Hey, guys! No idea what I am going to write about. I will just start and see what comes out. I have an hour to kill before going to teach class.
Told you I renewed my driver’s license yesterday. That was sort of stressful. I tried to do everything ‘right’ so I did not end up ‘outing’ myself. I would not want to try to pass as fully sighted everyday. I guess the truth really does set you free!
Remember: I don’t drive. My stubbornness and vanity are not worth someone’s life. I just needed to feel like a ‘big girl’.
After that I went and made a physical therapy appointment. I need to bring this shoulder back to health. Right now it is cramping my style worse than the eyes. The eyes don’t hurt! The shoulder does. I thought I was being good, but it still aches. Try trying to be active but not using one arm. Grrrrrrrrrr……
After kayaking on Sunday (yes, I know I have a bum shoulder. It reminds me hourly), I went to the phone store and got a new cell phone. Two and a half hours later and I was out of there. In that time I had to go potty at least once. If the process went on for another half an hour I was going to ask them to order take out!
Anyway, the point is this: phone store people are very helpful. They will spend the time with you. I still have a lot of stuff to do on the phone but Ron, the phone store guy, gave me his number and he promised to walk me through it all. As soon as I figure out some of what the hey I am doing on this phone, I want to load the augmented reality app and see how it works as a magnifier.
If your phone is slightly older, like mine was, it might behoove you to invest in a new one. On the new one, Ron turned the magnification up all the way. If I do the three taps thing after that, letters can be ¾ of an inch high. The easier to see, my dears.
Three taps thing? Yep. It is possible on Android phones to tap the screen three times in quick succession and everything magnifies. Three times again and it goes back down. No one may have showed you that little trick. The younger generation believe tech knowledge is innate, not learned. They think we should know.
And now news some of you can actually use, they are finding more evidence that we may be better off doing genetic testing before we start drug therapy. PubMed recently ran an article citing research that the risk allele of the Y402H polymorphism in the CFH gene is related to less favorable outcomes when using bevacizumab (Avastin) or ranibizumab (Lucentis). (Quiz: What does -zumab as a suffix tell us? Answer: humanized antibody. I learned something!) The ‘in English’ version of that is this: if you have a certain variation on the complement factor H gene, your response to those drugs will be less than you expected when it comes to wet AMD control. If you are not getting desired outcomes with either bevacizumab or ranibizumab, you might suggest your doctor try another drug instead. It appears that, in some cases, if one of those drugs doesn’t work well, the other one won’t work well either.
Well, I guess I should stop prattling here. Need to get ready to go again. Type at you later!
written July 12th, 2017
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