new friends Terri, Tom, and Phyllis, then have dinner.  A perfect day.  Not so fast.

I woke up early to raindrops, and a call from Fran.  The weather service had issued a tsunami advisory, and she wanted to cancel our walk and go look at the waves.  We couldn't walk anyway because if was raining.  My pickleball game was cancelled because of wet courts, but thankfully my bridge game and dinner was still on for later in the afternoon.  So, I took Pepper for a walk in between raindrops, read for a while, and did a little cooking.  (made some delicious WW mushroom soup).

The tsunami advisory got me interested in exactly what was a tsunami advisory, and how did it differ from a tsunami warning.  First, a tsunami is a series of waves in a body of water (usually the ocean) caused by displacement of a large volume of water, usually an underground earthquake or volcano.  On January 15 there was a volcanic eruption in Tonga that caused the tsunami advisory.

A tsunami advisory tells you there is potential to generate strong currents and beware.  Stay out of the water and boats until told it is safe to return.  It could be several days.  A tsunami warning is much more serious and immediate.  It is issued when the tsunami has the potential to generate widespread inundation.  An advisory does not necessarily mean big waves (although it could).  A warning does mean big waves and absolutely stay away from areas close to shore.

If you look at the weather app on your phone (mine is set for Oceanside), click on Learn More.  It will tell you all about the details of the weather forecast.  That's where I found out that this current advisory was caused by an underground volcano in Tonga.  Just thought you might like to know.

   

Who Knew? Spiders Can Fly

I had always thought that spiders could balloon, a process that carried them long distances with the help from the wind, but recently found out they can fly across entire oceans on long strands of silk.  Scientists have discovered that when spiders are in a chamber with no wind, but a small electric field, they are likely to prep for take off.  The sensory hairs that cover a spiders body move when the electric field is turned on, much like our hair stands on end due to static electricity.  The spiders sense that it is time to fly.

This makes the spider only the second known arthropod after bees, to sense and use electric fields.  How did this information come to be known?  It started several years ago in Hawaii, where an astrophysicist named Peter Gorham became interested in observations made by Charles Darwin years ago.  Darwin observed spiders ballooning en masse aboard a ship at sea.  He wondered if the spiders were using electrostatics to take off.  Gorham wondered this too, and so he turned to finding the answer.

Gorham published his findings, hoping to find other scientists that would work on this question.  Others got interested, and we now know more about spider migration than we did before.  Spider migration is important.  As top insect predators, spiders play a major role in all ecosystems.  Information you could probably live without, but I thought it was pretty interesting. 

 

Sometimes The Best Remedies Are Simple

My mom and I recently completed a 9 day Caribbean cruise.  It could not have been any better.  Prior to departure, my mom decided walk a little more every day at home.  She was "training" for the increase in walking she would do during the trip.

Actually, the amount of walking she did on the ship was far more than even her home training had prepared her for.  She was walking a minimum of 6,000 steps a day, which is quite a lot for anyone, much less a 98 year old woman.

Mom had had a nagging hip pain for a long time.  She had tried cortisone injections and lots of physical therapy.  Still, nighttime pain remained, where she was waking up 2-3 times a night in pain.  Well, two days into the trip, mom wakes up and tells me she had NO pain at all the night before!  This continued for the duration of the cruise.  No pain EVER!!!

The only variable that had changed on the ship was the amount of walking she did each day.  At home she was walking 1,000 steps a day.  On the ship she was walking 6,000 steps a day.  Walking obviously made her hip better.  A simple solution to a problem that had been plaguing her for many months.

Now her challenge is to keep up the walking now that she's home.  It's hard, but when the results are so significant and obvious, it's hard not to continue.  My guess is she will be taking two walks a day and keeping her hip pain in check.  Bravo, mom. 

Who Was Henri Charpentier?

 Other than Julia Child, Henri Charpentier was probably the most famous chef of the 20th century.  He certainly accomplished more, and served more famous people than you can imagine.  How did I even come to hear of this incredible chef?  Well, my mom and I were deciding where to go for dinner one night, and we both felt like French food.  She asked me if I knew who Henri Charpentier was, and I said I had never heard of him.  She proceeded to tell me about his restaurant in Redondo Beach (in his home!) at the end of his illustrious career.  But I'm getting ahead of myself.

Henri was born in 1880 in Nice, France.  Before coming to the U.S. in the early 20th century, he was chef at 9 of the most famous restaurants in the world, including Hotel de Paris (Monte Carlo), Maxim's (Paris), Tour d'Argent (Paris), Savoy (London) and many others.  He cooked for the Prince of Wales (soon to be King), where he created crepes suzettes by accident.  He was making a pancake dessert, and in the process, burned the sauce and flambed it, creating the famous dessert, and naming it after Suzette, a child who was eating with the Prince.

Henri came to the U.S., where among other things, he was the personal chef for John D. Rockefeller.  They opened a restaurant together too.  Henri opened numerous restaurants in New York and Chicago, before finally coming to California.  He opened Henri's on the Sunset Strip, where he introduced Americans to Caesar salad.  Finally, in his later years, he opened a restaurant in his home, in a nondiscript area of Redondo Beach.  Customers were seated in the living room, with a maximum of 14.  He did not think chefs needed a fancy restaurant to turn out fabulous food, and he proved that to be true.  His restaurant was booked 1 year in advance.  The cost of dinner in 1948 was $7 for a gourmet meal.  

Loved learning about Henri Charpentier and sharing this information with you.  I hope you enjoyed this blog.

