The time I failed to do surgery on a Sleeptracker watch

I've blogged before about my various successful attempts to repair various malfunctioning household objects, so it's only fair if I write about my failed attempt.

I'd been using a Sleeptracker watch for years without incident, when one day the battery died.  The little hole-in-the-wall jewellery store where I'd previously gotten the battery replaced had closed and I happened to be at the Bay store at Yonge & Bloor, so I decided to see if their jewellery department did watch batteries. They did, and appeared to change the battery successfully.

Unfortunately, after a couple of days' use, I determined that the watch wasn't beeping any more.  It was telling time properly, but not beeping when the alarm was supposed to go off. Which makes it useless, since the whole point of a Sleeptracker is to wake you up!

 I did some googling, and found some other people on the internet who had had the same problem with digital watches (although never Sleeptrackers specifically), including instructions that were supposed to fix the problem. (I can no longer google up the specific instructions I found.)  So I bought a tiny screwdriver and opened up the watch to follow the instructions.

I managed to open it up reasonably easily, followed the instructions, replaced the battery, but it didn't beep. And, to add insult to injury, I couldn't get the watched closed again.  The band kind of overlaps the piece on the back of the watcht hat needs to come off, and I just don't have the physical dexterity to get that piece back on and tucked under the band on both the top and bottom and get the screw-holes to line up so I can put the screws back in.

So I put all the parts in a ziploc bag, and ended up buying a new Sleeptracker watch on eBay. (They seem to have discontinued the watches and replaced them with an iphone app, which is useless to me given how often I throw everything in bed with me out of bed in my sleep!)

Now the battery of that new Sleeptracker is running low, and I'm worried about whether it will be a complete write-off too.

Excellent customer service from Rexall (but, unfortunately, subpar umbrellas)

I grabbed a black umbrella at Rexall because they were calling for rain the day we scattered my grandmother's ashes, and I thought my usual coloured umbrellas would be inappropriate for a cemetery. But when I went to open it at the cemetery, it refused to open and the handle just came off in my hand. Multiple people all tried to open it, and no one succeeded. Fortunately I was able to borrow an umbrella, or I would have gotten wet!

I took it back to Rexall (fortunately I still had the receipt and the label with the barcode, although the label was torn.)  The cashier tried to open it, had the same problem, and then promptly and cheerfully gave me a full refund, all while expressing concern that she hoped I hadn't gotten too wet.

Unfortunately, I've had problems with every umbrella I've ever bought from Rexall. They used to have these cheerful yellow ones that I adored, but they'd always break within just a couple of months - and not even from blowing inside out, just from opening and closing and being in my purse.  I've never once been satisfied with the quality and longevity of an umbrella I bought there.

However, I am very satisfied with their customer service, so I will send more of my non-umbrella business their way.

Why is there acetaminophen in everything?

This summer cold has used up my stock of Nyquil, so I went to the store to buy more.  They've changed their product line since I last bought any, and now there are two kind: Nyquil Cold & Flu and Nyquil Sinus.  I wasn't sure which one was "normal" Nyquil, so I read the labels, and was surprised to see that there's acetaminophen in both.

There's probably always been acetaminophen in Nyquil, but I noticed it this time because some random internet person recently told me that the freakish dreams I had when I tried Tylenol Cold & Flu a while back might have been due to the acetaminophen.  So I looked at the similar cold medicines on the shelf, and all of them had acetaminophen, except for the Advil-branded medicines which had ibuprofen. I could not find one single decongestant that doesn't contain acetaminophen or ibuprofen.

Why do they do this?

Acetaminophen is a painkiller and fever reducer.  The vast majority of my colds don't come with pain or a fever and, when I do have aches and pain or a fever caused by a virus, I don't always want to suppress it so I can accurately monitor the evolution of my condition.

I use decongestants so I can stop sniffling long enough to fall asleep.  I want my nose to stop running, and I wouldn't say no to a sedative. Fevers and aches and pains don't prevent me from sleeping (in fact, they make me want to lie down and close my eyes), so the acetaminophen simply doesn't help.


This cold also brought me a productive cough, so I decided to take an expectorant to make it pass faster.  Last time I had a cough, I learned that the very effective but very disgusting Buckley's cough syrup comes in pill form, so I bought some called Buckley's Complete Plus Mucous Relief.  I took this out of my medicine cabinet, read the label, and discovered that not only does it contain acetaminophen too, it also contains a cough suppressant in addition to the expectorant!  (And a decongestant, but I don't object to that.)  It seems that the cough suppressant and the expectorant would work at cross-purposes, and, since I'm at home, I don't want to suppress the cough! I want to spend the day coughing my lungs up and be done with it rather than having it stretch out over days and weeks.

So I went to the drug store and looked at the cough medicines and, once again, all of the cough medicines that come in pill form had acetaminophen and a cough suppressant. (There was a liquid expectorant, but liquid cough medicines are disgusting so I really hope to avoid them.)


I don't understand why they do this.  I very, very rarely need acetaminophen at the same time as I need a decongestant or cough medicine, and if I do have a fever or aches and pains that I do want to treat, it's no effort to take a Tylenol in addition to my cold or cough medicine.  There are also people for whom acetaminophen is contraindicated. What is gained by shutting them out of the cold medicine market?

On top of that, there have been concerns recently about people inadvertently taking risky levels of acetaminophen. Surely an easy and unobjectionable first step would be to remove acetaminophen from medications whose primary purpose is not pain management or fever management!

itunes deleted all the music off my ipod

The ipod: a 4th generation ipod touch running iOS 6.0
The itunes: itunes 11.0
The computer: PC running Windows 7


I added some new music to my itunes library, then synced my ipod (like I've done many, many times before) to add that music to my ipod.  But, to my shock, itunes instead deleted all the music off my ipod!

