You have a legal right to read the notes your doctor writes regarding your office visits and your treatment, but few people do it and physicians and clinics aren’t always eager to share. But a test project is underway this summer to break down some of the barriers to doctor / patient communication by making the notes more accessible. The Open Notes Project was described in a Wall Street Journal article yesterday.

Imagine sitting down at the computer a few days after your last appointment so you can explain to your spouse EXACTLY how sick you are by reviewing your doctor’s notes together. Fun! With each passing day, prime time TV fades as an entertainment choice.

Doctors’ notes are said to be as varied as any other kind of writing, sometimes terse and puzzling, other times quite detailed and descriptive, occasionally funny, barbed and lyrical. At the Columbia University College of Physicians and Surgeons there is a technique called the “Atchley History”, which, according to the Annals of Internal Medicine, commands that the doctor’s description be so complete that each patient should “leap off the page”. Leaping off the page might be asking a bit much, especially if you’ve got a new hip or problems involving dizziness. But one thing is clear – If you’ve been to the doctor a lot, there is a hidden book about you, and you’re entitled to read it.

That may be a risky choice. A person’s writing can be revealing in unintended ways, and both patients and doctors have voiced concerns that “Open Notes” could lead to misunderstandings and resentment. But the evidence so far indicates that this level of communication is helpful for both parties.

I’m not so sure. I haven’t seen my doctor’s notes, but I hear he’s a frustrated novelist.

Spawning symptoms and complaints the way a summer thunderstorm drops tornadoes, D trudged into my office today to ask that I examine his eye. His gloomy profile darkened the office door with a heaviness that spoke of larger issues. “Clear my calendar,” I told the receptionist. “It’s going to be a long afternoon.”

They eye was clearly infected. I asked if someone had stuck a finger in there and he proceeded to unpack a tale of woe related to work and God knows how many years of thankless labor with early hours sacrificed in the name of blah, blah, blah.

While he was busy talking I nodded in false agreement and casually examined his mouth. Discolored teeth, too-thin lips and a plump, dappled tongue spat myriad worries in my lap – needless concerns about aging and hairline and skin, skeletal problems, cognitive lapses, and something about a toenail.

I scribbled meaningless squiggles on my pad to reassure him, and then beneath that rat’s nest of illustrated ennui I drew a pirate’s chest, a saltwater soaked lockbox covered with barnacles and seaweed with a big rusty iron padlock, a place to put D’s demented ravings where they could be promptly and permanently forgotten.

It seemed that his infected eye had swollen to twice its original size while we had been sitting there. “You’re going to die,” I wanted to tell him. “We all are. Get over it.”

Would you want to read your doctor’s notes about you?

It’s Moon Footprint Anniversary Day once again!

Last year an appropriately huge fuss was made over the 40th anniversary of Apollo 11’s mission to land on the moon. The 41st anniversary is less of a party. Things (even footprints in the dust) can remain unaltered for a long, long time in space. Imagine the ho-hummity of the celebration for the 1,285,300th anniversary of Neal Armstrong’s step off the LEM’s ladder.
Will we even have feet by then?

My eye was caught by this photo of the plaque on the base platform for the lander. This was designed to last a long time, and will certainly still be on the moon when we are all long gone. Will our children’s children’s children’s children gaze on it directly, or through plexiglass as part of some Moon Based Museum’s Heritage Walkway in the Sea of Tranquility?

Here’s another amazing shot. I don’t remember seeing this one 41 years ago.
But how could anyone forget it?

Complete this sentence: “If we can put a man on the moon, why can’t we …?”

Time for an update on the many ways GOATS are improving our world.

Goats are stepping forward to help golf courses manage weeds, especially leafy spurge.
A golf course just north of Bismarck, North Dakota has added goats to the maintenance crew, taking them to problem areas and allowing them to graze inside a portable corral. I’m guessing the corral is to keep the goats on task, and off the greens. But how do they protect these workers from the occasional errant shot? And how many strokes do you add if you shank your approach shot into the goat pen?

Hawktree Golf Club has some of the stark, windswept look of Scotland’s Old Course at St. Andrews where the British Open was played this weekend. St. Andrews has an impressive history and carries the majesty and the weight of a great tradition, but the Scottish course doesn’t have goats!

And in Maryland, goats are helping the highway department preserve an important environment for endangered turtles.

In each case, normal grazing turns out to be a powerful force. Lawnmowers be damned! Expressed as an equation, it would be Goats plus Green Stuff plus Grazing minus Gasoline equals Good. Or as one You Tube commenter said, “When things go wrong, bring in the goats.”

Consider any difficult problem, then add goats. What do you get?

I believe we have previously looked at the romantic aspects of the world’s worst underwater disaster with an anguished love letter from oil.

Now that it appears this unfortunate affair is coming to a close, there is hope that the hidden forces that have compelled such a powerfully bad and fascinating thing may have finally been capped. Already there are feelings of separation, and perhaps it’s time for a poetic lament from the point of view of the responsible party, whoever you suppose that to be.

Of all the mistakes
I have made down the line
There is nothing to match
That old oil leak of mine.

