The Masked Runner

 Last year when COVID infection rates in the Western world were high, I read an article about how wearing a mask does(n't) affect oxygen levels in the body when running . Back then - August 2020 - it didn't mean too much to me because I wasn't running outside, and our office had a standalone gym that didn't require wearing a face mask while exercising.  Here is the link to the Men's Health article:

https://www.menshealth.com/fitness/a33521706/face-mask-oxygen-levels-running-myth-coronavirus-doctor-fact-check/

In all fairness the UK doctor does admit that wearing a mask is uncomfortable, but I do have several problems with the article in general. Before I get into that, I do want to say that 1) I am not an anti-masker, 2) I am not an anti-vaxxer, and 3) my level of running isn't as high as the good doctor's level. With regard to my stance on COVID prevention, I would say it is similar to my stance on disease prevention in general:  Stay home when you're sick, wear a mask when you are sick, keep a good social distance from people in general, wash your hands often, and avoid touching your face.  It isn't a surprise that these were general guidelines passed out by the CDC at the beginning of the pandemic, and it is unfortunate that we put so much effort into vaccinations, while almost forgetting the basics above. I hope these comments didn't trigger anyone, but if they did, well, be an adult and understand that you won't change my mind any more than I will change yours... and I'm okay with that.

Anyway, the issue I have with the article is that the doctor says his little experiment proves that wearing a mask didn't affect his oxygen levels. Perhaps it's true for him personally, but I don't think one run by one person with a (assumed) commercial oximeter proves anything. I picked up my outside running again in November at a time when the mask mandate here in Hanoi was, and still is, 100% when outside.  I want you to understand that people here are serious about the mandate, too.  Police will fine you if you are spotted not wearing a mask outside, and I know people that have been approached and fined. That may help you understand why I stepped away from running outside for a while; not because I am afraid of COVID, but because of the fear that I will be caught without a mask on.

For the past few months, I realized that I can walk at a brisk pace fairly comfortably with a mask on, and I continue to do that.  Running, on the other hand, presents an issue.  That is, that I can't run more than a mile without breaking a sweat, and sweat creates a seal between my nose and mouth, and the mask.  The description "uncomfortable" as described by the doctor in the article, is like saying getting waterboarded can be annoying. In my experiment, it is impossible for me to breath after the first mile. Even before the first mile, my breathing becomes so labored that I would be exhausted in a very short time.  I believe I have a good heart, but I wouldn't want to bet on my heart against the extra effort I have to put into breathing with a mask on.  

I also think the article missed the mark entirely.  Why do an experiment to prove your oxygen levels are fine while wearing a mask when running, when it would make so much more sense to explain how much more vulnerable you are not wearing a mask when you run? I personally believe that you aren't more vulnerable.  At least I don't think I am.  I run early in the morning and don't pass within two meters of anyone on my runs. Even if I were to run at a time when the streets are more crowded, I don't think I would be very vulnerable to catching a virus on the run.  

Anyway, I made a compromise that may sound a bit hypocritical.  I do wear a mask, and it covers my chin.  When I walk out of and into my apartment, I wear the mask full faced, but as soon as I start running, I pull the mask down where my mouth and nose are exposed.  I believe the benefits of running and being outside far outweigh wearing a mask in maintaining my mental and physical health. Frankly, if I had to wear the mask properly, I wouldn't run. Period.

The weather has been holding out for me these past couple of months and I will keep running until the morning showers just make it too dirty to get outside. I still don't understand how the paved streets can get so dirty and muddy here, but they do.  To reinforce my commitment to running, I ran around West Lake on January 1st.  I was surprised how well I did.

My Best Camera

 The quote by the famous photographer Chase Jarvis, "The best camera is the one that's with you," resonated with me a few years ago right after I got my Google Pixel II phone.  At that time, I had an older Nikon D80 DSLR and a new Olympus micro 4/3's camera, the OM-D E-M10.  I loved both of those cameras and was very satisfied with the results I was getting when I shot in the RAW format.

I loved my Pixel II phone's camera. The colors were vivid and the shots were generally sharp.  Armed with my famous photographer's quote and my camera phone, I ditched both of my other cameras.  Honestly, I took most of my photographs while traveling, and carrying around the camera and equipment was just worrisome.  There were times and certain conditions where I wished I had one of my other cameras and a specific lens, but - for the most part - I was content with my new set up.  

This went on for about four years.  Then, google told me they would no longer update my Pixel II.  This made sense given my old phone was showing its age, but I loved the photos it took.  As fate would have it, the same time my phone became a legacy item, my wife's phone of choice - the iPhone 🤢 came out with the iPhone 12.  So, she got a new iPhone and I got a hand-me-down... her iPhone Max XS.  I had owned an iPhone before so many of my apps were still available, and it did have a widely respected camera.  