I tried to sync it again, but this didn't add any music to it. And, unfortunately, the second attempt to sync overwrote the backup of my ipod (itunes only keeps one backup and there's no way to keep others!), so I couldn't just restore the backup.

I went through all the usual disconnecting, reconnecting, turning stuff on and off, pressing both buttons to reset the ipod, but I still couldn't convince my music to go back on my ipod.  At one point about 400 songs (out of over 8000) went on the ipod, but when I tried to add more they went away.

Some parts of the internet suggested that this was a copyright thing, and music that wasn't purchased through the itunes store was being deleted, but that wasn't the case here.  I've never purchased any music through itunes, and the 400 songs that did end up on my ipod were from a mixture of CDs and downloads.

This discussion thread had some people experiencing the same problem. Some people suggested that this was a known issue and if you went to the Apple store they'd fix it, but they never specified what the Apple store did to fix it. I was slightly reluctant to do that, because the Apple store would probably update my iOS, and whenever my iOS is updated something goes wrong with one of my apps.  Also, since my computer is a PC, the Apple store won't even look at it, even if part of the problem is in the itunes that is on my computer.  So all I could see them doing was restoring my ipod, thereby forcing me to upgrade my iOS, and sending me on my merry way.

During the course of my research, I learned about the Manually Manage Music option in itunes, which allows you to drag and drop music onto your ipod rather than using the sync function. I tried to put my playlist on the ipod using this function, and it transferred about 500 songs (again with no discernible pattern) which is better than before but still only a small fraction of my 8000+ playlist.

Someone on the internet who was having the same problem mentioned transferring their songs album by album, so I decided to try to transfer the songs from an album that didn't get transferred.  I typed the name of the album into the search box in itunes, selected all, and dragged them over to the ipod.  It sat on the first step of the process (something like "preparing for transfer" - I'm not about to try it again just to get the exact name of the step!) for a really long time, leading me to believe it wasn't going to work.  Resigned, I contemplated whether to update and restore the iOS, update or reinstall itunes, go to the Apple store, or any number of time-consuming and no doubt fruitless steps that happen next in the troubleshooting process.

At some point during this contemplation, I idly backspaced the album name that I'd typed in the search box of itunes, so itunes once again displayed all the songs.  And, at some point during this contemplation, itunes started transferring the remaining ~7500 songs to my ipod!!

I have no idea if backspacing the album name out of the search box is what caused all the songs to transfer.  I have no idea if it was caused by something else I failed to notice.  But I haven't been that happy since the day my computer finally came back from the Dell depot!

So now I'm keeping my ipod in Manually Manage Music mode, so I don't have to do a full sync the next time I want to put more music on it. If I have trouble again, I'll try transferring just a few songs isolated by searching in itunes, then backspace the search out of the search box.  (I have no idea if that will work, but that's where I am in my testing.) However, I'm dreading what will happen when I have to sync the ipod again to update apps or something.

The time I did surgery on a remote control

A few days ago, I turned on my TV, pressed the AV button on the remote to switch it to my Wii, and discovered that the AV button didn't work.  I pressed some other buttons, and they didn't work either.  I replaced the batteries, and they didn't fix the problem.

My cable remote could be convinced to control everything on the TV except switching it to AV, so I figured I'd have to either try a universal remote (might not work, since my TV is not a common brand) or maybe even buy a new TV.

Since the remote was dead anyway, I decided to see if I could take it apart to find out why it wasn't working. I saw some little screws, so I unscrewed them.  Then I pulled the casing apart, and could clearly see how the inside worked.  There was a rubber layer that constituted the buttons, with a small dot of what I assume is conductive material corresponding with the appropriate point on the conveniently-labelled circuit board.  I couldn't see any flaws or signs of wear and tear, so I sprayed compressed air at everything and put it back together, noting with interest that the various parts seem to be deliberately shaped in a way that makes it impossible to put it back together incorrectly. 

I screwed the screws back in, put the batteries back in...and it worked!!!

I have no idea why it worked - I didn't do anything to cause it to worked - but nevertheless I took it apart, put it back together, and it worked.

That's one impossible thing before breakfast!

***

I've blogged before about positive physical changes that correlate with getting older.  I think I now have a positive mental change that correlates with getting older: better ability to take things apart and put them back together.

I've blogged about my experiences with a chair and a lamp.  In both cases, and in the case of the remote control, I don't think I could have done it in my 20s without clearly-illustrated written instructions.  My brain just didn't see how things worked the same way.

I have no idea why this is. I've never done anything to work on it deliberately.  There's nothing in my day-to-day life that should improve my ability to take things apart and figure out how they work.

Understand, I'm still not objectively good at taking things apart or figuring out how things work.  I'm still very much hindered by my clumsiness and poor physical skills of all types. But I do seem to be better at it than I was before, and I do seem to be improving, for reasons I cannot fathom.

Pants

I had a teacher in high school who always wore high-waisted, pleated pants, and I thought they made her look frumpy. This teacher was the kind of person who would otherwise have come across as youthful and with-it - she was under 40, savvy, up on her students' pop culture, able to discern who had a crush on whom, meticulous with her hair and makeup - but I thought these pants were so aging and out of touch.

It occurs to me that teenagers today probably think the exact same thing about me and my boot-cut pants.

I have noticed recently that when I see boot-cut, flared or wide-legged pants being worn in media from 10-15 years ago, it seems a bit out of place.  But, nevertheless, I feel badass in my own boot-cut pants, and frumpy in skinnies.  So I keep wearing what makes me feel badass, even if Kids Today might be laughing at it. Flares are scheduled to come back in a few years anyway.

