Thursday, November 17, 2011

Business Cards/Ringing in the Ears/Inter(mittent)net

I have to admit, I think I have thrown more business cards away than I have given out in my professional lifetime. It's not my fault. The business card cannot be changed quickly and often to reflect how quickly and often reality changes.

For instance, when I stopped representing the disaster recovery company on the West side of the state, I threw away the 1,000 new cards they had just printed for me. It was a pain to shred them so they could be recycled, but that's what I did.

Then for the minority joint venture company, I got 500 brand new high quality cards. And our office address and phone changed. I never even gave one out. 500 more tossed to the winds. I am getting sick to my stomach just thinking of the waste. When I got new ones, I asked them to pay more per unit to get fewer cards, since that card is only passed seldom and under specific circumstances. I just don't want to waste more of them.

Most recently, I discovered my card for the janitorial company had the disaster recovery company phone number listed as the emergency phone number. So those, too had to go. about 300 of the original 500 down the tubes. I just picked up 1,000 new ones yesterday. That can only mean some sort of dramatic shift is right around the corner.

The business card seems so old-timey. Why we haven't switched to a universal virtual card, I don't know. In fact, smart phones should have a short-cut button that automatically transmits your card. There should be a standard format across platforms. Easy. No waste. Nothing to carry (or forget to carry).
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Add tinnitus to the ever-longer list of maladies from which I am suffering. This one is a special kind of hell. It is omnipresent and disturbing.

I have been reading a bit and there are a number of causes of tinnitus and a number of manifestations. It could be accompanied by hearing loss, trauma, high blood pressure, stress, aspirin use, blockage, or any other of a seemingly endless list.

What that means to me is that "they" basically don't have a clue as to the true nature of this disorder and are compensating by throwing the kitchen sink at it.

As usual, the internet is full of homeopathic remedies that supposedly work, though the sites that are mostly medical in nature hedge on the effectiveness of these. There is some promising research involving an iPod like device with an additional sensory output that attaches to the user's tongue. This attachment pulses along with the music (any music apparently will do) and somehow retrains the auditory cortex to recognize only actual signals instead of those that are elusive.

Some tinnitus can actually be physically heard by trained ENTs, (sorry, Otolaryngologists). I went to a website with sound clips of various types that have been heard and replicated. I have almost exactly what that site describes as "High Frequency Buzzing". It is uncanny how close, even in actual frequency my reality is to that sound clip. I doubt I could even hear it if it were any close.

On top of my normal issues with sleeping, this is now taking its toll. Wearing headphones and listening to music (quietly, I assure you) when I am working alleviates most of it. But that is only so much of my life.

I guess I'll talk to the doc and go see an ENT and see if there is a specific pathology involved with my case. If not, I'll start trying the herbal remedies that are out there and see if by some miracle they work on me.

I hold out little hope for success. It just reminds me that if I knew I was going to live this long, I would have taken much better care of myself.
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Intermittent internet is plaguing my home. I have done all I can without spending money. Comcast says it isn't their fault. I believe them, since our TV is working fine. It's just the internet.

Likely it's my geriatric modem. I already shored up all the connections and reattached the grounds that were left unattached when the plumber came this past spring. But, the problems didn't start way back then, so I suppose that was wishful thinking.

The wire does go through a lot of tree limbs and it is windy today, but again, TV is fine. Just internet is affected. Add it to the list of stuff I don't have time or money to fix.

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