I knew well when we met
That the stars had aligned.
I had recklessly summoned
That old oil leak of mine.

We were doomed from the start
I was selfish and blind
With no place in my heart
For that oil leak of mine.

When they made us a pair
Called us two of a kind
I denied that I loved
That old oil leak of mine.

When they said she was bad,
And the worst of all time
I agreed. And I cursed
That old oil leak of mine.

I betrayed her because
She was so unrefined.
And embarrassing too.
That old oil leak of mine.

She amazed the whole world.
As an unabashed crime.
Millions watched as she spewed.
That old oil leak of mine.

Now at last she has gone.
Intervention, divine.
But she’ll never be over.
That old oil leak of mine.

I will search and I’ll drill
Many more wells I’ll find
But I’ll never forget
That old oil leak of mine

OK, it could be that even catastrophic and profoundly damaging relationships leave one feeling sorrowful when they finally end, especially if your role in it was less than noble. But there must be limits.

Dare we say “good riddance” to this one?

We’ve taken on a lot of biggies. In the past three days we Banished Blanket Statements, Gut-punched Gravity and brought Art to Asteroids. What’s left?

How about Financial Industry Reform? The Senate passed it yesterday so it’s all over the news today, which means it’s high time for some Uninformed Commentary from Bud Buck.

Finally Congress has passed a financial reform measure! This was sorely needed after the sub prime loan debacle and the collapse of major banking institutions that were Too Big To Fail. There was some other stuff that happened regarding money things that are too difficult to understand. Something about derivatives and bundling and credit-default swaps. Whatever.

But now all of that has been addressed. Or if it hasn’t been addressed, at least I can stop trying to think about it, and that provides some personal relief for me in these terribly stressful times. Thank you congress!

But there is one part of the bill that irks me, and that’s the section that creates a new Office of Financial Literacy. In addition to lowering the boom on predatory lenders and Wall Street Fat Cats, now Washington is going to try to make me smarter about money so I don’t squander so much of it! I don’t know what that will entail, exactly. I can be stubborn, so my first bit of money saving advice for the government is to not waste any resources trying to educate me! I’m doing great!

For example, I always read agreements and contracts completely before I sign anything, which is a real headache for sales people since they have to sit there and watch my lips move while I read and they wait. But over the years I’ve been able to speed up the process by skipping over the terms I don’t understand. Instead, I just go with the way the word “feels”. For instance, I always make sure my bank accounts pay “simple” interest instead of “compound”. Why? Because all simple things are good, and houseflies have compound eyes, which are creepy.

If I see that a loan has “balloon” payments, I sign it. Balloons are happy, colorful things, and so much of the other stuff that you see in contracts is gray and dismal. If the balloon payments can be shaped like pretzels or wiener dogs, all the better!

Investing is important to me, so I always go for the highest number when it comes to the projected return, especially if some fund or bank or individual is paying a whole lot more than the others, because that means there’s somebody super-smart involved – somebody who knows a lot more than all the other dummies on Wall Street. Like this guy I ran into on the street corner just outside my bank. Inside they were paying, like 2% on savings, but he said he could get me 22% on a special deal he called a “Ponzi”. That sounds like “Fonzi”, who was a very cool, very big star years ago on “Happy Days”. That’s proven celebrity talent, and if a celebrity says I should do it, I usually do. Being popular is their main job, so why would they lie?

Finally, I always make sure my finances are organized so I can get a big fat tax check back from the government in the spring. My paycheck is smaller, but what could be better than money in the mail?

So here’s a notice to the new Office of Financial Literacy – don’t fritter away those precious government dollars trying to improve my situation. Direct the money toward dealing with the truly important issues like Too Big To Fail, and leave me my Too Good To Be True.

This is Bud Buck!

Assess your financial literacy.

The European Space Agency’s Rosetta spacecraft just completed a fly-by of an asteroid named “Lutetia” a few days ago. Here’s the striking image of a rock hurtling through space, with Saturn in the background.

Sorry, maybe I shouldn’t have used the word “striking” so close to “asteroid”.
We’re all a little sensitive about this, right?

There have been enough disaster movies on the topic to convince even the most casual worst-case-scenarist that the ultimate destination of every speeding lump of space metal is the flower bed in their own back yard. It’s not a matter of “if”, but “when”. This is enough to make a person a little bit paranoid. And in fact, the newly revealed shape of Lutetia, which previously had only been seen in images taken from here on the ground, reminds me of this famous and oft-copied universal representation of stress – Edvard Munch’s “The Scream”.
Don’t see it? Well, we’re all in denial.

How about now?

On a happier note, this fanciful discussion raises the notion that we could sculpt or paint zooming asteroids to make them more interesting to look at, even if we can’t deflect them.

Which existing work of art should be re-created on Lutetia?
Or should we turn it into something new?

Yesterday we challenged the veracity of all blanket statements.
Today, we’re going to dismiss gravity.