***

I blogged previously about the recent trend among young women of wearing high-waisted pants with shirts tucked in.   I recently found out why they do this: they believe it's slimming because the well-defined waist emphasizes how small their natural waist is.  This flabbergasted me because, with my fashion awareness having happened just as the last shirt-tucking trend waned and shirt untucking (with narrow shirts) came into fashion, I think an untucked shirt is more slimming because it creates a smoother line, and a tucked shirt is less slimming because it creates a sausage effect.  In one of my journeys down an internet rabbit hole, I landed in a fashion forum populated by young women where people posted comparison pictures to prove that high waists and tucking and belting was more slimming, and I genuinely felt that these pictures demonstrated beyond any doubt that an untucked shirt was more slimming.  We're looking at the exact same thing and seeing it as a complete opposite!

I'm not going to link to the examples I saw, because it isn't appropriate to send my adult readership to look at pictures of teens and scrutinize their figures with the general message of "See how these kids think they look slim but they really look lumpen!"  So, instead, I'm going to show you two pictures of actress Angie Dickinson from the 1950s:

Angie Dickinson (right) in a belted bodysuit

Angie Dickinson in a non-belted bodysuit

I think the outfit on the left is less flattering, specifically because of the belt. To my eyes, the belt creates a sausage effect with the soft part of her belly above and below, making her tummy below look sticky-outy, and the fleshy bit above look like a roll of fat.  Obviously this effect is very minimal on Ms. Dickinson - it's far more pronounced on a person with a more average figure - but you can see the hint of it here.  In contrast, I think the outfit on the right is more flattering because it creates a smoother line without any bulges of flesh.

However, people who choose high waists and tucked-in shirts see the picture on the left as more flattering, because the belt is cinched tightly around her waist, showing just how small her waist can be made to go. They'd see the picture on the right as less flattering, because it doesn't necessarily demonstrate the minimum possible circumference of her waist.

This isn't just an evolution of fashion trends, it's a complete change in what different people perceive when looking at the exact same thing!  It will be interesting to see how the fashion choices of the belt = thinner contingent evolve as trends change and, eventually, a high waist and tucked-in shirt once again become signs of frumpiness.  I've blogged before about differing generational perceptions of pants length. Maybe in a decade or two, we'll also have differing generational perceptions of waistlines.

Unnecessary TTC announcements

I was riding a subway northbound on the Yonge line. As we travelled from Davisville to Eglinton, the driver made an announcement: "Attention all passengers: we are currently bypassing Spadina station in both directions on both lines due to a police investigation."

Problem: We were heading north from Davisville to Eglinton, which is directly away from Spadina station.  To be affected by delays at Spadina station, a passenger on our train would have to get out, board a train heading in the opposite direction, and travel quite a few stations.  It's highly unlikely that anyone would do this!

Back in my commuting days, I've been on trains where this happened quite a few times - the driver announces a delay that's behind us, or heading in the opposite direction, and therefore is not going to affect our train at all and isn't going to affect any of the passengers unless they get out and switch to a train heading in the opposite direction.  These aren't system-wide loudspeaker announcements, like you hear made by a pre-recorded voice when waiting on the platform.  These are announcements made specifically by the driver of our one train.

I don't think they should make these announcements. 

One thing I've noticed since I started following @TTCNotices on Twitter is that the vast majority of delays are cleared very quickly, often within just a couple of minutes. I also learned, back in my commuting days, that even delays for which shuttle buses are called are often cleared so quickly that it's better to wait them out than to get on a shuttle bus.

So I think having drivers make a specific effort to announce delays that don't apply to the train will just make passengers unnecessarily worry and stress and think the system is unreliable.  This is exacerbated by the fact that the audio quality of driver announcements is not as good as that of recorded announcements, so it produces some unnecessary "Wait, what did he say?" moments.

If any passengers are going to be affected by the delay in the opposite direction or behind us, they'll have plenty of time to find out when they're waiting on the platform for their opposite-direction trip, or when they look at one of the video screens on the platforms, or when they check Twitter.

But I think nothing is gained by having drivers make an announcement just within their train when the announcement definitely does not apply to that train.

Epsom salts are the solution to blisters!

Content warning: this post contains graphic, yucky descriptions of blisters and feet. tl;dr: if you have blisters on your feet, soak them in water with epsom salts

Last week, I wore my awesome brown sandals for the first time this season. Even though I've been wearing them comfortably for years, this time around they somehow managed to give me an enormous blister on the bottom of my foot, right where the heel meets the arch of the foot. I was a fair distance from home when I realized I was developing a blister, so I had to walk for another half an hour before I could take the shoes off and treat the blister.  By this time, the blister had grown to about three finger-widths in diameter.

This was, clearly, a problem. I didn't want to burst the blister because then the outer layer of skin would peel off and I'd have an open wound on the bottom of my foot.  (Not the most hygienic place for an open wound!) But if I put a shoe on my foot, the blister would burst by itself from being compressed between my foot and the shoe.  I didn't have a bandage or dressing big enough to cover it and didn't much fancy walking to the drugstore on my blistery foot, so I started googling for home remedies for blisters in the hope of finding something I could do to shrink it with what I had on hand.

The only thing I google up that I had in the house was epsom salts. I highly doubted that would work, but soaking my feet sounded nice anyway.  So I soaked my feet in hot water with epsom salts and a drop of iodine, and discovered that the blister was sticking out far less, as though some of the water had drained from it.  However, I didn't feel any stinging when my feet were in the water, so I was pretty sure it hadn't broken open.