I continued on with my iPhone for a couple of months, but I have to say, I no longer love my photos.  If I was ever on the ledge with regards to whether I would go back shooting a "real" camera before, I was definitely there with my "new" iPhone.  So, I pulled out both of my cameras and dusted them off... my love for photography rekindled.

The D80 came out in 2006, so it's pretty old.  Part of me wants to upgrade to a D7500 or maybe even a Nikon full frame, especially since used bodies are relatively cheap and I have enough lenses, but the other part says hold off until I am sure I am truly converted back to my DSLR.

Here are a couple of shots from my D80:

Then, I took my micro 4/3 E-M10 that came out in 2014 with me to Quy Nhon for my winter break.  Here are a couple of shots from that camera:

While I see give and take on which of these two cameras I like more, I feel good about the photos they both take and the lens flexibility I have to get the pictures I want.  

I will always have my phone with me, and there is utility in that camera phone that I will never have in a "real" camera. I use that phone camera to help me remember things and take pics of documents, and myriad other tasks that make it invaluable.  It's just I will unlikely take many, if any, photos that I will cherish for a lifetime with that stupid iPhone.

I think I will be carrying around one of my real cameras a lot more in the coming year(s).  It took iPhone to change my mind.

Richard Marcinko Passes Away (December 25, 2021)

 I read in one of my news feeds the other day that Richard Marcinko passed away. It reminded me of the time I met him back in 1996.  After I left the Air Force, I returned to Vietnam and lived in Ho Chi Minh City for about five years. While there, I met a Vietnam-era SEAL who was working with this investment group I was loosely involved with.  The prior-service SEAL contacted me from the US looking to see if I could facilitate for a documentary crew who was traveling to Vietnam with a number of special operations Vietnam War veterans led by Dick Marcinko, and included Chief "Patches" Watson.  My role was to help the crew get their filming equipment into the country and help with any other facilitating that required translation and interpreting. It was generally a simple job, and I was happy to do it.  This was only about 25 years after most of the group had served in Vietnam and they were all in their late 40s to early 50s.

I traveled to several local areas with the group, but honestly don't remember specifically those locations or much else about what happened during that week or so of work. Only one event sticks out in my mind that I would like to share:

It was probably the second day the group had arrived. They were staying at the New World Hotel on Le Lai Street, across from what is now known as the Saigon Central Park.  At the time, homeless people lived in the park in cardboard boxes, or whatever other makeshift shelters they could put together.  I lived just down the road off Tran Hung Dao Street and walked to the hotel that afternoon. When I got to the hotel, I saw the producers out in the park, directing some of the homeless people to collect tree limbs and move them into a pile.  When I asked one of the producers what he was doing, he responded that he was having the people prepare a bonfire that he would light in the evening and have the group meet around and tell war stories.  The producer talked like the event had been organized, but also implied the homeless people had some sort of ownership of the park.  I thought the event a bad idea and intended to tell Dick as much. He invited me to his suite where I talked with him and his wife, but didn't get to properly discourage the evening activity.  I walked down with Dick and his wife later, when it was dusk, and saw that the fire had already been lit and the group was gathering.  Though still worried, it looked like things were going fine.  Well, until everyone was gathered around and about eight to ten motorbikes with two Ak-47-armed public security men on each arrived and surround the group.  Though all of the American veterans had combat experience, I was most concerned with the reaction from Dick.  I think everyone else looked to him to gauge their own actions, so I worried when I saw Dick looking into the fire with a thousand yard stare. No panic, fear, anger or any other emotion was evident on his face.

Fortunately, I was able to move to the Vietnamese team leader and explain in very broad terms what was happening.  This police captain was less than impressed and asked who gave permission to build the fire.  I translated for the producer who answered that the people who owned the park had allowed it.  Playing stupid, I translated this verbatim and looked for the officer's reaction.  In the end, I was able to convince the policeman to let the group return to the hotel and allow me to write a statement at the police station.  Oddly, the group got off without a penalty, not even a fine. Even better, I suffered no ill-consequence for the remainder of my time in Saigon.

Several years later, Dick Marcinko was in Mobile, Alabama promoting his new book Red Cell. I bought the book and had him sign it for me.  I don't have the book here in Hanoi, but his message proved he remembered the event back in Saigon.  He was a good guy, and I am sorry to hear of his passing!

The Good Old Days

 It wasn't long ago that I saw a reference to someone longing for the good old days. I don't remember who wrote it, on what social media site, or under what circumstances in general. But, I do remember that there was no shortage of responses that seemed to indicate we are in a much better place now than we were then. The poster was excoriated for making such a statement, and accused of being one with too much privilege.

