The Adventures of Accordion Guy in the 21st Century
Joey deVilla’s Personal Blog
From the monthly archives:
Great books deserve great covers, and Shepard Fairey’s new cover designs for Penguin Publishing’s editions 1984 and Animal Farm are gorgeous:
Click the photo to see the original article.
Click the photo to see the original article.
[Found via MetaFilter.]
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My friend and b5media co-worker Tris Hussey has started a new blog on the b5 network titled Manscaping 101, a blog devoted to men’s grooming. So far, he’s posted articles on shaving to saving money on razors to styling your hair to cologne to the standard definition of “manscaping” (that is, grooming “below the equator”). Manscaping 101 promises to be a good read for the modern gentleman who cares about his appearance without having to go to ridiculously metrosexual lengths. Go check it out!
For your amusement, here’s the South Park episode South Park is Gay, the one in which the entire town falls victim to the metrosexual craze, which turns out to be a plot to take over the world.
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VidKing, the celebrity gossip and news video site, is the project on which I’m working that’s also the most visible to the outside world (a lot of other items on my plate are still in the “I could tell you, but then I’d have to kill you” category). There are new videos put on the site all the time, so it’s always fresh. If you like celebrity gossip and are looking for some brain candy to enjoy on your lunch or coffee break, go give VidKing a look!
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While walking up Roncesvalles Avenue to pick up my bike from the shop, I decided to take some pictures along the way. I posted my favourites in this Flickr set; you can also see the photos in the slideshow below:
Created with Admarket’s flickrSLiDR.
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I’ve received a lot of email resulting from my CPAP article. Many emails asked me about the costs of a CPAP machine. I’m only too happy to provide a breakdown for the curious.
When reading the table below, please keep in mind that it covers only the cost of the machine and a service plan; you need to be titrated (that is, have the CPAP’s pressure calibrated specifically for you) at a sleep lab. Depending on where you live, this may or may not cost you more. If you buy a unit with a humidifier, there’s also the regular expense of distilled water, which is relatively cheap.
| Item | Amount |
|---|---|
| Fisher and Paykel HC604 SleepStyle CPAP system (comes with Acclaim 2 basic CPAP mask) | $1040 |
| Mirage Activa Nasal CPAP mask | $200 |
| ThermoSmart heated CPAP tubing kit | $200 |
| Advacare’s five-year clinical support plan (includes consultations, telephone support, pressure changes, machine verification, loaner equipment for use during repairs, machine downloads if applicable | $50 |
| Subtotal 1 | $1490 |
| Ontario healthcare plan’s “Assistive Devices” coverage | - $780 |
| Subtotal 2 | $710 |
| Expected reimbursement from b5media’s rather nice employee benefits plan from Empire Life (100% of the cost of the mask and accessories per benefit period; up to $2000 for the CPAP machine per 60 months) | - $710 |
| Total | $bubkes (That’s “zero”) |
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Some updates on Andrew McCallum, taken from his brother David’s notes in Facebook (for more on Andrew, see here and here):
Thursday, April 10, afternoon — Coasting
No change to speak of, today. Andrew’s nurses and doctors are trying to deal with a fever and keep his temperature at a safe level.
It occurred to me that I may have been a little overzealous with the “thumbs up” news. Andrew is by no means in the clear yet, and I was told that the thumbs up was really just him raising a thumb on command while still being out. This is great news, but he still has a long way to go. Please keep the prayers coming.
I got the CDs playing to him today, and will print out more of your wonderful comments for him. I’m having trouble keeping up with all of you!
Thursday, April 10, late afternoon — Infection
Andrew’s developed an infection in one of his lungs and is now being dosed with antibiotics. You smokers out there, take note: the nurses tell me that smokers are more likely to develop infections in their lungs in critical care, and infections are serious problems in this state.
So, why don’t some of you target your prayers to his lungs, and the rest of you keep focussing on his head? Let’s make sure all of him’s covered.
