Thursday, March 30, 2006
I forgot to mention yesterday that I saw a new eye doctor. He referred me to a Lasik doctor if I was interested in having a laser cut my eyeballs to correct my vision. I asked him what happens if there's an earthquake or power outage and he said he thinks the machine shuts off automatically—that it was safe—but he wasn't sure. On average, he said it's $5,000 to do both eyes—the cost varies based on exactly which procedures you need. The Lasik doctor he referred me to is Ella G. Faktorovich, MD (415-922-9500, One Daniel Burnham Court, www.pacificvision.org). This surgery does not yet interest me because (a) I don't believe they can guarantee complete safety without complications, (b) I can get by well enough without it, and (c) the results could be disastrous if anything did go wrong. I also forgot to mention a day or two ago that I was waiting for the bus and was startled by a street-parked car nearby me automatically starting. There was no driver in it, and the steering wheel was clubbed. I looked around to see if anyone was coming toward the car or checking it from a nearby window but it was not the case. I looked more carefully in the car to make sure there was no child or dog in it—you never know when you might end up in one of those stories which later become Hollywood films. Nothing. It reminded me of KITT. And then I realized it was just someone warming up their car with an automatic starting device, and I thought, "Come *on* now, you're not living in Alaska, Chicago, or even Seattle," but to each his or her own—everything is relative, and I haven't had a car commute since 2000 and back then I was able to afford a garage. Today I got on the elevator and at least one of the two men also in the elevator smelled really awful. Usually this kind of thing happens only on Muni. I got off two floors early and took the stairs the rest of the way but for hours the smell haunted me and I thought at times I could still smell it—that it was still on me somewhere. Humans stink! Wireless info gathering meeting with John W, Carl T, Waylon S, Joe G, Sean S, Dan F, Steve L, me, Binh N, and Steve Y with Eric Y dialing in. Met with student KB—Dreamweaver help. Helped Robin C who had a quick question about PowerPoint: when I click on the text to edit, the background color changes so that I can no longer see the text. In about 5 minutes I found the answer using the web (answer: Format > Slide Design > Color Schemes > Edit Color Schemes, then change the background color appropriately) and then improved my answer by opening up Photoshop to look up an RGB color value which matched the one in her template.