Big News

Forging ahead into a bright, new future!

There was some big news announced in my department this week - I'm retiring! I have been pretty quiet about this on the blog and in my work life, but I learned about early retirement (sometimes called FIRE, for Financial Independence, Retire Early) almost ten years ago and it captured my imagination. Through frugality, privilege, and a bit of luck, I will be retiring from my job in less than two months. 

My immediate plans in February are to sleep in as much as I want and start getting more exercise. But longer term, hopefully at the end of 2022, I hope to sell my house, most of my belongings and move to Madrid. I have always liked Europe, and Spain has a visa system that makes this viable for me. 

I'm sorry to be leaving my work at the American Physical Society and my wonderful colleagues, but I'm excited for a new adventure. Stay tuned in the coming months for more.

Friends

When I was a kid, the 64 set of crayola Crayons was *the* status symbol to have. However, the school supply list only specified that you needed to bring 24 crayons, and that's all my parents ever bought me. (They were teaching me to be frugal even then!) I was always a bit envious of the kids who had the extra-large set of crayons. A friend heard me tell this story in the summer, and so he and his family sent me my very first box of 64 colors. I'm so excited, it's best Christmas gift ever! 

I've really appreciated all the kind thoughts and messages from people. One friend keeps bringing me mushy food (and now, a coloring book so I can use the crayons) and another friend brought me these beautiful flowers. 

Today I had my the first of two root canals, and looking at the flowers and all of my coloring supplies makes me very grateful for all my friends who are keeping my spirits up.

Waiting

The dental work has turned out to be more complicated than expected. I have two root canals scheduled, one in a little over a week, and one the following week. For those keeping score at home, that will mean almost a full month of not eating real food. In fact, I have cancelled travel and given up chewing, exercise, alcohol, and spending time with friends to devote myself to resting extensively, taking painkillers, and occasionally being quite sad. 

I think I am working with an excellent endodontist (aka "root canal doctor"), in contrast to the dentist who has advised me poorly and then has ignored all of my follow-up calls. While I now know what needs to be done to my mouth, there were simply no appointments available in the next two weeks. My guess is this is a result of the Great Recession (I've read there are significant staffing shortages in the dental industry) paired with everyone delaying their dental work during COVID.

I'm trying hard not to wish that December was over. I strongly believe that it's important to enjoy whatever you can from each day of life, even when it's an awful day. But I'll also admit to putting on my pajamas at 6pm most nights so I can feel like the day is done. I am absolutely sure this is going to get better, and I'm very aware that some people suffer pain like this for years. That can help build my empathy skills, but I'll still keep wishing that everyone could be pain free.

Practicing Stoicism

Last year I started to get interested in stoicism. It's an intriguing philosophy and one that I want to apply to my life. (I feel like there should be many asterisks here, as there is still a lot about it that I don't understand yet. Apply philosophy to your life at your own risk.)

One of the ideas I like is that difficulties in life are to be embraced, as they are an opportunity to practice living according to stoic virtues. Well, I've had lots of chances to practice this in the last week. On Monday, I had two crowns put on. It didn't go smoothly, and I was in the dentist's chair for four and a half hours, requiring the maximum amount of novocaine they were allowed to give me. Since I turned forty, I have averaged one major dental surgery per year, and during COVID I didn't have any, so it was about time.

The time after hasn't gone too well either. I'm still on a mostly liquid and ibuprofin diet, and in mild pain continuously. My dentist has now decided I need a root canal. Those words used to scare me, but this will be my third one. Moreover, I think I will be in less pain when they are done than I have been for the past week. And then there are temporary crowns and permanent crowns and heavens knows what other followup.

I've done a pretty good job staying calm and upbeat being told all this bad news. But the low grade continual pain is definitely wearing on me. I am immensely grateful for the modern miracles of painkillers and dentistry. Consider that for almost all of human history I would have lost most of my teeth by age forty, and I am looking pretty good. But I'll still be grateful when it's finally Wednesday and I can have that root canal.

Dinner

In the end, the malaria treatment was so effective that they announced me cured before I had any symptoms. From this point on, I'm just a data point on a series of graphs. I asked so many questions about the process and the research that the doctor recommended some books to read and promised to send me the paper if/when it is published. This same group worked on the recently approved  malaria vaccine, so there's cause for hope, but maybe not for decades.

In the meantime, I had some friends over for a long-planned meal. We had done a multi-course French meal in July and I wanted to do something similar with a fall, Italian theme. 

We all dressed up. I was careful to choose a roomy skirt to allow for gluttony.

Tagliatelle, served with a walnut sauce. Delicious.

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This picture serves to remind me that burrata is an incredible cheese and that my friend L is an excellent photographer.

When I visited Albuquerque recently, my Uncle de-I gave me a fresh pasta tutorial and sent me home with imported semolina flour, admonishing me to quit using the all purpose flour I had previously used. I followed his instructions to the letter, except I let the machine do most of the kneading. (Sorry, Uncle, I'm lazy!) 

Dessert was a trio of homemade ice cream, which I thought would be the pinnacle of the meal, but it was, in fact, underwhelming. I have been trying out more gourmet recipes lately, and while Campari raspberry was a keeper, lavender blueberry was like eating a flower. Masala chai sounds good in principle, but ended tasting mainly of cinnamon and I ended up tipping the leftovers into the sink. My brother is a huge chai fan, so I'm not giving up on that idea yet.

I wish friends would come to dinner every week. Although I have to prepare for two days, the reward is hours of conversation, a week of delicious leftovers, and a house that is cleaned from top to bottom. It's a good deal.

Testing positive

 So... I have malaria. Let me tell you, if you drop that into the small talk part of your work meetings (those first three or four minutes as everyone logs on), it really gets people's attention. 

I tested positive almost as soon as it could have been detected, seven days after infection. I was pretty bummed. I knew this was a long shot, but I hoped it might work. However, the researchers seemed pretty blase' about it. Said the PI, "Science is a harsh mistress." Still, all is not lost. Since this is the first trial in humans, the primary goal is to assess safety. I've been told that even if it doesn't appear very effective, as long as it doesn't cause serious side effects, they will still hold larger trials. 

The type of malaria I was given was chosen because it is quite treatable. I had medicine before I even had symptoms, although I heard that other volunteers felt like they had the flu. So, even through I'm walking around full of parasites, I can't really tell. And because we don't have mosquitoes that transmit this malaria in DC, it perfectly fine for me to interact with people; there's no way for them to catch it. And in about a year or so, I will hopefully be able to read a paper published about the results and know I was one of the n that contributed.

Malaria

I was infected with malaria today. Isn't that the best clickbait? It is actually true, though. I volunteered to be in a vaccine trial earlier this spring. After three doses of the experimental vaccine and many doctors visits, it was time to test the efficacy, something they call the "challenge." 

Reducing malaria has been a cause I've supported for years. A Facebook ad offered me a chance to sign up for a medical trial. When I found out it was for malaria, I signed on the dotted line. I mean, after reading the thirty pages of Institutional Review Board documentation, of course.  

The challenge meant exposing my arm to a cup of malaria-infected mosquitoes until I had the requistite number of bites. For the next three weeks I'll go in every day, while they monitor my blood for signs of the parasite. The plan is that they'll treat infection before I even have symptoms, but at the end I'll get treatment even if I don't show any symptoms.

I have learned enough to know that this malaria vaccine will probably fail, as many have before, but it still feels good to possibly contribute in a small way.