We seem to have amassed a large group of people who are all directing positive energy towards Andrew, and it’s a very lovely thing. I also realise that there are many others out there also in need of positive energy, and I think Andrew would love to be able to make use of this situation to help others. I can’t ask him, of course, but he’s an upstanding chap and I’ll just assume on his behalf.
If anyone out there has someone in need of prayers and good energy, please post about them on the discussion thread that I’ve started so we can all send some good vibes their way. All of you sending positive energy out, please add these people to your prayers.
Friday, April 11, noon — Stabilizing
This morning, Andrew gave another raised thumb to the nurse, but it apparently wasn’t repeated. She suggested that this may be because he is simply exhausted. Still, we’re taking comfort in this gesture.
He also has a fever that they’re treating, and this too is apparently improving. Little steps for Andrew.
I updated the group description because it was a few days out of date.
A photo collage is being organised for Andrew. If you’d like to contribute, please see the discussion thread about it (which will be created, if it hasn’t already been).
Please keep your prayers coming, and tell your loved ones that you love them.
I’ve done my share of sitting in a hospital, hoping that a family member will recover, so my heart goes out to the McCallum family. Stay strong, folks.
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Photo by Richard Lautens, Toronto Star.
I’m not the only accordion guy in town, and I’m glad to see some younger folks taking up the instrument. Here’s an excerpt from a Toronto Star article titled Squeezing Life Into His ‘Hood:
Ronen Segall uses his bright red accordion to inject life into his Huntley St. home near Bloor and Sherbourne Sts.
The 25-year-old is an information technology employee by day, but come the weekend he’s an accordion-squeezing entertainer. French favourites are always a crowd pleaser, he finds.
Segall played the piano for years but he was looking for a more portable way to share his love of music. He picked up his 48 bass-button piano accordion in Kensington Market about a year and a half ago.
He admits it takes a sense of humour to walk the streets with an accordion. But he is a social guy.
“I like talking with people. I think this breaks the ice.”
Segall can be hired to play events but doesn’t play for money on the street.
To earn cash as a busker, you need to crank out the show tunes, he explains, and he prefers songs from movies such as Amelie and the Oscar-winning tune “Falling Slowly” from the film Once.
Segall likes to play music on a stone bench in front of his home. “I think it adds a nice atmosphere to the street.” When he plays it’s common for people to stop, start a conversation and occasionally dance. “Old folks love to dance,” and a French tune is almost guaranteed to get them stepping, Segall says.
You can catch Ronen at the corner of Bloor and Brunswick on weekends or at Crêpes A GoGo in Yorkville. I salute him with a filet mignon on a flaming sword for his keeping the accordion alive!
[Thanks to vinyl demon for pointing me to this story!]
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In an earlier post, I wrote about Andrew McCallum’s accident and being in the hospital in serious condition. There were some good signs yesterday afternoon, as reported by his brother David:
Holy crap. According to the nurses, this morning, Andrew gave a squeeze and a thumbs up on command. Holy crap!
Andrew is apparently no longer in a regular coma (whatever “regular” is), but during this brief bout of consciousness he was struggling against the respirator and working himself up into a tizzy, and tizzies are bad for him at this stage. The staff sedated him and he’s now in an induced coma to allow him to rest and heal. I think he is in a lot of pain. I can only imagine what it must feel like to be inside his head right now.
Thank you very much to those who dropped CDs off. It turns out that he now needs low stimulation, but you can bet I’ll be playing those CDs when he’s ready for it.
Thumbs up!
Here’s a message from Andrew’s father:
Saturday, Andrew was in the deepest coma. Today he is not. He has been put into a drug-induced coma to give him rest, because when he isn’t resting he is fighting all the tubes in him. This is a good sign, like the thumbs up he gave the nurse on command this morning.
He is not out of the woods by any means. He needs you to continue whatever it is that you are doing that is washing him in healing light and energy.
Andrew’s friends are beyond amazing. We read your messages to him and they sustain us all. The nursing staff in ICU stop by to listen to your poems, your prayers, your mantras, your chants, news of your prayer circles. One said yesterday, “Andrew must be truly wonderful to have so many people love him so passionately.” The medical staff have been excellent and are to all patients, but I think that hearing your messages makes them go that extra yard for Andrew.
