Kona Trip Report day 3

2023-11-04, 04:00 UTC−7

[day −1]
[days 0-2]

I had crashed early last night and got a good night’s sleep, so I woke up at 4 in the morning wondering what to do with myself.  I got caught up on my e-mail and wrote and published the days 0-2 trip report.

07:00:  the “complimentary breakfast” was a dismal affair—paper plates and plastic utensils, you’re supposed to bus your table when you’re done.  They had the usual breakfast buffet stuff, but nothing special.  I had scrambled eggs, potatoes and sausage which was real food; but it was cold by the time I got to it.

Hyatt House Emeryville:  convenient to the Amtrak station, and the folks at the front desk are very nice and helpful; almost no food service.

12:00:  check-out time.  I was expecting to have to be out earlier than that, so that at least was a good surprise.

13:30:  my taxi arrived.  I decided not to try to use BART since my old back was complaining a bit.  When I said that I was going to the Grand Hyatt at SFO, the driver asked me for an address.  That surprised me:  surely he knows how to get to the airport, and surely there’d be signs directing us to the hotel once we got there.  That was indeed the case, but the signs pointed only to “Hotel”.  I guess the Grand Hyatt is the only hotel on airport property.

The freeway was stop-and-go at least half way to the airport, maybe more.  That didn’t bother me since I had all day to get to the hotel, but I was sorry that I had put the taxi driver through that.  I gave him a $40 tip, which was probably too much since it was almost half the regular taxi fare; but I was very happy to get an easy (for me) ride.

All the folks at the Grand Hyatt were very nice and helpful, even lugging my luggage all the way to my room.  I was even able to arrange for wheelchair assistance all the way from my room to the terminal for tomorrow morning.

The room itself is very nice, but I needed to close the drapes to keep folks from looking in:  the AirTrain rolls right past my window.  Also, there’s not a proper desk for setting up my computer.  There’s a table with a comfortable chair, but it has a marble top which doesn’t allow my optical mouse to track well.  Fortunately, I had an A-size sheet of paper left over from the Varna trip which worked OK as a mouse pad.

17:30:

The restaurant opens for supper at 17:00, but I decided to let my laptop battery charge completely.

The menu should have been a warning:  they handed me a tablet-like device that was much more flashy than useful.  This old fart would have preferred a conventional menu.

I opted for the pork fried rice which was the only dinner entrée that I could identify.  The waiter warned me that it came with kimchi which I hadn’t had since I was stationed in South Korea near the end of the Vietnam war.  I was expecting a fermented cabbage salad, but what I got was just bits of rotten cabbage mixed in with the rice.  There were rather large chunks of pork sitting on top of the rice.  It was all more pretentious than tasty.

I don’t think I’ll bother with the restaurant for breakfast, mostly out of fear that I’ll run out of time:  the restaurant opens at 06:00 and my wheelchair assistance will show up at my room at 07:00.  There’s a shop that sells snacks and beverages on the fourth floor which is open 24/7.  I’ll probably just stop in there for a Danish and a cup of coffee in the morning.  I expect that I’ll get fed again on the airplane.

My goal for the rest of the night is to repack for flying rather than riding trains.  This mostly involves moving anything that might freak out the TSA folks to my checked bag, principally my scanner, various cables, and a box that I can plug into the earphone jack on the scanner which generates a bluetooth signal that feeds my hearing aids.  I’ll probably get some more blog reading done, but that’s not essential.

The good news is that the U.S. is switching from summer time to winter time in the wee hours of the morning, so I’ll get an extra hour of sleep.

Kona Trip Report days 0-2

[day −1]

2023-11-01:

Everything started well.  I had packed everything except my computer and toiletries the night before, and I arrived at the St. Louis Amtrak station in plenty of time to catch my first train to Chicago.

We departed St. Louis right on time; but as soon as I started getting my usual computer setup in order, I discovered, as I reported earlier, that I had stupidly failed to pack my laptop’s power cord (*sheesh*).  I still had a few hours of battery power available, but that clearly wasn’t going to get me to California.  I was off-line all the way to Emeryville and took no notes, and so I have almost nothing to report until the antepenultimate stop on day 2.

ca. 13:30−5:

We started boarding the California Zephyr and, amazingly, departed Chicago right on time at 14:00.

