Below you'll find a list of all posts from March, 2020
A couple of days ago I intubated my first critically ill patient with probable COVID (the test takes 5 days to return, so we never know in the moment). I should preface what I write next: Many talented people have taken on unbelievably time-consuming, entirely voluntary roles in order to ensure a robust response. My institution has risen to the …
Dear reader, if you seek distraction as a form of solace, this might be for you. It is not intended to make light of the seriousness of our current pandemic – simply to give your brain a couple of minutes to engage in a different thought process. A month ago, my wife and I tried to pull off the kind …
Dear reader, I realize these topics are light fare in comparison with what we deal with on a daily basis during the COVID pandemic. Some posts were written before it unfolded, others are my attempt to engage my brain in a manner other than the apprehension that characterizes many of my waking hours. If you seek distraction as a form …
I was at a conference in Vegas last week when local manifestations of the global crisis occurred in rapid succession. The day after I departed, our district announced that local schools would close for at least the next two weeks. A day later, an older immunocompromised loved one was hospitalized with a viral pneumonia (thankfully not COVID). My loved one …
Confessions Of A (Former?) Drama Geek I was a teenage Madrigal. The Madrigals were our high school’s premiere mixed vocal music group, and our Broadway-influenced musical director made sure we had choreography and a mix of classic and contemporary vocal arrangements to make even the most sedate nursing home audience stand up and pop wheelies with their walkers like the …
45 years ago, British economist Charles Goodheart inserted what he considered a snarky aside into an otherwise serious academic publication: Any observed statistical regularity will tend to collapse once pressure is placed upon it for control purposes. Was his humor hard to recognize due to his being a British academic or due to his being an economist? Hard to say. …
Many folks pursuing Financial Independence (FI) as high income professionals often opt for a lifestyle comparable to average income households, arbitraging the difference in income (greater than households at similar spending levels) and expenses (far less than peers in their profession) to supercharge their investments. A modest lifestyle with high income and financial literacy can combine to act as a …
My experience with burnout in medicine reflected a perfect storm (a lawsuit; a toddler at home with a second child on the way; a near-denial on a home loan; and working far more than I wanted due to two years of understaffing). It led me to the path of financial literacy, which in turn set me up to become a …
There was a time in life when the poetry and prose of Richard Brautigan brought me great solace. He was widely popularized as a Beat poet, but I always viewed him as a lonely soul who found companionship through his readers. I was one such reader as a high school student. I was alone surrounded by people. I connected with …