One call I received today told us about a dream this person had of Andrew touching his nose, toes and ears on command and of a floating, glowing golden balloon.
Keep it up. The love of Andrew’s community is powerful and growing and demonstrates a love for each other, a caring supportive community in a world about which we are tempted to be jaded. You prove the power of love.
A very old and dear Iraqi friend of mine called me from England saying that he and his daughter had just arrived back from Dubai in the past couple of days. On the flight back from Dubai, unaware that we were going through this ordeal, his daughter asked him, when were they going to visit the McCallums in Canada. She had met David and Jonathan but never Andrew. His observation about her premonition: “the heart knows, before the mind.”
What your hearts know about Andrew seems to be coming to pass. Make it so.
Get well soon, Andrew.
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Here’s an anti-drinking-and-driving poster from Mumbai — you should view it at full size to get the full effect:
Click the photo to see it at full size.
Photo courtesy of Miss Fipi Lele.
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The missus has been watching the Toronto Transit Commission’s press conference on CP24 and took notes on Twitter. Here’s the scoop:
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Ben Stein has had an interesting career so far: law professor, economics writer, Nixon speechwriter, Nixon apologist, television show host and movie actor (you might recall his famous scene from Ferris Bueller’s Day Off in which he talks about “voodoo economics” and the Laffer curve, boring his class to sleep), and it’s going to remain interesting — if dead wrong — for some time, thanks to the upcoming release of the “documentary” in which he appears: Expelled, a film that claims that “Big Science” is squelching the theory that he feels is correct: that of Intelligent Design. The movie goes to some incredible lengths to discredit “Darwinism” (the code word that ID proponents use for the theory of evolution), right up to blaming evolution for things like the Holocaust and Planned Parenthood. Its release date is April 18th, the date on which Charles Darwin (the central figure in the movie’s demonology) died.
Here’s the extended trailer (7 minutes and 36 seconds) for Expelled:
And here’s the short version:
There’s an article in Scientific American on Expelled that’s worth reading: Ben Stein’s Expelled: No Integrity Displayed. It does a pretty good job of explaining the bunk in the film, most notably the bit about the theory of evolution leading to the Holocaust:
The most deplorable dishonesty of Expelled, however, is that it says evolution was one influence on the Holocaust without acknowledging any of the other major ones for context. Rankings of races and ethnic groups into a hierarchy long preceded Darwin and the theory of evolution, and were usually tied to the Christian philosophical notion of a “great chain of being.” The economic ruin of the Weimar Republic left many Germans itching to find someone to blame for their misfortune, and the Jews and other ethnic groups were convenient scapegoats. The roots of European anti-Semitism go back to the end of the Roman Empire. Organized attacks and local exterminations of the Jews were perpetrated during the Crusades and the Black Plague. The Russian empire committed many attacks on the Jews in the 19th and early 20th century, giving rise to the word “pogrom.” Profound anti-Semitism even pollutes the works of the father of the Protestant Reformation, Martin Luther, who reviled them in On the Jews and Their Lies and wrote, “We are at fault in not slaying them.” I don’t think Protestantism is accountable for the Holocaust, either, but whose ideas were most Lutheran Germans of the 1930s more familiar with: Darwin’s or Luther’s?
I’ll watch the film once it’s leaked onto BitTorrent; I’d rather not encourage Stein and company by giving them any money.
On that note, I’ll leave you with this still from Family Guy:
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I’ve been asked a number of questions in response to the previous post, CPAP (or: Snorkeling While I Sleep), both via the comments and email. I’ll answer them over a few posts.
Mike asked this question:
I sleep on my side, and usually turn to the other side at least once during the night.
I may need a similar device, and one thing that concerns me is will I still be able to do that? That is, is the hose long and flexible enough to sleep on your side, facing the inside of the bed?