My sleeping car [train] attendant (TA), O. C. Smith, was very helpful all along the way, the food and the [food] service attendants (SAs), not so much.  The quality of the food service on Amtrak trains has taken a nosedive in the last decade or two.

2023-11-02, ca. 07:00−6:

It’s been at least twenty years since I last rode the Zephyr and, unsurprisingly I guess, the Denver station was all different from what I remembered.  We still had to pull quite a way north of the station and shove back to the stop, but this time there were several more tracks and very attractive platforms, and we were spotted on track 4 or 5 (I don’t remember which).  The last time I rode this train, we were shoved onto track 1 and spotted on a dingy platform near the headhouse.

I would later notice similar improvements at the Salt Lake City and Emeryville stations.

All the way from Denver to Grand Junction, the conductor made frequent announcements on the PA about the various sights along the way; and he was often amusing.  Most of the things to see were on the engineer’s side of the train (off to the right), but my room was on the fireman’s side.  I still appreciated the announcements, though.

2023-11-03, ca. 15:30−7:

Amazingly, we were right on time, even waiting for scheduled departure times at several stations, all the way to arrival in Martinez, CA.

We seemed to be having a really long dwell time in Martinez, surprising because the westbound Zephyr is discharge-only all the way from Sacramento to Emeryville and so doesn’t have to wait for scheduled departure times.  After about fifteen minutes or so, the conductor made an announcement on the PA saying that we had a medical emergency and that the train would be in Martinez for quite a while, but that passengers for Richmond and Emeryville would be handled on a Capitol Corridor train that was about an hour behind us.

I got off the train and followed the conductor to the baggage car where I claimed my one checked bag; and a station agent graciously allowed me to ride along with him with the other checked baggage to the headhouse.  He wouldn’t accept a tip.

I was working up a sweat, though.  I always wear a suit when I travel, principally because I like having all the pockets; and I was also wearing a St. Louis Cardinals baseball cap* and an overcoat on what turned out to be a warm day in the Bay Area.  This was going to be a problem because I’d be wearing the same suit and dress shirt all the way to the hotel on the Big Island.  When we got to the headhouse, I threw the hat and coat into what had been my checked bag, but that didn’t help much.

When the Capitol Corridor train arrived, the same station agent collected me and drove me to trainside where he got me a one-up seat on the lower level with a place to put my bags for the short ride to Emeryville.  My stress level was beginning to subside. 😎

On arrival in Emeryville, I’d be spending my first night at the Hyatt House just across the tracks; but the station agent couldn’t assure me that the elevators to the pedestrian crosswalk over the tracks would be working and suggested that I take a taxi.  I was reluctant to stick a taxi driver with such a short fare, but fortunately, the one taxi that was still waiting was the Emeryville Taxi Service.  The driver immediately understood my predicament, and I made it worth his while.

After checking in at the hotel, the clerk at the front desk said that there was a Best Buy not far away.  Fortunately, the taxi driver had given me his business card; so I called him back and he graciously drove me to the Best Buy and waited while I bought one of those universal laptop power cords.  On the way back to the hotel, I told him that I’d have a much longer fare for him tomorrow if he wanted it:  the Hyatt House Emeryville to the Grand Hyatt at SFO.  He agreed to pick me up at 13:30 and take me to SFO.

Recommendation:  If you ever need a taxi in Emeryville, CA, call the Emeryville Taxi Service, +1 510 612 9000.

The folks at the hotel’s front desk were very nice, the room is comfortable and convenient, and somebody in the housekeeping staff was happy to provide me with a stool to sit on in the shower (this old back complains if I’m vertical for more than a minute or two).  I do have one caveat emptor though:   the Hyatt House Emeryville doesn’t have a proper restaurant where you can get lunch or dinner.  They do offer a complimentary breakfast from 07:00 to 11:00.

My goal of getting caught up with my blog reading wasn’t accomplished.  PZ, Mano and Marcus have some interesting posts with comments that deserve careful reading; but I wasn’t up to that.  I verified that my new power cord worked corrently, played a little solitaire on the computer (as you might imagine, not something I do to improve my mind 😎 ), and crashed about quarter to nine.