Then I went to bed, and slept for 11 hours (I usually sleep 9-10 hours even on non-alarm mornings).  When I woke up, I discovered that the blister was completely empty of water!  However, it hadn't been punctured - the water had either dried up internally or been reabsorbed into my body.  The outer layer of skin was still dead and it seemed like there was still an open wound underneath, but the outer layer was completely stuck to the wound, serving as a very effective moist dressing - which is a bonus since I don't have the materials to make a moist dressing here at home!

My foot stayed like that for a week - the blister didn't fill back up, there was no sign of contamination or infection, it just looked funny - and then one day it became really, really itchy.  I tried to avoid scratching it because I didn't want to damage or contaminate it, but eventually I couldn't resist and scratched it.  The gross dead outer layer of skin came off....revealing fresh, pink new skin underneath, and no hint of open wound!

I've never before had a large blister heal to completion so quickly, and this was by far the largest blister I've ever had!  Next time I get a blister, I'm going straight to soaking it in epsom salts before I even try anything else.

Taking for granted achieved!

With yesterday's legalization of same-sex marriage nation-wide in the US (congratulations, by the way!), I was surprised to see a few people on Twitter suggesting that same-sex marriages had been legalized easily and without any fuss in Canada. 

At first I was shocked that anyone could forget, but then I realized that same-sex marriage was legalized in Ontario 12 years ago.  There are grown-ass adults who would be legitimately unaware of the struggle to get it legalized for the simple reason that they were children when it happened!

Five years ago, I wrote:

One day, in a couple of decades, we will be celebrating the 20th or 25th anniversary of the legalization of same-sex marriage. I will be in my late 40s, with lines on my face like my father's and salt-and-pepper hair dyed chestnut like my mother's, wearing no-line bifocals as though that little line is the only thing that betrays my age. My co-workers and I (for in my imagined future I'm still in the same workplace with the same co-workers) will sit around the break room reminiscing. Where were you when you first heard? Who was the first same-sex married couple you knew? When was your first big gay wedding? Newspapers will tell the story of how this all came about, track down the court justices and the Michaels and do "Where are they now?" profiles. And in our office will be some new hires, kids in their early 20s just out of university, who will look at all this fuss we're making and feel nothing, because for them it will be something that has always been there.

 I'm in my mid-30s, with the lines on my face just beginning to form and enough salt in my pepper that I'm aware of it but not enough that I'm dyeing it. My glasses are still monofocals.  I'm not chitchatting with my co-workers in the break room because I work at home, and I still haven't had the opportunity to attend a big gay wedding.  But already, 10 years earlier than I estimated, there are people who are unaware of the fuss and feel that same-sex marriage has always been there!

Happy Pride, everyone!

All change is not created equal.

My various investigations into resilience tend to talk about change an awful lot, often framing people as either embracing change or being change-averse, and talking about how to become more open to change.

And, analyzing my own life, I realized that this is a huge fallacy.  Change is not a monolith.  I (and, I assume, others) embrace change when it's a good change, but want to avoid it when it's a bad change.

For example, I was (and still am) absolutely thrilled about being given the opportunity to work from home rather than going into the office very day.  But that's not because I like change per se, that's because working from home is in all ways superior to working in the office.

And I was stressed like crazy about having to do without my computer when it was being repaired.  But that's not because I dislike change per se, that's because not having a computer is in all ways inferior to having a computer.


I find I am more resistant to change in many areas as life goes on, but that's not because I'm growing to dislike change in my old age. That's because I've been able to figure out how to make more and more areas of my life optimal, so change would make them worse, whereas before I was able to make those areas of life optimal, change would simply make them different.

For example, when I lived in one of the many 1970s highrises in my neighbourhood, with no dishwasher and the laundry in the basement and a small silverfish invasion every spring and fall, I wouldn't have been disappointed if I'd had to change apartments, because there was clear room for improvement and many comparable buildings (with room for better to exist). But then when I moved to my current apartment, which was brand new when I moved in and had all the appliances, much better management and construction, and averaged only one bug a year, I would have been distraught about having to move because there wasn't, to my knowledge or within the reach of my research, anything comparable in existence. (Now there is, but there wasn't for several years after I moved in.)

This has nothing to do with my attitudes about change itself, but rather with the fact that leaving good housing for mediocre housing is different from leaving mediocre housing for other mediocre housing.


My inner conspiracy theorist wonders if this "openness to change" thing is a conspiracy. I'm sure most people welcome change when it's an improvement and dread it when it makes things worse.  But by presenting "openness to change" as a virtue, perhaps the powers that be are trying to shame or embarrass people into speaking up against changes that will make our lives worse?

Teach me about the connotations of Orange County, California in the 1980s

When I was in elementary school (between 1985 and 1991),  this story-teller sort of guy came to our school and told us some stories.  When it came time to tell us the last story, he said we could choose between two: one was about a boy and his pond, and the other was about a big-city thief.  His tone and delivery suggested that the boy and his pond story was idyllic (and, by extension, boring) and the big-city thief story was exciting. My schoolmates overwhelmingly voted for the story about the thief, so he told us that story.

Afterwards, there was Q&A session, and someone asked him if anyone actually asked to hear the story of the boy and his pond, and he replied that it had happened once, in Orange County, California. His tone and delivery suggested that if you knew anything about Orange County, California, you'd understand why this was and perhaps find it humorous.

Of course, as an elementary school student in southern Ontario, I didn't know anything about Orange County, California.  In fact, I still don't.  This memory came back to me in the shower this morning so I've been doing some googling, and I still can't figure out any characteristics of Orange County that would make it clear why students there in the 1980s would prefer to hear a story about a boy and his pond. 

Anyone have any insight?

