Author: ceddammit

I was diagnosed with Parkinson's Disease (PD) in January of 2015, at the age of 42. Five years later, the progression of PD forced me into an early retirement. It was almost another two years before I finally made this blog happen.

Nevada 2024 Trip Report (Days 3 through 5)

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As usual, I am falling behind on my “real time” trip reports, so I’ll make the next three days go more quickly than usual.

Day 3:

Took this pic at sunrise, from my room on the 18th floor of the Strat…

Went to the National Atomic Museum. Learned that 100 above-ground nuclear tests were performed within sight of Las Vegas during the 1950’s. Tourists came to Vegas from all over, just to see the real, live mushroom clouds. I spent half the day here. I’d recommend it. Next, I drove up Paradise Road to get back to my hotel. Pondered the irony of calling it Paradise Road, when it seems to have been paved by work crews from Hell. Spent most of the rest of the day gambling. I won a shiny fiddle made of gold!

Day 4:

The devil I went down to Bellagio, and watched the fountain show (in broad daylight). It was as I remembered…pretty cool. Proceeded to walk around what I’ll call the Vegas “Skywalk” system. There are liquor stores and restaurants galore, but I wandered into the Bellagio casino and got lost. Once I was found (but not claimed), I headed back to the Pinball Hall of Fame. I found a whole aisle of machines that I had missed on Day 1. This included a large number of OLD (“woodrail”) pinball machines, and more of my favorites (which seemed to be pretty well maintained, and a couple of oddities – notably, a game called Canada Dry. Yes, a pinball game themed after Canada Dry. I ran away.

Day 5:

After a few days of dealing with throngs of people (both in cars and on foot), overpriced (but good) food, a 15-minute walk from my hotel room to my car, and other tribulations, I was quite happy to take this day off and work on my tax returns.

Nevada 2024 Trip Report (Day 1)

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Today was a long day. First, I couldn’t sleep last night; this appears to be happening every time I travel now. At a little after 5:00 AM, I left home and headed to the Charlotte airport. Here, I found the line just to drop off a checked bag for an American Airlines flight was nearly as long as the TSA line. And both were HUGE! It was cold this morning in Charlotte, and there are some cold days in the forecast for this trip, so I was wearing my winter coat. In this mass of humanity. By the time I had to take off my coat at the security checkpoint, I almost couldn’t get the thing off, as I had been sweating so much that the inside of the coat sleeves were soaked to the point of sticking to my arms! Ultimately, I was reminded yet again that I need to get TSA Pre-Check.

Then there was The Flight. I was flying to Las Vegas, Nevada, but had a stop in Los Angeles, California. From Charlotte to L.A. is a 5.5-hour flight, and for a flight that long, I did NOT want to be stuck in “Basic Economy” (read “no leg- or even foot-room”). So, I threw down an extra ninety bucks for an exit row seat. I also took a dose of Lorazepam, hoping this would keep any anxiety at bay AND cause me to sleep through the flight. I did sleep off and on, and the leg room was marvelous!

It took a LONG walk to switch planes in L.A. I have to say, there are large portions of LAX that look more like a high school basement than a major city’s international airport. But never mind that. I made it to the second flight, and on into Las Vegas with no trouble. Since my flight was an early one and I was flying west across three time zones, it wasn’t much past lunch time when I got my rental car. So, I headed to Naked City Pizza, which was recommended on the “Diners, Drive-Ins, and Dives” web site, which specifically endorsed (among other things) the “Steak and Cheese Fries”. So that’s what I ordered. I was a little disappointed. They were good, but not the taste explosion I was hoping I would get.

After lunch, it was still a little too early to check into my hotel room at The Strat (formerly The Stratosphere). So, I hit up the “Pinball Hall of Fame” (PHOF). Please note that this place is not so much a “Hall of Fame” as it is a HUGE arcade with an amazing selection of pinball machines of all ages. There are a fair number of arcade video games as well, and a couple other coin-operated machines of yesteryear. For my purposes, I’ll divide the pinball machines into three categories, like so:

  1. Old (anything built before 1980). PHOF has an AMAZING selection of Old pinball machines, many of which you can still play. Many others cannot be played at any given time, which is understandable, since it must be hard to find parts for them.
  2. Middle-Aged (built between 1980 and 2000). All my favorites fall into this category. I was a little upset at the condition of most of these machines. Yes, it’s gotta be increasingly difficult to find parts for them, but I’ve seen machines in dive bars that are better maintained than many of these are at PHOF. Some of them weren’t even leveled – they wobbled back and forth as if one leg were shorter than the others.
  3. New (built in the 21st century). PHOF had a surprisingly large variety of New machines, and all the ones I tried were in great working order!