*I have a red Cardinals cap.  I’ve been thinking about getting a blue one since folks who see only the red baseball cap might think that I want to Make America Hate Again.  I really like the red one, though.

Kona OOPS More Info

Success (I hope).

In Emeryville, I stopped at a Best Buy and got one of those universal laptop power cords.  I’m not sure I found the right tip in the box, but it fits, and the battery is charging as I write this.  The tip doesn’t fit quite as snuggly as my regular power cord does; let’s hope I don’t damage the socket it’s plugged into.

My goal for tonight is to get caught up on my e-mail and FtB reading.  Tomorrow night I’ll write a proper trip report.

Kona Trip Oops

Oh, dear!  I stupidly forgot the power cord for my laptop.  I have 90% of my battery; but that won’t get me to California, let alone Hawaiʻi; and I have no clue what I’m going to do during the meetings.  I might have to buy some cheap tablet and figure out how to use it.

I’m going to be silent at least until I get to Emeryville.

Kona Trip Report day minus one

Tomorrow morning I begin my trip to Kailua-Kona, Hawaiʻi for a week of meetings [itinerary].

I’ll start out on one of the Lincoln Service trains from St. Louis to Chicago where I’ll catch Amtrak’s California Zephyr all the way to Emeryville, a suburb of San Francisco.

I’m leaving a day early to give myself a buffer in case the Zephyr has any delays along the way, likely if there’s much snow on the ground.  If all goes as planned, I’ll spend two nights in the Bay Area.  The Hyatt House Emeryville is just across the tracks from the Amtrak station; and the Grand Hyatt at SFO is just a short AirTrain ride from there to the terminal.  I should have a whole day to get from Emeryville to the airport and so not be stressed at all.

The return trip will basically be the reverse of that, except I’ll spend only one night in the Bay Area and a second in Chicago.  The eastbound Zephyr will likely be late, and so the extra night will give me plenty of time to catch my preferred train for the last leg back to St. Louis.

I’ll have a decent camera with me this time, so maybe I’ll take some pretty pictures.  We’ll see whether I’m any good at it. 😎

[timetables for Chicago-St. Louis and Chicago-Emeryville]

Chemo Three

I have now officially completed the third of four rounds of chemotherapy for the cancer.  The drips finished yesterday just before noon, and I had a couple of pills to take this morning after breakfast.

After the infusion yesterday, they stuck a small boxy thing on my abdomen that gave me more medication to stimulate the bone marrow, in particular to ward off a low white blood cell count, another possible side effect of chemo, giving an increased risk of infection.  I was instructed to take it off when the green light stopped flashing, which it did about 4:20pm; and I promptly took my first real shower in six days. 😎  (It was a little disconcerting the first time I woke up to see my stomach flashing green; but after a beat or two of cognitive improvement, I knew what it was and could laugh at myself.)

As before, I’ve been fortunate to experience none of the horrible side effect of chemo.  I expect my bowels to be all stopped up for two or three days, but that’s just an annoynance.

Next up is to get all ready for my trip to Hawaiʻi that starts on Wednesday.  That trip will get in the way of my fourth and final round of treatments which will be delayed a few days until the Monday through Wednesday before Thanksgiving; but I was adamant that I wanted to make the trip.  These ISO standards committee meetings are what’s keeping my brain exercised during retirement. 😎

The New Speaker of the House

FtB already has plenty going on about Johnson (R-obviously) [Mano, PZ]; and I won’t repeat any of that; but I was taken by one possible dystopia in which all of our corporate media maybe have only short bullet lists of Johnson’s looney bits at the ends of stories that are mostly about how the Republicans “got it together.”  I had planned to watch a bunch TV news shows to see how that’s playing out so far.

PBS’ World Channel has an english language broadcast from DW News at 4:00PM my time (UTC−5).  They’re usually more concerned about what’s going on in Europe, but they did have a short story about the new speaker that contained the expected bullet list at the end, and they lumped a lot together under the rather bland “conservative Christian” label.  (Maybe that’s a red flag for Europeans—I don’t know.  It doesn’t sound particularly ominous to us US folk until you’re reminded of all the various bits of it.)