As I am now on the cusp of officially being a senior citizen, I too long for the good old days, and given the negative responses I saw on that previous post, I would like to explain myself. First of all, I would like to peg the period of the good old days to the seventies and eighties. I think of my teens as the good old days; the ones that I look back on with the most nostalgia. Obviously, the "good old days" mean different things to different people. I could easily just say they were the good old days because I was a teenager with nary a worry in the world... well, no real worries anyway. I was a good student without trying too hard, and I was in great physical health though not a star athlete. I was closer to ugly than handsome on a scale, but I wasn't obsessed either. I could say they were the good old days because I was healthy and fit and invincible. But I won't stop there, because that would make my definition of "the good old days" extremely subjective.

I want to explain why they were the good old days for more objective reasons. First of all, the U.S. involvement in the Vietnam War ended in 1973. From then until 1991, we largely enjoyed a peacetime America. I remember the Falklands and The Iran Hostage situation, but not much else other than the cold war. Also, though the fuel crisis of the early 70s influenced - in the most negative way - the cars that were manufactured through the 70s into the early 80s, the muscle cars of the 60s were still around and easy to buy. People were still able to retire in their late 50s and early 60s on pensions that took them to their natural end, and a person could live on their wages in general. The nuclear family was not an anomaly and everyone spent time at home eating dinner and watching TV together. College and medical care was still affordable, and one could make money on interest-bearing bank accounts. You could even send your kid to college without breaking the bank... life was good. Even politically, the left and the right weren't that far apart. Bill Clinton who didn't enter office until 1993 wasn't so far to the left that average Americans couldn't relate on some level with each other. By today's standards, Bill Clinton would have been right of a modern moderate-right politician.

So let's compare that to today. We have been at war for over two decades. Granted, no one has been drafted, but generations of soldiers have been affected by our involvement in Southwest Asia. The very same technology that allows us to work better has led to the loss of the nuclear family. Everyone is tied to their phone or their playstation or their whatever-technology-they-are-addicted-to. You see people on dates with their eyes glued to their phones, and people off work still working... on their phones. You see kids who can't separate homework from socializing because it's all on their computer. I have seen the advent of email kill the planning process. All of a sudden, people who have no idea what is going on can send an email to the group with the most ridiculous suggestion and fuck up a perfectly good plan in a New York second. We work in a society that I have to see what pronouns someone uses before I can address them, and I can't tell someone that they suck at their job without being censured. Don't get me wrong, I don't care who or what you identify as, I just don't want to have to think about it. If I'm not dating - and I'm not - your gender and sexual preference is immaterial to me. People say that we are racially woke, or working in that direction, but I remember dealing with people of color much the same way I do today, with mutual respect and cordiality; oddly enough, because I was taught from the earliest of age to do unto others as I would have them do unto me. I rarely get addressed as sir, though my responses as a youth to someone older than me were always suffixed with a sir or a ma'am.

You can say I grew up privileged, but I didn't really. Sure, I had my skin color, but it didn't get me in college. Dad had a good job, but Mom didn't work. We lived in a decent neighborhood, but by no means was it well-to-do. I would place us in lower-middle-class in retrospect, though no one really cared. It wasn't until my teens that we had a microwave, and a CD player. I had no idea what an LCD TV was... VCRs were a new thing. My generation made cassette tapes from the radio, and knew that rewind-was-kind when returning tapes to the Blockbuster. I remember our first house with air conditioning, too. Looking back, though, what I liked best about my youth is that I could make a mistake, or do something stupid, and it wouldn't be recorded by some asshole and put on Tik Tok or YouTube for the world to see. Adults could have a bad day and treat someone badly, and have a chance to find that person and apologize before getting doxxed. Or, worst case, not apologize and everyone knew that "some people are just assholes" and leave it at that.

Yep, there were good old days. No doubt about it. We didn't have the things we have now, but we made do. And, we were happy... at least most of us were. Just my opinion, I suppose.

Good Bye 2020 and Good Riddance

 Sorry for the negative title. This blog won't focus too much on the negative aspects of 2020, but I will just get that out of the way.  Back in March, half of our office staff departed for the U.S. - some as evacuees and some as regular rotation, without replacement. We went several months without enough personnel, and we were still pushing support to host nation teams... my workload increased significantly. The added work load and reduced ability to work properly due to telework requirements made things maddening at times.  As I said, though, I won't focus on that.

As a matter of fact, the pandemic allowed me to do some things that I would not have normally been able to do.  I read way more books than I had resolved to read, and I was able to drop 30 pounds thanks to exercise and Intermittent Fasting (IF). I gained about 10 back since my lowest weight, but I have a plan now, and feel I will be able to break that last plateau.  Anyway, the pandemic wasn't all bad is my point.