The Circuitry of Violence

 I was fascinated by a recent lecture I listened to on The Jordan Harbinger Show (I listen on Spotify) by Dr. Douglas Fields.  Dr. Fields is a world renowned neuroscientist who studies the brain, and why we react the way we do.  It's a little over my head to try to explain the circuitry of the brain, so I won't even attempt that.  Instead, I'll give you an overview of what he talked about, and if it sounds interesting, you can look him up or check out one of his several interesting books.  I'm intrigued by Why We Snap.

Douglas says we are all wired for violence, humans and animals.  What would make someone risk life and limb?  Can we diffuse that behavior?  We often hear that a mass murderer was "just the boy next door."  Anyone can snap.  Fields identifies 9 specific neurocircuitry behaviors that trigger rage.  Some of the most obvious are insult, protection of family or tribe, and environmental(protecting your environment, like your home).  

Fields is a slight man, maybe 130 pounds, 56 years old, with no martial arts training, yet when he was traveling with his 17 year old daughter in Barcelona and was attacked by a gang of pick pocketers, he reacted instantly.  He was protecting himself and his daughter, and he pinned the robber to the ground!  Had he identified the trigger immediately, he may not have reacted as he did.  He was risking life and limb for a wallet, something he surely would not have done had he had time to recognize what he was doing.

Who has not lost self-control?  We all wish to believe that we are in control of our behaviors and actions, but the fact is, that sometimes we are not.  One of the 9 triggers that Dr. Fields identifies can unleash an automatic and complex program for violence, destruction or even death, all of it unconscious.  Rage explodes without warning, overpowering judgement and fear, resulting in violence.  This human response has been vital to our survival, yet it puts your life at risk.  These behaviors are hard wired in our brain.  The question is, what triggers this deadly switch for violence and killing? To find out more about the circuitry of violence and rage and how to diffuse it, check out Dr. Douglas Fields.  

I Can't Believe I Missed This

 I was checking out a new restaurant on Coast Highway one morning, when I noticed Lofty Coffee,  where an art supply store used to be.  Fran, Kristi and I decided to stop there for coffee on our morning walk.  I was shocked when I asked the barista how long they had been open, and he said, "Six years!"  I couldn't believe that I had driven by this corner maybe 100 times over the past six years and never noticed it.

Lofty Coffee began in 2014 in a little storefront on the west side of Coast Highway.  I had never stopped there, because Fran and I usually walk south, so I never had occasion to try it.  I did notice that they were always busy, and over the years had opened other locations in Solana Beach, Little Italy and LaCosta, but I never saw their beautiful location on the east side of Coast Highway, in the old art supply store, in Encinitas.

We walked up a little incline to get to the place, and were delighted at what we saw.  The interior is sparkling clean, neat and looks brand new.  That's when I asked how long it had been opened.  There is a small space inside for indoor eating, and several large patios outdoors.  It is spacious and comfortable, and somewhere I will go back to again and again.

They have a rather extensive breakfast menu which includes, croissant sandwiches, acai bowls, lots of locally made pastries, breads and cookies.  Coffee is delicious.  They also have cold tea drinks, hot tea drinks, and specialty coffee drinks.

The large location we went to is also where they roast their coffee, and the smell is intoxicating.  They have a subscription membership to a coffee club, which you might be interested in joining if you are interested in exotic coffees from faraway lands. 

I was missing the Starbucks in the Lumberyard that closed during the pandemic, but no more.  My new go to coffee shop will be Lofty's. 

2022 Here We Come

Yes, 2021 was a terrible year.  There's no denying that.  But, I try to look at the bright side and look forward to the future.  What happened this year to make me optimistic?  Well, first of all, we all got vaccinated and boosted, or should I say most of us who believe in science did so.  Medical science has also developed new ways of treating Covid-19, so if you do get sick (and are vaccinated) you have a very good chance of surviving.  Think about it.  We had none of this in 2020.

Other reasons to be optimistic?  Children went back to school.  This is huge.  People also went back to work, more restaurants stayed open, Broadway came back, so did concerts, professional sports and extracurricular activities for kids.  So, compared to 2020, 2021 was a pretty good year. 

Yes, so many people still died, so many did not follow the science and unfortunately for them, became statistics.  The last month of the year brought the Omicrom virus to our shores, and created new challenges for us all.  This too, shall pass, and we have to stay vigilant and do the right thing so that in a few months we can all feel safe to go out.

Travel came back in 2021, in the form of cruising, airplane trips and auto trips.  The economy came back, too.  Unemployment is low, the stock market is up, the economy is humming.  (yes, there's high inflation, but I'll talk about that later).

For me personally, it was a very good year in many ways.  I made several wonderful new friends in my community.  I had rotator cuff surgery, and after 5 months away, I was back playing pickleball.  I was able to travel to Colorado three times, to see my children and grandchildren.  That's so important to me.  Finally, I got to go on a Carribbean cruise with my mom and several friends.  It was a real highlight of the year.

Yes, 2021 was a difficult year for many, but if everyone would just get vaccinated we would get out of this mess sooner rather than later.  It will end, or we will find a way to live with it.  If you're not part of the solution, you're part of the problem.  It's sad to think that over 200,000 people died unnecessarily in the last half of the year.  We live in a democracy where people have the right to make their own choice on whether to get vaccinated or not.  Making a choice that is not based on science put many in the hospital, on respirators, or worse.  Let's all do our part to make 2022 the year we return to a life without fear.