Unfortunately, I hadn’t slept well last night, and I had to get up early for a normally 35-minute drive (but during the morning rush hour today) to the hospital for the beginning of my third round of chemo drips; so by the time that BBC World News America came on, this old fart had to take a nap for about an hour, expecting to skip the BBC show and my local TV news.  When I woke up, all the news was over; but I stayed up for the World Channel’s repeat of PBS NewsHour and the local news on my NBC affiliate.

PBS NewsHour covered the speaker vote only during the initial “headline” part of the show, but that can often expand on particular stories.  This time was mostly Lisa Desjardins talking about how Johnson is “well thought-of among Republicans”; and she also grouped a lot together as “conservative Christian.”  (She did eventually break out the LGBTQ+ and abortion issues, but there was no mention of, e.g., creationism or Christian nationalism, the latter being particularly scary for me.)

There was also an interview asking a Republican representative some softball questions.  She wants to “keep the government open” and described Johnson as humble and one who puts the best interests of the country ahead of party (I’m not making that up).  We’ll see…

That was it.

I was hoping that my local TV news, after the leads that bleed, might have a bit from NBC News about the House vote, but no such luck.

It’s Official

I’ll be hosting a meeting of the ISO standards committee that I serve on.

It took a little longer to set up than I had expected; but our meetings can be a little complicated.  (I hope the hotel’s sales rep. didn’t get too exasperated with me.  I try to not be one of those 20% of customers they spend 80% of their time with; but details, details don’tcha know.)

We’re expecting to have about a hundred people show up with maybe twenty or thirty more Zooming in.  The meetings are scheduled for five and a half days with Monday and Saturday mornings being plenary sessions where we handle a variety of administrivia and take formal votes.  The committee’s real work is done in smaller breakout groups, some of the groups dealing with as many as twenty or so papers during the week.

I’m looking forward to actually hosting a meeting.  I’ve gotten a great deal more from my participation than I’ve given over the years; and now that I’m retired and getting older, I think it’s time for some payback.

Two Down, Two to Go

I finished the second round of chemotherapy sessions on Friday, and once again, nothing bad happened that I could recognize.  The only side effect that I noticed was constipation, but I got moving again last night, so that was just a minor annoyance.

There was one side effect of my first round of treatments that had no symptom that I was aware of:  a blood test before the second round showed that I had a really low white blood cell count giving me a high risk of infection.  This time, after the last drip on Friday, the nurse taped a small box on my stomach that, I gather, gave me a trickle of some drug that would stimulate my bone marrow.  I was told to leave it on for a bit over 24 hours and then just take it off and throw it away in the regular trash.  Again, just a minor annoyance at worst; and most of the time, I didn’t even need to pay any attention to it.

They found a really good vein on Thursday and so were able to leave the IV in overnight; but I don’t think I’ll ask them to do that again:  given the really small needles they use these days, and the high skill level of all the nurses that I’ve had, getting stuck one more time is better than not being able to take a proper shower later and worrying about messing up the IV while I was sleeping.

I’ve been tremendously fortunate so far.  I’m just n=1, of course, so my experience isn’t significant; but so far this hasn’t been bad at all.  Indeed, once I found out that I could bring my computer and WiFi hotspot with me, there wasn’t even any boredom. 🙂

My next round of treatments will be Wednesday through Friday starting on the 25th; and the doctor said that it would be OK for me to get my next COVID booster about a week before that.

On the first of November, I’ll begin my trip to Kailua-Kona, Hawaiʻi for some meetings; and I’ll get my final round of treatments probably a couple of weeks after I get home on the 15th.

And on the Cancer Front …

One of the possible side effects of my chemotherapy drugs is risk of infection, I had a blood test today in preparation for my second round of chemo on Wednesday which found a very low white blood cell count, and it’s not hard to connect the two in my mind.

The nurse called me on the phone and seemed concerned about that, to the point of moving the next chemo session back a week, and ordering another lab test before the first treatment.  We’ll see how it goes.  I don’t currently have any cold or flu-like symptoms; but I might need to take extra precautions against being around other folks who are sick just in case.

I’m hoping that it’s just a mistake at the lab.  (If I were a perfect person myself, I wouldn’t be able to imagine that; but…uh…)