47 Years Ago Today

President Kennedy was assassinated on this date in 1963. Almost everyone in my generation remembers where they were when they heard the shocking news. I was sitting in my high school biology class when I heard the announcement over the PA system. Many of the girls in the class cried.

In some ways, he was the President Obama of that time. He was the first Catholic president, and the first president of Irish descent. Most people forget that the Irish were treated like dirt in the early 1900's, and I observed that it took about 50 years for Americans to drop that prejudice. And I estimated many years ago that America would be ready to accept a black president about 50 years after the Civil Rights Act in 1964, or about 2014. It takes that long.

Think we'll be ready to accept a gay president by 2040?

Thomas Sowell quote

While writing on the topic of the benefits of a divided [federal] government, Thomas Sowell wrote:

"It is not a matter of faith that a market economy can recover on its own. It is a matter of faith that politicians speed recovery."

Source: Nov. 15, 2010 issue of Washington Times

Power Outage

It was windy last night. I was just starting my second hour on the treadmill last night when the power went out. The DVR valiantly tried to record Castle while running off the uninterruptable power supply (UPS), but it only lasted a few minutes.

This morning we were sitting on the bed trying to plan the day when, poof, the power came back on. Whew. So it was out about 10 hours, and the temperature of our house only dropped 4 degrees.

New Hearing Aids

I bit the bullet and bought a pair of hearing aids today. My hearing loss is significant (60 dB loss above 2kHz) but not unusual. As even the audiologist did not know, 60 dB is a factor of a 1,000 in acoustical power. After the audiologist tweaked the hearing aid amplification spectrum, I retook the hearing test and scored 30 dB hearing loss above 2 kHz. She offered to turn up the gain, but I declined. Maybe later, after I have adjusted to hearing the clanging and clicking of daily life.

The first change I made after I driving away from the doctor's office was to turn down the treble in my car radio/CD player. I had turned it way up before, and now having the bass and treble set to zero gain sounds fine. Here are the sounds that are most different for me:

Paper(!) -- flexing a paper bag, wadding up a piece of paper, even something as small as a 3M sticky note.

Car alarm chirp -- I could hardly hear it before.

Car keys and door latches -- they really clink and clack, don't they?

Water flowing into the kitchen sink -- it is a loud clatter to me now.