Much to my dismay, my arms started cramping after a couple of hours here, so I checked into the hotel and just rested until bed time. I am hoping to go back to PHOF before I leave Las Vegas. If I do, I’ll try to get some pics while I’m there.

Stay tuned, this is planned to be a long and varied trip, so there’s MUCH more to come!

Hiatus Update

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Have you thought about the fact that we’re almost a quarter of the way through the 21st century? I’ve thought about it. It hurts my brain.

There is no ThrowBack Thursday (TBT) this week. As was the case last week, this blog is on a short hiatus. There will also not be a TBT next week, but you can’t blame that one on the hiatus. Next week I will begin my Nevada State Vacation. Not one, but two weeks of fun in the desert! And only four days of that will be in Las Vegas. Once that trip is underway, my posts on this blog will pick back up. But fer now, I’m gonna take a nap.

Hiatus

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Howdy, folks! I just wanted to let you know that I may not be updating this blog for a few weeks. I’m taking an impromptu trip to visit family in Kansas, then will be trying to find a new car in a short time, THEN fighting to get caught up on some things at home, to be sure I’m ready for the Nevada trip I have planned for March 28 – April 12. If nothing else, I definitely WILL be blogging from Nevada about that trip as it unfolds. That trip promises to be full of good pictures, as I will be going to a National Park, a National Conservation Area, two state parks, and that’s not to mention that I’ll be driving “the loneliest stretch of road” in the US Highway system.

“Printing” Brain Cells

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Recently, a friend pointed me to the news article linked here.

This news, while exciting, is also extremely scientific (i.e., hard to read). So, I offer you my summary of what it all means.

First of all, the article is about research done by the University of Wisconsin. Yet it has nothing to do with cheese, Leinenkugel’s, or the Green Bay Packers. I guess Wisconsin does science, too.

The big news is that researchers have found a way to use 3-D printers to print WORKING brain structures. If my understanding is correct (and I do have some questions), it works like this:

  1. Neurons are grown from “induced pluripotent stem cells” (iPSCs). This is the term used for adult stem cells that have been triggered to act like embryonic stem cells. This means they are using stem cells that could be harvested from any adult human being – no embryo or fetus is involved.
  2. These new brain cells are placed into a “bio-ink” (be careful where you put the hyphen in that term or you may end up discussing the sexual orientation of pigs). This bio-ink is the medium that delivers nutrients and oxygen to the new brain cells – essentially it performs the functions normally performed by blood and/or brain fluids.
  3. The brain cells actually begin connecting to and communicating with each other, just like new brain cells in a human embryo.

Now you may be saying to yourself, “But Cedric, what does this all mean for Parkinson’s sufferers?” And if you are talking to yourself…and calling yourself Cedric…then you may be in serious need of psychological help. Believe me! I call myself Cedric, and I am in serious need of psychological help.

The reality is this: scientists have long known that neurons physically connect to one another and communicate through electrical and chemical signals. What they haven’t necessarily understood is exactly how these communications work. Part of the reason for this is the sheer complexity of the brain. The human brain contains about 86 billion neurons, and a typical neuron connects to 1,000 other neurons. This 3-D printing breakthrough enables scientists to create mini-brains with much more manageable numbers of neurons. This of course will make it easier to isolate and study specific aspects of brain functionality, ultimately leading to better understanding of how the brain works. And since Parkinson’s Disease (PD) is a brain-based disease, this better understanding of brain functions could lead to better and/or more permanent treatments for PD. And it doesn’t end with just learning. During the development of new drugs, these “printed brains” could serve as test subjects to determine whether the drug actually works, before moving on to testing it on animals or humans.

My ultimate hope, though the article doesn’t directly say anything about this, is some day they MIGHT be able to cure PD by removing brain cells that have died (the death of cells in a very specific part of the brain leads to PD), then “printing” and implanting replacements for the dead brain cells. Or maybe, just maybe, some day we’ll be able to round up all the truly stupid people in the world and print them each a new brain.