An article in the New York Times describes the fulminations of a physicist named Erik Verlinde, who has denounced gravity and wants to remove it from its exalted position as one of the four fundamental forces governing all objects, giving it a reduced role as a mere sidekick to the laws of thermodynamics.

Holy demotion, Batman!

First Pluto was diminished from planet status to the lesser realm of large speeding chunks. Now gravity is at risk of being dropped from the four-headed pantheon of fundamentals, leaving only the strong nuclear force, the weak nuclear force and electromagnetism as the invisible sheriffs in our universal town.

The article quotes Dr. Verlinde in a talk given “to a bunch of physicists,” in which he likens “the unfolding story of gravity” to the tale about the emperor’s new clothes.

“We’ve known for a long time gravity doesn’t exist,” Dr. Verlinde said, “It’s time to yell it.”

Verlinde’s comments about gravity are hailed as genius by people who admit they don’t understand what he’s saying. This reminds me of the way art mavens enthuse over the latest unexplainable painting because the work is ground breaking and the artist is brilliant, even though they have no idea what any of it is about.

That’s me. I’m completely with Dr. Verlinde on this gravity thing, even though he baffles me. Why would I get on board with such a wild idea? I can only describe it in a short, sing-songy, completely weightless poem.

What goes up must come down.
So we thought for all.
But if we want to fly around,
Gravity must fall.

Beat it up and take its lunch
Kick sand in its face.
Drop it with a sucker punch.
And leave it in disgrace.

Gravity, your song is sung.
You’re finished as a force.
And once you have dropped down a rung
We’ll conquer you, of course.

George Jetson, here we come!
Once gravity is thoroughly humiliated, how might things change?

In a shocking reversal of conventional wisdom, all blanket statements have been declared untrue as of the moment you started reading this sentence.

That’s it. Things have changed.

Old reliables like “It’s a Man’s World” and that thing about only children being coddled misfits are only the most recent B.S.’s to bite the dust, each one taken down by a different national magazine during the past two weeks.

Parting shots, no doubt, since all magazines are doomed.

And people who read paper books are pathetic luddites so out of touch with reality they will never understand what happened when these quaint artifacts they worship finally disappear for good.

Not to mention the commentators who say such things. They’re all smug, pencil-armed cowards too wrapped up in the internet to risk a difference of opinion in a face to face conversation. Good thing, too. They’d get trounced in a fair fight. All of them against a single cowboy? No Contest.

Repeat blanket statement makers are in denial about this. Their social and lobbying organization, “The Truly Wonderful People,” recently sent out a press release declaring that “all blanket statements contain at least 20% pure truth, and most are completely correct 88% of the time, a far better accuracy score than vague assertions and fair minded allowances.”

But this is typical of the B.S. crowd. Whenever they use numbers it’s a lie. Every one of them refuses to see the truth even when it’s so plainly in front of their face. They’re pathetic losers.

You all agree with me on this, of course.

Everyone who reads this blog makes a comment of one sort or another, particularly when the post involves remarkable, unassailable research like this.

That’s just the way it is.

Dear Dr. Babooner,

I worked very hard to become quite good at a well-known sport by playing with superior style and elegance. And finally my team won a difficult extended competition against many opponents, but my final victory was quite messy and the commentators are saying that although I deserved to win, the historic game was an ugly brawl.

But brawling wasn’t the sport I chose to play! I imagined this moment would be a wonderful vindication of how hard I worked to excel and not an opportunity for people who couldn’t run the length of the field to practice many different ways to use the word “sloppy” to describe the Biggest Game of My Life. I still feel happy, but a little bit tarnished.

Why can’t people just say nice things? Do they always have to find something to criticize? I would like to control everything that is said about everything that has anything to do with me. Is that so wrong? I am a champion after all, and I think I deserve some special privileges, and a little respect!

Sincerely,

S. Panya.

I told S. Panya not to be so sensitive, and certainly not to worry about what other people are saying. People can be thoughtless jerks who parrot the nonsense that other thoughtless jerks say, and ultimately none of it means anything. But of course we all care what others say about us, and when I mentioned “thoughtless jerks”, of course I wasn’t talking about you.

But that’s just one opinion. What do YOU think, Dr. Babooner?

Earlier in the week tim issued a challenge to any and all who fancy themselves poetic:

dale i think we need the writers blog for poems haiku bawdy drinking songs and bear laments as well as limericks

there once was a bear from nantucket
whose tounge was so long he could suck it
he said with a grin
as he wiped off his chin
oh look theres some mud in my bucket

cooking book club and writers den. up to it?

Well, I say why not? In poetry and food, not every dish pleases all diners.
If we can collect recipes for the purpose of filling that empty spot inside, why not stash away some silly and serious poems for the same purpose?

We’ll call the new addition “Rhyme Wave“.

I have given it a dark, poetic background, and I’ve posted tim and Clyde’s bear verse, along with our espionage limericks. There is no jury to decide about worthiness. If a poem appears in the comments, I’ll include it.

Down the road I’ll comb through previous posts to find other offerings. If you have a favorite and know how to find it, please leave it in today’s comments! This post will stay up through the weekend and we’ll start with something fresh on Monday.