I was happy with the results of my resolutions. Though I haven't gotten through many books in the last couple of months, I far exceeded my goal for the year. Also, I got back into exercising regularly and plan on staying this way even if I still worry that an injury will take me out for longer than I would like... the older I get, the more cognizant I am of how badly injuries affect me.  The last goal I had was taking an online course. While I didn't finish my online course, I hope to have the first one completed by January.  I also registered for another one that should be complete shortly after.  By the way, those two courses are related to Programming in the C Language and Linux Essentials.  I registered for both of these courses in EdX.org. 

With that being said, I am not sure what I will focus on in 2021. I have some ideas rolling around in my head, but further thought is required. Let me get back to you on that.

I am off to Mui Ne the day after tomorrow. I will meet up with Diep in Saigon and take a long, long bus ride there.  This lazy, beach-side resort town is the thing I need to start the New Year.  Being with my darling on New Year's Eve is good, too!

I reckon the worst part of 2020 was not being able to get back to the US for a vacation this year, so I will end this post on hope.  I hope that next year restores our global health and that I am able to get back to the U.S. to visit family that I haven't been able to see for a while now.

Happy New Year to All!

Desperate Need of a Break

 I know it's been a while since I have given an update.  Sorry. I am in desperate need of a break and I am stuck in a country that I can't leave without being relatively certain I will spend quite a bit of time in quarantine before I can get back to work... so, I wait.  I won't get into the mechanics of the work I am doing, but I feel pretty certain that until I get a break I won't be performing anywhere near my 100% mark. 

In other news, I have been doing fairly well keeping up with my new year's resolution in the area of working out. I believe I committed to four days a week, with each session or cumulative work in the day equal to at least one hour. As it is, I have been getting in about five to six work outs a week, each one taking about an hour.  With the exercise and a new intermittent fasting routine I am doing, I have managed to lose around 25 pounds since May.  That would be more impressive if I hadn't let myself go so much before I decided to do something about it.  The good news is that the exercise in combination with the fasting seems to be something I can maintain, as opposed to the last time I lost about forty pounds by running an ungodly amount of weekly miles and eating whatever I wanted. That was about 15 years ago, and it worked well until I couldn't hardly move because my knees hurt so much. The fasting has a lot of other benefits as well including better blood sugar, burning more fat than carbs, and generally feeling better. The negative aspects of fasting that I expected, like a lack of energy and weaker workouts never happened.  Win-win.  Oh, and I am fitting into clothes I haven't worn in 10 years because they were too tight. 

I read three books this month, too. I read Finding the Dragon Lady, The Silent Patient, and Where the Crawdads Sing.  I enjoyed all of them, but Where the Crawdads Sing was definitely my favorite.  The Silent Patient had a great twist and I learned a bit about Madame Nhu in Finding the Dragon Lady the Mystery of Vietnam's Madame Nhu that I never knew before. I have read 20 books since January 1st, 2020.  Not bad, but I find myself having to scrutinize more closely my next reads.

I wish I had more to report, but the job keeps me from taking any travel right now, not even in-country travel.  Maybe next time.

Memoirs, and More Memoirs

I suppose it's only been ten days since my last post. With teleworking, one day rolls into the next and it gets really hard to distinguish what day I am in.  I've been fortunate that I have been able to get more reading in, of late, and I have to admit the genre of choice has been memoir.

I had read somewhere that The Barracks Thief, by Tobias Wolff was well worth reading and I looked in my library collection but didn't see it there.  I did see This Boy's Life (memoir) that he had written and thought I would give it a try, figuring that if I liked his style I might spring for The Barracks Thief.  I have some holds in the library right now, but The Barracks Thief is definitely a book I plan on purchasing in the future.  I can say indubitably, Tobias Wolff is one of the best writers of books I have read. I very much enjoyed his memoir, which is odd, because the things he wrote about himself made me feel like I very much would not have liked him had I had been a school mate.  He wrote of himself to be everything I didn't like in an ideal, or even acceptable, childhood friend.  Many of his recollections were cringe-worthy, and if nothing else, I admire his courage in writing them down.

The other memoir I just finished was Educated by Tara Westover.  Many of her recollections were equally hard to get through.  She grew up in the foothills of Idaho, raised by a father who was paranoid about the government, and radical in his religious beliefs.  Her mother was a homeopathic healer who was so dedicated to her bipolar husband, she neglected her children in the most basic of needs, love and protection.  The abuse she suffered, and her lifestyle were the perfect backdrop to her story of higher education.  I found it to be a great read.  I borrowed the ebook from the library, and was very lucky that I got a go-to-the-head-of-the-line offer that allowed me to borrow it for a shorter period of time, with no extension.  That's good, because I would have been waiting for about two more months, otherwise.

Other than my reading, I have been working way more than I would like. The stress feels unbearable, for there is no respite in the tasks I have at hand. I need a break, to go somewhere out of the country. But, I know that if I leave, I probably won't be back for quite a while.  This pandemic has to end some time, I just hope it's over sooner than later.