I thought I’d help mike out by taking a photograph of how I’ve got the CPAP machine set up in my room, with the hose reaching over the pillow to show its reach. Keep in mind that the pillow in the photo is a king-size pillow (in accordance with my rock and roll lifestyle, we have a king-size bed):
If you sleep on your side (I prefer to sleep on my right side, and I sleep on the right side of the bed), you need to find a mask that will accommodate that position. The one I have flexes a little; it also allows the hose to be positioned at any angle.
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Regular readers of this blog will remember the article last year in which I wrote about my overnight stay at the sleep lab at St. Joseph’s Health Centre. I got the results a while back, but it was only a couple of weeks ago that I saw my doctor about the results. (I’ll admit it. When it comes to matters medical, I’ve tended to put things off.)
“At one point, you were registering thirty-three apneas an hour,” said my doctor, pointing to my sleep lab results. “When that happens, you make this sound,” after which he made a sound at the back of this throat that sounded like a combination of snoring and choking.
“That…sounds bad.”
“That’s actually classified as severe,” he said.
“I thought that only happened if you were really overweight,” I said, “Say, in the weight class where you have to book two seats on a plane.”
“Well, losing weight can reduce apneas, but even if you’re at your ideal weight, you can still have it.”
One gag-a-riffic examination with a tongue depressor later, he said “You’ve got a narrow airway. That’s a big factor with sleep apnea.”
“So,” I said, “what are my options?” I was already dreading the answers.
“Weight loss will lessen your sleep apnea, but it won’t completely fix it.”
“I could stand to work out a little more,” I said, patting my gut.
“There are mouthpieces you can get, but they’re not always effective. There’s also surgery, which also isn’t effective — it’s basically scraping the inside of your airway, and it can actually make the other methods less effective.”
I already knew where this conversation was going.
“The most effective solution for you is…”
“CPAP?” I asked.
“CPAP,” he replied.
I must have grimaced at the thought of spending the remainder of my sleeping life hooked to a machine, because he said “You’ll be surprised at the difference it makes.”
CPAP (pronounced “SEE-pap”) is an acronym for “Continuous Positive Airway Pressure” and is used to refer to the machine used by the man pictured below:
Sleep apnea is caused by the upper airway being closed off when the muscles relax during sleep. This cutting off the of the airway leads to a loss of oxygen, which triggers an automatic fight-or-flight response from the cardiovascular system and brain, which causes a waking response. This sort of thing, repeated over and over again, messes with your sleep and puts undue strain on the heart.
A CPAP machine provides pressurized air to the nose, which inflates the airway, keeping it continuously open. The end result is unobstructed breathing, which in turn eliminates sleep apnea and as an added bonus eliminates snoring.
The downside? You spend all night in something that looks like a gimp mask. (I’m aware that there are a number of people out there who do not see this as a downside.)
With a prescription and list of CPAP stores given to me by my doctor, I set out to do some CPAP machine shopping.
Lesson #1 of CPAP shopping: it’s not like shopping for a computer, DVD player or any other household or office appliance. You have to make an appointment since it takes about an hour and a half to get fitted, and here in Accordion City, it’s pretty much a Monday-to-Friday business.
The guy at the CPAP store was pretty nice and showed me a number of CPAP machines and masks, explaining the differences between them. As I looked over the different models, I thought that CPAP shopping might be a good way for techies like myself to understand what non-techies go through when shopping for computers and electronics.
I decided that the best strategy would be to go with the machine and mask combination that was the most comfortable. If it didn’t feel good, I figured, I wouldn’t use it regularly.
In the end, I chose the machine shown above: a Fisher and Paykel SleepStyle 604. It was squarely in the middle of price range and had the most comfortable-sounding features, including the best humidifier unit and a tube with a heated coil around it to prevent condensation. The more expensive unit, the ResMed (it’s the blue-and-white unit shown in the photo above with the man in bed) was smaller and looked nicer, but the store’s customers have reported that its humidifier wasn’t all that good.