The international exit sign

I first saw this kind of sign in Frankfurt Airport in 1998.  I had just gotten off long flight and badly had to pee.  In my condition, I thought the sign pointed to the washrooms.  After all, where else would a person possibly want to run to?  I followed the arrows, running nearly as fast as the figure in the sign, and eventually found some washrooms, to my great relief! It wasn't until several days later, when I saw the sign in a context where it was clearly pointing to the exit and not the washrooms, that I realized what it meant.

They recently installed this sign in my apartment building, replacing the red EXIT signs that are more commonly used in North America.

And every time I see it, I feel like I have to pee.

Emotions are weird

When I was a little girl, my grandmother took us to see Sharon, Lois & Bram whenever they were in town. Eventually, we outgrew their concerts, as one does, and we never went again.

Last year, they named a playground in my neighbourhood after Sharon, Lois & Bram, and the trio showed up at the dedication and sang a few songs.

When I heard that Lois died, one of the first feelings to come to me was "OMG, that time I saw them at the park was the last time I'd ever see them perform live in my whole entire life!!!"


Except of course it was.

I'm a grown adult who's childfree by choice.  There's no reason to think I'd ever go to a Sharon, Lois & Bram concert again.

I didn't regret not having gone to more when I was an older kid. I had outgrown them and, in addition to not enjoying them as intended, would have felt awkward and out of place.  I only went to the one in the park last summer because it was in a park - I could just walk by on a public sidewalk, stop and listen if I felt moved to do so, and casually drift away if I got bored or felt out of place.

And, just to make things weirder, if I hadn't had the opportunity to see them in the park last summer, I would never have felt "OMG the last time I saw them was the last time ever!" I wouldn't even have had a specific memory of the last time I saw them, just like how I don't have a specific memory of the last time I watched Sesame Street or Mr. Rogers (both of which I do occasionally watch as an adult).

But for some reason, because I had the opportunity to wander age-appropriately into this little mini-concert last year, I felt this pang of...whatever the hell you'd call the emotion of "OMG that was the last time ever!", which I never would have felt otherwise.

Emotions are weird.

In which Google messes up and gives me a scare

I recently decided to try a face cream containing retinol.  Shortly after I applied it, I felt a funny taste in my mouth.

So I googled retinol taste in mouth.

Near the top of the results was the wikipedia entry for strychnine poisoning!

It turns out that this result came up because Google perceives "retinol" as a synonym for "Vitamin A".  The strychnine poisoning article has a "Poisonings, toxicities, and overdoses" category box at the bottom, which includes a link to Vitamin A.  And one of the symptoms of strychnine poisoning is a taste in the mouth.

So I didn't die, and the next time I tried the retinol cream there was no taste in my mouth, so it must have been unrelated.

I haven't noticed any difference in my skin using retinol though.

Mammogram after ultrasound

When I got the phone call telling me I needed a mammogram, part of the reason why I was so freaked out was that my research about breast ultrasounds had suggested that ultrasounds are superior to mammograms and are sometimes ordered as follow-ups to mammograms (as opposed to stand-alone tests like I had), so I couldn't fathom why a mammogram would be ordered after an ultrasound. I googled around the idea of mammogram after ultrasound, and couldn't find anything informative - mostly just people saying that it seemed backwards and ultrasound normally comes after mammograms.

I know I've already posted at length about my breast lump diagnosis process and this post basically repeats that information, but with more focus on why the mammogram was applicable after I'd already received the breast ultrasound, and what we learned from the mammogram that we didn't learn from the ultrasound, with the target audience being people who are googling for patient experiences with a mammogram after a breast ultrasound.

Patient profile: 34-year-old female, never been pregnant, no family history or risk factors of breast cancer

Diagnostic process: While conducting a routine breast exam during my annual physical, my doctor noticed an assymetricality in the armpit area of my breasts. He ordered an ultrasound, which found the lymph nodes were enlarged on one side. The mammogram was then ordered to get a better look at the lymph nodes.

My doctor's explanation for the mammogram:  My doctor said that the mammogram can get a better look at the architecture of the lymph nodes than an ultrasound.

The content of the mammogram report: The mammogram report said that there were no malignancies, and also said that my breasts are fibrocystic.  The ultrasound report did comment on either of those things.  The logical conclusion would be that the ultrasound couldn't determine either of those things, but I don't have the medical knowledge to make a definitive declarative statement to this effect.

Diagnosis: enlarged lymph nodes on one side but not the other. I believe this is due to a recent vaccination. I've been instructed to get an ultrasound again in 6 months to make sure they're back to normal.  (I hope the don't follow that ultrasound with another mammogram!)

Things that I learned about having a mammogram

1. At the beginning of the appointment, they screen you for pregnancy. They do this by asking if there's any chance that you're pregnant. When you say "None whatsoever," they take you at your word. This is a vast contrast to those various adolescent medical appointments where they interrogate you about choreography and bodily fluids.

2. If you're of childbearing age, you get a lead apron to put over your abdomen so your uterus is protected.  Then they tell you to lean over further so your head is closer to the machine.

3. The machine compresses your breast as far as humanly possible, and then another 10% further.  The pain is exactly what I would have expected from this - it's not a shocking new disproportionate kind of pain, but neither is it painless.

4. The pain stopped as soon as they took me out of the machine.  There was no residual pain, and no marks or bruising left on my breast.

5. What was weirdest to me about the whole experience is that you literally can't move once you're in the machine.  You're held in place by your breast.  That's rather a disconcerting experience.

6. If your hair is breast length or longer, you should wear it in a bun for the appointment.  They don't tell you this in your pre-appointment instructions, but your hair can easily get caught in the machine.

