Larry’s Comments (group member since Nov 23, 2020)

Larry’s comments from the Nonfiction Reading - Only the Best group.

Why read And Finally: Matters of Life and Death by Henry Marsh?

The heading on the review by the Guardian is a good start: "Fearlessly frank and endearingly geeky reflections on life and death by a neurosurgeon diagnosed with cancer"

But maybe read the whole review here: https://www.theguardian.com/books/202...

Met, I’ve been dealing with some major health issues for my wife. she’s just completed her second set of chemo cycles … some more appts. coming up (Pet scan and appts. With two oncologists, but I hope to get back to things here.) I actually appreciate you posting this.

Carol wrote: "I'm not receiving notifications either. Very annoying.
Samantha Harvey won the Booker Prize. I had never heard of her but see that she has won several prizes. Will buy Orbital and also The Western ..."

Carol, I just reserved ORBITAL at our local public library.

Notification ... on my laptop ... seem to have been restored. Sigh.

John, we are in a drought here in Northern Virginia ... and we're also getting some rain today. I wish it were more ... much, much more. You are so right about extremes. This is the Age of Extremes.

I don’t know where my comment of several days went, but it was just a simple one seconding Carol’s recommendation of ACT OF OBLIVION. IT’s a brilliant book.

We voted early by mail, knowing that we would be in the hospital all day today!

What an appropriate holiday for things going on across the pond.

Carol, it’s so frustrating when a device stops functioning. At this point, I think I’ve bought about a dozen Kindles (mainly Paperwhites) . Two had major problems …. Both in the first year. We’re still using eight of them (six for me … two for Cina). Why so many? Well, that’s complicated.

On those books. I really found LORD OF THE FLIES depressing when we read it in school. But it was still thought provoking and provoked lively discussion in class. I wish I had time to work my way through all of Stevenson’s works. Loved KIDNAPPED.

John, my notifications had stopped for most of a month. They resumed this week after I used my computer to look at my settings and checked a box. I know that this is obscure as an explanation and wish I could help more.

Cynda & Carol, I think that you both understand deeply what it's like to care for a person you love in these times. Life for all of us can be at one and the same time so fragile and so meaningful.

This kind of AI problem is really serious: "OpenAI's Transcriptions Make Up Things You Never Said to Your Doctor
Let's hope your physician isn't transcribing your conversations with Whisper."

SOURCE:https://apple.news/Akhtmw6BHRFqGPvBf2...

A fascinating look into why the quality of some paperback books has recently declined. https://lithub.com/have-you-purchased...

So our life (this is persnal and not a general statement) is so much organized around our doctors right now. On Monday, we report to the Schar Cancer Institute, where my wife will check in and have chem for two of her three chemo drugs. Then we go across the street, where she is admitted to the hospital. We spend the night and then early on Tuesday she starts desensitization and then full treatment with the third chemo drug. At some point she will have an allergic reaction. They will stop the infusion and treat her with much more Benedryl and steroids ... after the allergic reaction slows, they will resume the infusion of the third chem drug to conclusion. This will be the next to last chemo cycle like that. It's hard ... and totally worth it. Her blood work shows that the cancer will be almost eliminated ... and our hope is that this lasts for another two or three years. A PET scan will be used after that last chemo cycle to confirm that there are no major (and maybe no detectable) tumors left. So this takes over our life and yet our life is pretty much the same. We are lucky ... because Cina's cancer responds so well to the chemo drugs used. Not everyone is so lucky. And the side effects for her are pretty minimal. Just that allergic reaction ... that can be controlled. No nausea. Two simple words ... that many chemo patients wished that applied to them. Life is good.

