I haven’t posted anything about the Covid-19 pandemic other than one brief update at its onset. Now that our lockdown has spanned a full year, I should probably document how it’s been.

( Read more... )

After eight years of reliable service, it was time to replace my primary laptop, a 2012 MacBook Pro. It had been my first non-work Mac, and I gave it a lengthy review after buying it.

Back then, I luckily bought the last model before Apple made numerous user-hostile changes to their laptops, such as their unreliable butterfly keyboard, sub-par ( Read more... )

So we have a global health crisis on our hands. The COVID-19 virus has eluded even our harshest attempts at containment, and there’s no prospect of either a preventative or treatment, other than for associated diagnoses such as pneumonia.

With an unknown number of infectious but asymptomatic carriers wandering around, Inna and I have taken the ( Read more... )

Enough stuff has happened in the past two months that it’s time for another aggregated life update.

Health issues remain inconclusive. After surgery in December, I had another attack of abdominal pain around New Years, which prompted another visit to the GP and a followup CT scan. That detected nothing, so I’m back to eating a regular diet and ( Read more... )

Although it’s a completely arbitrary marker, this is the time of year when people look back and take stock, with the aspiration that things might be different from this point forward.

I am entertaining that same hope this year, because the past 18 months have been pretty brutal. There have been a number of really great things, but also a hell of a ( Read more... )

I can’t say that I’m a big fan of losing a body part that has been with me since birth.

The first time I consciously noted the discomfort in my abdomen was in August, after I finished the Pan-Mass Challenge. I didn’t really pay much attention to it. It came and went, but eventually it became clear that it wasn’t just going to go away. By the end ( Read more... )

I find myself in the mood to record a brief rundown of the major events of 2011.

In terms of my Buddhist practice, a few nice things happened. I completed a year of dedicated compassion practice, I became a paying member of CIMC for the first time, I began volunteering to read ( Read more... )

It’s been a standing joke for as long as I can remember: what is Ornoth’s body fat percentage? Well, after my recent purchase of a scale that includes body composition, we now have a definitive answer.

Sort of.

Before this posting, I solicited guesses from our ( Read more... )

There’s an idea that pervades society that men act like wimps when they get sick. Naturally, this has been advanced and perpetuated by the female lobby, but I think many men generally accept it, as well.

Usually, ideas that are so universal have at ( Read more... )

Two weeks ago, as I mentioned in a previous post, I had my first eye exam in pretty much ever. Over the past year, my ability to resolve fine print has deteriorated noticeably. The only reason why I delayed the exam was to wait for work to implement its planned vision care benefit.

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