7.  The mammogram is taken by a technician. The images are then sent to a radiologist, who writes the report. The report is then sent to your doctor. This means that your doctor doesn't have access to the images, and the person who interprets the images isn't present when taking them. So the person interpreting the images might wish she could pan over to the left a bit, but she can't unless she calls me back in for more imaging (which is not a step taken lightly). Or my doctor might be wondering how the mammogram findings jibed with what he was feeling in my breast that he believed to be a cyst, but he can't just look and see. That seems inefficient to me, and likely to magnify any human error that may occur.

Why copayments for medical appointments are a bad idea: a breast lump story

When conducting a routine breast exam during my annual physical, my doctor detected something on the armpit side of my left breast that wasn't present on the right side.  He ordered a breast ultrasound, which found some of my  lymph nodes in that area were larger than perhaps they should be.  A mammogram was then ordered, which found that a few individual lymph nodes were enlarged, but there were no malignancies or other problems.  I was therefore instructed to return in six months for another breast ultrasound to see if the lymph nodes in question returned to normal.

While I was in the middle of this process, Steve Paikin posted a blog post sharing his doctor's idea for copayments for each medical appointment.  I commented on that post expressing my concern that the majority of medical appointments I get aren't even my idea but rather are required by red tape (I've previously blogged about that here), but this breast lump diagnosis process was an even better example.


During this little adventure, I had five appointments in a nine-day period (and a minimum of three more if I opt to follow up in six months as recommended), none of which I actually wanted or would have thought to request for myself.

I only got the annual physical because it's the price of admission for getting my birth control renewed. I'd be more than happy to buy my birth control over the counter (as some have recommended should be possible for public health purposes), but I have no choice but to go to my doctor and get the recommended screenings if I want a new prescription.

I didn't think the thing my doctor found was a problem - to my touch it felt just like a normal part of my breast anatomy. After reading up on breast cysts, I didn't think getting a potential breast cyst diagnosed was especially important - they're not a problem, most often non-actionable, and quite often go away by themselves. That area of my breast is squishy and mobile, it's nothing like the description of hard, immoveable lumps that I've always been told indicate possible cancer.  But I went along because it's a quick, easy, non-intrusive test and it was probably faster to get the test than to argue.  And, I figured, once the test shows it's nothing, my doctor will be more likely in the future to take me at my word when I say that's just how my breast is.

After the test, I had to go to the doctor for test results, which I think is a suboptimal way of doing things. I'd rather have the results emailed directly to me, and schedule an appointment with the doctor if I had any questions. But my doctor's policy is that they only contact you with results if action is required, so if I didn't go for that follow-up I'd never learn what action was apparently required.

On an intellectual level, I didn't think the mammogram was necessary as a follow-up to the ultrasound either.  After reading up on breast ultrasounds, I didn't see why a mammogram would be helpful or informative as a follow-up to an ultrasound - all the information I found talked about how ultrasounds saw things that mammograms didn't see.  But, frankly, I was scared into it.  Getting a phone call telling me I needed a mammogram (when this wasn't on my "things that might happen" list) was shocking and disconcerting.  I have it mentally categorized as a "cancer test", so it triggered fears of cancer, and I went along with the test to rule out cancer.

And, again, I had to go to the doctor for the mammogram results even though they were clear to me and I didn't need any help with interpretation.  Because I have no way of getting the results without going to the doctor, I had to take that appointment or I would never have received confirmation that there were no malignancies.

So that's five appointments, all of which were required by my doctor as opposed to by me, none of which I would ever have asked for myself if it were completely up to me.  And if I follow up in six months, I'll need three more (one with my doctor to get the ultrasound requisition, one at the imaging clinic for the ultrasound, and one with  my doctor for the ultrasound results.)  I'm really disinclined to follow up - it feels like a fishing expedition - but I'm concerned about being considered a non-compliant patient if I don't, and I do need my doctor's goodwill to keep getting my contraception.


At this point, some of you are thinking "Breast lumps are serious business!  It's good and important that you got it checked out - you really shouldn't skimp on that sort of thing!"

If that's the case, that's a very good reason why there shouldn't be a copay for each appointment.  A copay would disincentivize patients like me from following up on lumps in their breasts, or perhaps even having these lumps detected in the first place.


Besides all that, before they can even consider a copay, they'd have to streamline the process so that fewer appointments are required by red tape.  For example, as I mentioned above, they shouldn't make you go in to see the doctor to get your test results.  It would be much more efficient to just email them to the patient when emailing them to the doctor, and the patient can contact the doctor if they have any question.  When I'm doing medical translations, I find it a fairly simple matter to google up any terminology I don't understand and the implications of the test results become apparent once I've worked out the meaning of all the words.  If they want to cut down on the number of appointments, they need to at least start by eliminating unnecessary appointments like test results that can just be replaced by a simple email!


At this point, some of you are thinking "That would be hideously irresponsible!  Many people can't accurately interpret medical results and there's all kinds of ridiculous information on the internet! People who aren't medical professionals need the guidance of medical professionals."

If that's the case, that's another very good reason why there shouldn't be a copay for each appointment. A copay would disincentivize patients like me from discussing our test results with our doctors, and instead leave us making decision based on our haphazard informal education and Google.

Best Customer Service Ever from Soak

I've been using Soak to wash my bras ever since I was introduced to the product by the bra-fitting geniuses at Secrets From Your Sister. It's super convenient for someone like me who lives in a small apartment with no access to a laundry tub because, as the name suggests, you just have to soak your delicates - no rinsing!  I've also discovered it's useful for knits (which is very helpful given my love of cashmere), and for spot-cleaning things that can't easily be rinsed (put the tiniest dab possible of Soak on a damp cloth, and scrub well).  The internet has also suggested that it could be used for stuffed animals, although I haven't tried this myself yet.