A.I. is everywhere ... openly and also hidden. Update to the operating systems of iPhones and iPads now include so-called "Apple Intelligence." Browsers like MS Edge now come with CoPilot, which is a pervasive AI agent ... if you sign in to MS. I use CoPilot ... I want a little bit of experience with A.I. But so much of A.I. is hidden ... the new MS PC comes with hundreds of A.I. processes built in. I don't know where all this ends,, but it worries me. I think I've mentioned before the intrusion of A.I. generated music ... in the form of music playlists that are not created by humans. It's meant to be non-intrusive background music, but it's offered because the music streaming services don;t have to pay any human for music rights.

Ron wrote: "Crazy that we're at the start of it being mid-October. Time is flying.

I have therapy today so after I'm gonna use it as an excuse to go to the bookstore after. I need to get a few more books for ...That's okay though as it is, of the 6 I have read this month I feel bad that 4 of them have been fiction. I can't wait for nonfiction books "

Overall, it's just important that you are reading. Don't beat your self up too much over this.

Carol wrote: "I believe Dr. Fauci had West Nile Virus in the summer and was seriously ill and had to be hospitalised."

For most people, it apparently is asymptomatic ... sort of like Covid ... but for others, it can hit them hard as Dr. Fauci got hit, sometimes causing encephalitis and even killing them. Viruses fascinate me ... and viruses scare me.

We breathe in so many chemicals. I try not to go down the laundry detergent aisles in our supermarkets because the smell is so strong from the detergents and the additives ... and I know that those chemicals do'n't really help my lungs.

Carol, you are so lucky not to have mosquitoes. I remember the year of the major West Nile virus outbreak. More than 50 percent of our crows died. I think I came down with it also, but I never had it checked out. Just a bad fever lasting three days. Most people who were infected were asymptomatic.

The Plum Tree
A.E. Stallings
Tu ne quaesieris …

The plum tree’s dying branch by branch,
A candelabra going dark.
Leaves ticket down, no avalanche,
A gangrene inches through the bark.

Fruit trees are short-lived. So we’d heard.
For years we thought its time had come;
Yet each spring bridal blossoms stirred
And each year purpled into plum.

One summertime will be its last –
I think it’s this one. You do too.
It happened gradually, then fast,
As bankruptcy is said to do.

Yet look, here is a last hurrah –
A meager harvest of late fruits,
Some hanging on dead boughs. What law
Of time and ripeness in cahoots

Offers this unlooked-for haul?
Let’s gather it, though posthumous;
And if the final count is small,
The sweeter is the sum to us,

And we can pray, just as before,
For signs (should we consult them) that
Our plum tree has one summer more,
This now, ever penultimate.

A.E. Stallings is the Oxford Professor of Poetry. This Afterlife: Selected Poems was published by Carcanet in December 2022.

From the 10 October 2024 issue of The London Review.

John wrote: "Carol wrote: "I live 300 feet above sea level, on flat land which extends to the coast and with a steep hill to the right so I think I am probably safe from tsunamis and that the sea will not flood... have golfed in Maine. You have to be alert for bears. "

There are worse things than bears. On one of my trips to Malaysia (to Kuching on Borneo), one of the members of our delegation went golfing. He related at dinner that there were warnings not to go into to rough to look for a ball because there might be cobras there. Searching for and recovering balls was a job for the caddies! :-(

John wrote: "Larry wrote: "Today’s Washington Post has this story about what Helene brought to Western North Carolina.

https://wapo.st/3XZuarr"

I’ve been reading this article and others. The pictures are just unbelievable. I always had this belief that the mountains kept you safe from tornadoes and hurricanes. It does not appear so...."

When we moved to our retirement community, I thought about risks, including flooding from hurricane level rains. We're on the first floor of a five floor apartment building. But the land falls away with a decline of about 50 feet. The bigger risk mught be flooding in the lower level garage where we park our car. If we were expecting 10 inches of rain or more, I might drive our car over to my son's single family home and park it there.

People rarely think about risks. I've been following the RISKS DIGEST for about thirty years now. (LINK HERE: http://catless.ncl.ac.uk/Risks/ ) I'm not sure how much protection that gives me, but about once or twice a month, I see something tht might be relevant to our life.