Tech/software updates
Just sharing two software/workflow changes I’ve made recently, and why they’re improvements over what I had before.
The secular Serenity Prayer
I grant myself the serenity
to accept the things I cannot change;
courage to change the things I can;
and wisdom to know the difference.
Living one day at a time;
Enjoying one moment at a time;
Accepting hardships as the pathway to peace;
Taking this world as it is, not as I would have it;
Trusting that we can make all things right if we come together in unity;
That I may be reasonably happy in this life
and that I can leave this world a better place than I found it.
Medications are expensive
So, being unemployed, I have to pay my own health insurance. This is currently around $500/month.
This insurance uses high copays on medication in order to “encourage the use” of cheaper medications. I have four medications which are expensive and get a $100/month copay, so I’m still paying $400/month on those meds.
Two of those meds have copay assistance programs, which present their own set of problems, and insurance companies hate that they exist, because they’re a retroactive incentive to make it easier for people to swallow the high copays on the meds while insurance still has to pay the bulk of the price, and the pharmaceutical companies bake the copay assistance program discount into the retail price of the medicine anyway so it’s not like they’re hurt by it at all.
But if I had to pay out-of-pocket for these meds, I’d be paying more for them than for my house.
Medical updates
Just some quick medical updates.
Replacing the Waterfox icon on macOS
Okay so Mozilla has gone deep into the AI hole again, so I’ve switched back to Waterfox, a fork of Waterfox that focuses on the core browsing experience and eschews all of the stuff that nobody actually wants.
Waterfox is great, but its app icon is ugly and doesn’t look like a browser to me.
macOS does let you customize app icons but it isn’t super clear how to do it successfully, so here’s a process that works for me, as of macOS Tahoe 26.4.
The State of the Fiona
Fiona’s been dealing with some respiratory stuff for a while, with what seemed like a cold starting around a month ago. Over the past few weeks she’s been having continuous problems with mucus in one nostril, and this past weekend she was also having nasal bleeding, although that’s cleared up.
Anyway, she’s really tired of going to the vet, but yesterday she got another examination with the most recent developments and it seems that whatever she has is probably systemic and/or structural. The most likely issues are that she either has a tumor or other structural issue in her nose, or she has an abscess in a tooth. It’s unlikely to be a sinus infection since it’s not bilateral.
Unfortunately, because she’s so elderly (she’s at least 15 years old, possibly older), the vet is hesitant to do anything invasive (such as dental work or a CT scan) since they’d all require anesthesia, and that can make things a lot worse.
She’s also lost a lot of weight, but it’s been difficult to keep her well-fed without also overfeeding Tyler as a consequence. It doesn’t help that she’s had typical old-lady dental problems for a while which make her unable to eat dry food anymore (and I think the mucus has impacted her sense of smell so even wet food doesn’t seem so appetizing to her right now).
So for now we’ve just got her on antibiotics which should at least help to clear up the acute infection, and if it returns later we can try other palliative approaches like steroids.
Fiona’s still super energetic and cuddly and generally a happy little creature, but she’s at the age where things could take a sudden turn for the worse and it’s time to start feeling grateful for the time I’ve had with her.
On the plus side, she’s doing a lot better than Werner did at this age and he still made it to around 19 or 20, so hopefully I still have a few years left with her. But I’m not going to go out of my way to extend her life; I’d much rather she has a happy time on this planet while she’s here.
Happy π day
Today is π day, which is a silly day to celebrate based on a completely arbitrary calendar system that happens to share some concordance with the inferior circle constant in our standard number system1. But π day is a bit special to me. Or rather, this π day is special to me, because it’s the 10th anniversary of an important thing that happened.
The HRT saga
It’s about time I finally write a timeline of how frustrating HRT has been over the years, because I’m tired of re-explaining it and just want something to point folks to whenever it comes up.
Short version: I have historically been done extremely dirty by the healthcare system when it comes to HRT access.
I am not anti-AI
In every corner of my life right now I cannot seem to escape the increasing fervor of the ongoing debate regarding AI and machine learning in general, where on one side you have people who are completely anti-AI and others who are completely pro-AI, and any point made in opposition to either of these things is seen as a hardline stance that is an attack or something to be corrected.
As with basically everything there is nuance, and a lot of conflicting things that tend to be collapsed down into single talking points, and I am getting caught in the middle. Over the last few days this has reached a fever pitch, and it’s gotten to the point that I feel like I’m constantly on the defense and on the edge of a panic attack.
I’m also very tired, and I want to just write this thing in my own little space where I can get some complete thoughts out before someone jumps down my throat in the middle of a series of posts. I’m not sure that this will have any real positive effect, but maybe a public rumination will help me work through the latest panic attack that woke me up after a particularly emotionally-draining day.
Updog
These days I have quite a lot of ambition but not enough energy to execute on it. I’m trying, though.