Unfortunately, the Secrets From Your Sister location in my neighbourhood closed, and then Très Jolie also closed, so there was nowhere to buy it in my neighbourhood any more!

(Retailers in the Yonge-Eglinton area: there's a business opportunity for you here.)

Then I discovered that you can buy directly from the Soak website! Awesome!  Since they had free shipping on orders over $75, I ordered several bottles, figuring I'll certainly use it all eventually.

But when my order arrived, I discovered that many of the bottles weren't what I ordered!  Soak comes in a number of different scents, and most of them were in a completely different scent.

I retraced my steps, and discovered that there was a fluke on their website (my best guess is a copy-paste error in some code) that caused the wrong scent to be listed in one of the items on the page of the scent I was shopping for.

I figured I didn't want to deal with an exchange since it would be expensive to ship back (being liquid) and I could live with the incorrect scent.  But I decided to email the Soak people to let them know of the website problem anyway - some future customer might be more upset or inconvenienced about receiving the incorrect scent.

To my utter astonishment and delight, they promptly sent me replacements in the correct scent, and told me I can just pass the incorrect bottles on to someone else rather than having to pay for returning them!  The replacement bottles arrived by FedEx first thing in the morning on the next business day, and, even though they were already sending me free product at non-negligible cost the box even contained a few little free sample packets!

This is literally the best customer service I have ever received in my life! Thank you Soak!

Therefore, I am strongly recommending Soak to everyone who's in the market for a hand-washing and/or rinse-free laundry detergent.  Not just because it's a useful, convenient and effective product (which it is), and not just because it's a local, made-in-Canada product (which it is), but also because they're an awesome company and deserve to win.

Door etiquette

Proper door etiquette is normally to let people out first and only enter once everyone has exited.

This makes perfect sense for enclosed spaces like elevators and trains, and everyone should diligently follow this rule at all times.

However, it occurs to me that the rule should be the opposite for entrances to buildings, especially in bad weather: you should let people in first, and only exit once everyone waiting to answer is inside.  This means that the people in the cold/heat/wind/rain/snow/humidity can get out of the uncomfortable environment as quickly as possible, and all waiting is done in the comfortable environment.  In other words, wait inside the comfortable lobby to let people get out of the cold rather than vice-versa.

In cases where both weather and enclosed space are factors, such as a train with an outdoor platform, I think we have to let the enclosed space rule take precedence.  Regardless of the weather, it's still logistically necessary to let people out so there's room for new people to get in.  Plus, in the specific case of a train, it's easier for the person in charge of the doors to see that the loading/unloading process is still ongoing if there are still people on the platform, so they'll be less likely to close the doors and tell the train to leave while people haven't gotten on or off the train.

But in cases where there's plenty of room for everyone and no one is going to drive away and leave anyone stranded, let's let people in out of the cold as quickly as possible, shall we?

My second Dell depot repair experience

The good: Dell appears to have fixed my computer by implementing the solution I suggested

The bad: It took two months after I suggested the solution, two separate depot repairs totalling 13 days computerless despite the fact that the problem occurred under an on-site service warranty, and an assortment of additional stressers.

The details:

The problem was that, following an in-warranty replacement of a failed hard drive, my BIOS sporadically failed to recognize the presence of operating system on the hard drive.  This was a particularly stubborn problem, and had persisted through all possible troubleshooting and one previous attempt at depot repair.

I felt like they were grasping at straws when the best idea they could come up with was another attempt at depot repair and I was very reluctant to send my computer away and have to spend some time computerless, but the telephone technician told me it would be expedited since it's the second attempt (5-7 business days, rather than the standard 5-10).  Since my first attempt at depot repair had only taken 4 days all in, I reluctantly agreed to give them one last chance.

I received the shipping box on a Monday, which was the day before my grandmother died, and when I learned of her death I decided to postpone sending out my computer for a week.  Being computerless is very stressful to me, and I didn't want the additional stress when I was freshly bereaved.

So the next Monday, I dropped my computer off at the closest Purolator shipping office (a local print shop).  I decided to drop it off rather than having a courier pick it up so I could use my computer for part of the day on Monday and prepare it for shipping at my leisure rather than having to have the whole thing ready by 9 in the morning because I don't know what day the courier will come.

Unfortunately, there was a snowstorm on Monday, so the Purolator truck didn't show up at the store to pick up my package!

After a frantic Tuesday morning spent trying to figure out why my computer wasn't in the Purolator system, it was ultimately picked up on Tuesday evening, and arrived at the Dell depot on Wednesday morning.  I figured no big deal, last time around it arrived at Dell on Tuesday and was back in my hands on Thursday, so I'll probably still get it back this week.

The Dell tracker showed that they received my unit at 8:30 and began diagnosis at 2:30.  Okay, a bit more of a delay than last time, but still reasonable.  I was heartened to see the expected return day showing Thursday.

But on Thursday at 10 am, the status changed to "Customer Hold", which meant it was on hold until they got some information from me.  I waited and waited, willing the phone to ring, obsessively checking my email, but no one contacted me. 

As you might have noticed if you follow me on Twitter, this stressed me out. What was the problem?  Why did they need to contact me?  And if they so needed to contact me, why hadn't they done so yet?  Had they lost my computer?  Was it going to take months to fix?  What could possibly be going on?

