SXSW 2024

I never did get around to doing my daily posts at SXSW 2024.

Overall it was a fun time.

Still big problems with the staff. I was told there was no proof I bought the tshirt and poster. They eventually said they could find the tshirt but no poster. They would not refund the money I paid for the poster. I’m upset with this theft and they never responded.

The fast pass was fraught with problems every single day which was another disappointment. I read many posts from others on their problems. Of course it was the IT people attending who said they just set up scripts/bots to reserve what they wanted with a high success. Something to consider in some future iteration.

I do encourage people to go for the vast amount of information, and fun. I will also remember the hit and run driver that killed someone outside the comedy club late one evening and how thankful I am my uber driver was in the wrong place and I had to cross the street, thereby not being in the path of the other driver.

-SFA

Paper vs Electron

I keep a journal on paper. I also have this online journal.

It’s interesting to have both. There is a visceral feel in the act of putting pen to paper. I have to slow down my writing, take the time to process each word, and see the ink bleed into the paper to stay into some future moment, whether or not someone actually reads the words or not.

Online here it will live essentially forever as long as these electrons persist in the cloud. I can go back and reread, if I ever chose to do so, and others, also if they choose to, can take a glimpse into my in-the-moment thoughts.

This form is easier. I don’t have to hunt down my journal and pen. I just need internet access somewhere on the earth to be able to access this site and my blog.

Time passes so quickly, thinking it was only last week I put thoughts down when in fact, the never left my head. My new test will be keeping the site in a tab in my browser and seeing if I end up writing more.

-SFA

Movie Review: Founders Day

I’m doing this on my phone so this will be relatively short. Had this movie tried to be serious, it would be one of the worst movies of the year that I have seen. This is a B film that’s a comedy slasher. It is over-the-top and absurd. That doesn’t mean there weren’t aspects that were funny. There are those moments when you laugh when somebody is dying because it’s so fake.

Would I see this movie again? Not even if it was free. But if you find yourself with a free ticket or an opportunity for a cheap viewing, and there’s no other movies that you are interested in seeing, I would give it a try. It’s worth just that much free time out of your life.

-SFA

It is late and I want to eat something

I should be finishing some reading but I keep telling myself I need to write and maybe I have been suffering some spiritual constipation but not relaxing more and doing… well this. Writing papers in special formats to jump through a hoop is the antithesis to my general stream of conscious style here. But hoop jumping it is until I finish the classwork or give up. Moving on….

Hunger and I am hungry.

This is a recurrent struggle of mine. Right now as I am typing this, I have hunger. I ate something earlier. I did not eat until I was full but instead to contentness. I am trying to retrain myself to enjoy the eating and not feel stuffed. My hunger signal is a bit off these days though which makes it harder. I will eat and go from content to full in two bites where I used to feel that progression and be able to stop sooner. Perhaps it is all the extra weight I put on that is tricking my brain.

Now I am trying to eat until just before content, let it linger and then slow the eating even more to see if I still want more food. For someone that relearned how to eat slowly, and slower than the people around me who seem to finish by the time I am done cutting my food, I am eating even slower.

The next part I am struggling with is to not snack so late with this hunger in my belly. I keep waiting to see if it generates an I am hungry, but I am not there yet.

This was a good distraction. I will be getting back to my reading.

-SFA

Do No Harm

Do No Harm.

Three short, easy to pronounce words, but when linked, open a vast world of interpretation and consequences.

Read more: Do No Harm

Breaking down the phrase:

DO: Verb – Commanding in its tone promoting action.

NO: Adverb – Sign of a negative.

HARM: Noun – Damage or injury, both physical and mental, when related to a person.

This phrase is most often associated with medicine and is from Hippocrates. In some medical schools, students during graduation after receiving their diploma are asked to recite this or take a similar oath and follow this idea. In the Hippocratic Oath, there is a part that states, “I will use those dietary regimens which will benefit my patients according to my greatest ability and judgement, and I will do no harm or injustice to them.” From Hippocrates’ Epidemics, he says: “The physician must be able to tell the antecedents, know the present, and foretell the future – must mediate these things, and have two special objects in view with regard to disease, namely, to do good or to do no harm.” 

And to clarify, the specific phrase primum non nocere, “first, do no harm,” is not part of the Hippocratic Oath.

A physician, as a general, is not in the mindset of wanting to cause a problem. The physician is interested in helping someone to get better or improve an outcome. They do this after taking a history of the problem and of the patient, after doing an exam, and after synthesizing this information, along with tests and results, to come up with the perceived best path to bring a patient into an improved state of health and wellbeing. Perceived being the opinion of the physician and/or medical establishment.

However, to paraphrase the medieval satirist Walter Map, “No good deed goes unpunished.”

Doing good and doing harm can seem very clear, but more often is a razor thin edge. It depends on the side you look at to determine good or harm, both subjective terms, by the way. What the physician thinks is a good thing may not be what the patient or patient advocate thinks is right. The physician thinks the child has a cold and doesn’t need antibiotics, but the parent wants some. Some physicians will not prescribe the antibiotics based on general standards and some will placate the parent since “it is just antibiotics”. There are benefits and harms in both situations. In the first, the benefit is in not treating a virus with an antibiotic. The harm may be to the physician parent relationship. In the second, the benefit is a stronger relationship, but potential harm to the patient by giving antibiotics that are unnecessary. Yes, there can be harm. First, not taking the entire prescribed course can cause antibiotic resistance. You’ve killed off the weak ones but left the stronger ones behind by not taking the full dose or not for the full time. Second, there is a reinforced incorrect idea that you can treat a virus with antibiotics.

Another example is chemotherapy. These incredible potentially life saving medications take cells that are growing out of control and by taking advantage of this rapid growth, target these cells, and for all intents and purposes, eradicate the cancer from a human body. But. There are other cells that grow fast, like hair, which leads to the classic depiction of balding. Depending on the medications, the patient can have long-term permanent changes to heart, liver, kidney, and reproductive systems, and these are not positive changes. Reduce cancer and maybe heart disease? Reduce cancer and get kidney damage? Reduce cancer and you might not have children. These are more extreme, and some people do not suffer from long-term problems. There is still the risk though.

What about medical trials testing out a medicine or procedure? There can be unintended consequences. Unexpected adverse effects. Someone could get injured. And someone could die depending on the extreme of what is being tested and looked at. At the end, some people might develop problems, but the majority could be healthier, perhaps cured. The one or the many?

From not treating a cold to life saving medications, how much harm in the right way is enough to be good? Or how much good can be achieved by needing to cause harm?

-SFA