Although the unit came with a mask, it was recommended that I pick out a mask that was a little more comfortable. The up-the-nose mask (like the one in the photo with the man in bed) obstructs your vision the least, but it wasn’t comfortable at all. I ended up going with the ResMed Mirage Activa pictured above because it felt flexible and comfortable. Although you can’t tell from this photo, the mask goes over the nose, not the mouth.
“Now for the fun part,” said the guy at the CPAP store. “Let’s hook you up.”
Bring out the gimp!
I was put in a reclining chair and strapped into my CPAP machine and mask. I felt like a muzzled dog.
“This will feel weird at first,” he said and the turned the machine on. A rush of air filled the mask. “Now breathe normally through your nose.”
I did, and despite the increased air pressure, it didn’t feel too weird.
“Now try breathing through your mouth or talking.”
As soon as I opened my mouth, it started venting a rush of air. It didn’t hurt, but it made me instinctively close my mouth.
“Yeah, that’s the pressurized air from the machine. When your mouth is closed, the air goes into your airway and holds it open. With your mouth open, it goes out your mouth and bypasses the airway. When that happens, your CPAP isn’t effective. So don’t open your mouth.”
“Not much chance of that,” I said. I should’ve just said “Okay,” because talking with the machine on is uncomfortable.
I walked out of the store with the machine and mask, carrying cases for both and a service plan (they service the machine, and also check its “odometer” to see that you’ve actually been using it). The total cost was about $1400, half of which will be covered by Ontario’s healthcare plan. I covered the other half on my credit card; the health coverage from work will reimburse me for that.
The next step: titration (pronounced “tie-TRAY-tion”, not “tit ration”). That’s the process where the appropriate amount of air pressure for the CPAP is determined, which requires someone to monitor you while you sleep.
This meant a return to the, the St. Joseph’s Health Centre Sleep Lab. Here’s the bed:
…and here’s the camera over the bed:
Here’s an interesting thing about the camera: the purple lights you see in the photo aren’t visible to the naked eye. They are visible through the LCD viewfinder of my digital camera. I assume that they’re ultraviolet and that the sensor in digital cameras has a wider range than human eyes.
As with my last visit to the sleep lab, I got wired up with a lot of sensors:
Here’s the box into which one end of the probes went:
…and here’s where the other end of the probes went:
Unlike my last visit, I had a little more trouble falling asleep. The throat mic was scratching my neck, and it took me a little time to get used to wearing a CPAP mask, air pressure and all. Near the beginning, my mouth would relax a couple of times, causing it to open slightly, which made me spit slightly in a zerbert-like way, which woke me up. I eventually got used to all these new sensations and drifted off…
…to be woken up at 6:30 a.m.. Under normal circumstances, a 6:30 a.m. wake-up after 6 hours of sleep would leave me groggy, but I felt quite alert. Under the circumstances, this was a very unusual feeling. I felt very well rested, as if I’d had 8 or 9 hours’ sleep.
I went home, showered and got dressed and went to work. I didn’t have my middle-of-the-afternoon lull where I’d need to get some caffeine or go for a walk to wake myself up and stayed very sharp through the whole day. “It’s like Flowers for Algernon! Well, the first part, anyway,” I said.
That night, I used the CPAP for the first time at home, and Wendy was very pleased at the silence. Aside from the very quiet sound of the CPAP (a gentle whoosh, much quieter than the fan on most computers) the room was silent. No snoring. If she can get used to looking over at my side of the bed and seeing me all “hosed up” — she calls me “The Hosebeast” now — we’ll be golden.
(Wendy would also like it if I would refrain from re-enacting Denis Hopper’s “nitrous oxide” scenes from Blue Velvet with my CPAP mask [not safe for work]. But I have to be me!)
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Apparently it’s Poetry Month. I like annoying poetry fans with my follow-up to Audre Lorde’s oft over-quoted line, “Poetry is not a luxury”: “Yeah, luxuries are things people want and are willing to pay big bucks for.”
But seriously, folks…the reason I like the tiger warning sign below is that it has more poetry than a sign that simply says “Danger: Tiger”.
Photo courtesy of Miss Fipi Lele.
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