I spent much of the day stressing and crying and catastrophizing, and when I hadn't heard back by the end of the depot's business hours I started emailing and tweeting at anyone I thought might have information.  I finally got a snippet of information from @DellCares: apparently, the depot hadn't been able to reproduce the problem.  But that just raised more questions.  Why did they need to contact me?  And why hadn't they? If you need information from the customer about how to reproduce the problem before you proceed further, what is gained by not contacting the customer?  It seems like in this case you'd either ship it straight back with "could not reproduce" to keep your numbers up, or you'd contact the customer right away so you could move forward.  Both @DellCares and one of the techs I'd been emailing with said they'd have the depot get back to me the next day, so I eventually managed to soothe myself to sleep.

On Thursday at 10 am, I still hadn't heard from anyone.  So I checked the tracker again, and it said the hold had been lifted at 9 am.  But no one had contacted me!  What was going on here?  From where I'm sitting, it looks very much like they wasted a day (thereby doubling my number of computerless days because of the weekend) for no particular reason! 

At 11, the tracker said they'd begun repair.  I was glad to see progress, but how could they be repairing if they couldn't reproduce the error?  I hoped this was just an interim step towards shipping my computer back to me.

Meanwhile, the email tech told me that the hold delay was due to the depot having to find out whether I have a complete or limited warranty.  How does that take a whole day?  And why did the tracker say "customer hold" when that wasn't information that they'd find out from me?  And what kind of strange crazy problem did I have that required them to double check the warranty?

On Friday, the tracker still said the computer was under repair and the next update would be Monday.  So I bolstered myself for the stress of a computerless weekend, exacerbated by all these questions about the mystery hold.

On Monday, I eagerly refreshed the tracker over and over, but it hadn't been updated despite the fact that it said Monday was the next update day.  Had the repair failed?  What if they couldn't figure it out and insisted on holding onto my computer for weeks and weeks?  Partway through the day I received an email the email tech, but all he had to say was that the computer was still in repair.  It seemed like the email was either automatically generated or he was blindly transcribing the tracker status into email without regard for utility.

Then, towards the end of the day on Monday, the tracker said the repair was complete and they were shipping my computer back to me!  I was half delighted and half nervous, uncertain if the problem would actually be fixed or not, and, because of the various horror stories I'd read online, partly dreading that my computer might come back in worse condition.  I'd already decided that if this repair hadn't fixed it I wouldn't accept a third depot repair because it was just too stressful for me, so I was also partly dreading having to be assertive to get my computer fixed without Dell marking me as a problem customer.

I received my computer on Tuesday.  I was so worried that something might have gone wrong that I videoed the unboxing and the first few boot-ups, just in case I needed evidence of any damage or evidence of the problem reoccurring.

The first mystery was on the slip that came with the computer, telling me what work had been done. Under "The unit was received with the following cosmetic issues which is not covered by Dell's HW Warranty", everything was checked (Scratches/Marks on top cover/Case, Scratches/Marks on LCD Screen/Bezel, and Scratches/Marks on Palmrest).  There were no scratches or marks when I sent it out!  I inspected it closely, and discovered...there were no scratches or marks on it when I received it back either!  Did the depot check all those off as a matter of course so they wouldn't be obligated to repair any damage they did???  Yet another source of distrust!

Dreading the prospect of having a damaged computer in hand that Dell would refuse to prepare, I booted up, still taking video.  On the first boot-up, it said "Setup is preparing your computer for first use", just like it did after my last depot repair.  Figuring that meant they hadn't tested it like I asked, I created an account, finished the installation of Windows, and decided to boot up a couple more times to see if the problem reoccurred.

On the first boot-up after the installation of Windows was completed, I saw that there were in fact two Windows accounts: my own, and one named "Dell".  Maybe this meant they had tested it!  I did two more boot-ups from complete shutdown, and the problem didn't reoccur. 

I looked at the device manager, and saw that the hard drive they'd installed wasn't Western Digital this time! The device manager said my hard drive was a "ST1000LM024-HN-M101MBB", which, according to google, is a Samsung hard drive - just like I originally had and I requested after the first round of hardware troubleshooting failed back in December!

That appears to have solved the problem (so far at least, knock wood).  Since I got the computer back, I've had 8 boot-ups from a power-off state and 3 boot-ups from a hibernate state, and it has worked every single time.  I sincerely hope this means it's fixed!

A squandered opportunity

This whole saga has been a squandered opportunity for Dell to delight me and win back my unquestioning loyalty.  As I mentioned in my post about how Dell needs to empower its employees, the telephone tech was not empowered to dispatch a Samsung hard drive as I requested, even after we'd eliminated every other variable.   

 If he had been empowered to do so, the whole problem would have been solved with the second on-site service call.  I would have been delighted with Dell for, once again, saving my ass in the dying days of my warranty, and would have blindly gone with Dell for my next computer purchase, buying the best gaming laptop they'd be willing to sell me with all the warranties and upgrades available.

Since the problem would have been solved before xmas, I would have told everyone at xmas (empty-nester baby boomers and millennial young professionals, most of whom have more disposable income now than they ever have before) all about how Dell saved my ass.  But, since the problem was still ongoing at xmas, I instead was telling them about how Dell was stressing me out by wanting to send my computer to a depot even though the problem occurred under an on-site warranty.

Since I wouldn't have had any reason to google up other people's Dell depot experiences, I wouldn't have seen other people's horror stories and therefore wouldn't have been stressing out nearly as much.  I wouldn't have been saturating my Twitter feed with worries about Dell.  I wouldn't have been blogging extensively about everything I found stressful about Dell.  I would simply have written one blog post praising their warranty service, and gotten on with life.

But, because the Dell telephone technician was not empowered to take my suggestion of using the original brand of hard drive, and because the first round of depot repair either couldn't or didn't this suggestion, my loyalty was not won over and all the word of mouth and social media I produced about Dell over the past two months was full of stress and worry.

They should be able to do better, and it's rather their loss that they didn't.