There’s an App For That

Are you hoping to get outta Dodge for a while? Canada, maybe? Our super polite neighbors have created a few obstacles, but good neighbors that they are, they’ve also created an App to help you over the hurdles. It’s a nice little App that guides you through a screening tool to see if you are eligible to cross the border, then lets you put all the important information in one place to minimize fumbling around when you arrive. Just look for “ArriveCAN” in your App Store and follow the step by step guide. I’ll let you know if they let us escape to the wild and wondrous north.

Can Two People Equal One Visitor?

I took a friend to an ER yesterday. Always an interesting activity. She’ll be home today, so it was serious but not deadly. Each patient in the ER is allowed to have just one person stay with them to minimize Covid risks. OK. That’s good. But after several hours of tests with more to come, she decided it might be wise to call her son. All good; he got in his car and drove into town. But he never showed up to take over the lone seat in Exam Room 1. We waited, and waited. Finally, I went out to the ER reception room to see if they had heard anything. 

Son was sitting in the waiting area. He wanted to relieve me, but the one visitor rule was in our way. Apparently, it’s not “one visitor at a time.” It’s one visitor period. Hmm. Interesting. After much back and forth with the staff explaining to the powers that be that I was just the neighbor and he was the actual family member, someone finally gave the thumbs up for us to trade places. Moral of this story: before you accompany a friend past reception to the Exam Room, consider calling a family member just in case you’re in a place where they won’t permit a changing of the guard.

Demand Pricing

You’ll be familiar with demand pricing if you’ve ever tried to order an Uber in the rain. One rate for dry weather, higher rate for rain, much higher rate for leaving a stadium in the rain. Our chosen destination in Canada seems to be in a good position to raise its rates. Canadians can finally travel between provinces, and the border just recently opened to fully vaccinated Americans. Whoopee! Raise the rates! Yikes! We now travel in a tiny camper van, so maybe we’ll be sleeping in our car instead of a nice hotel downtown. I’m still working on this, but the weather is favorable for camping. I’ll let you know where we end up.

Poker as a Diagnostic Tool

I have a certain friend who enjoys poker. In fact, poker day is how we track the passage of time. This friend has a brain injury that sometimes looks like one or another form of dementia, but on poker day he shakes it all off and emerges as a serious player. His ability to function well in this circumstance but not in all circumstances confounds his doctors as well as me. What is going on up there? Can a person be so motivated to win a poker hand that he can juice up his brain for two hours a week, then flounder the rest of the week? If you know the answer, please fill me in. 

The End

OK, folks, that all I’ve got for today. Get ready for our booster shots, play outside as much as you can, mask up when you can’t, and be as well as you can be given the state of the world.