Ever since the near doorman strike back in April, I’ve taken more notice of doormen in the buildings I enter. The NYTimes article about doormen pointed out the haphazard ways that one can become a doorman(woman). I still wonder how one finds a job opening for a doorman position without word-of-mouth referral. I’ve never seen any advertisements for doorman jobs.

I became curious enough on the workings of the doorman world that I decided to ask José, a doorman whom I’ve known for 6 years now. He staffs a 31-floor residential building (that I don’t live in) 4 days week. I befriended him when he allowed me to park my car on the sidewalk of the building when I was moving some furniture. I usually chat with José about once a month, whenever I pass by campus. We usually speak about general world matters, and I was always impressed that José never failed to educate me in politics. Last week we chatted about medicine, and I became sidetracked (from asking him about doorman life) when I commented on his esotropia (ET).

It turns out (no pun intended) that José developed a squint when he about about one year old. He was living in Cuba (!) at the time. His mother had pushed the doctors to straighten his eyes every week for 3 years, without success. Apparently there was a huge deficiency in physicians in Cuba, and the waiting list was infinite. He finally had surgery after 3 years, only to have his ET regress after months. He waited in line for surgery for almost another year before being approved by the government. The day of his surgery, he found out that his ophthalmologist had fled to Spain by means of a fishing boat earlier that morning!

Several years later, José emigrated to Madrid with his mother and brother.  However, ophthalmologists in Madrid determined that it was too late for his amblyopia to improve with surgery, and he fell off the waiting list for surgery to straighten his eyes (non-emergent). He never got around to getting repeat surgery. The interesting part of his journey was that he decided to emigrate again, this time to the US.

“Unemployment is just too high in Spain,” remarked José, “I wanted to come to the U.S.”

Why did he become a doorman?

“I have one bad eye. It’s not safe to drive a cab.”

Too bad taxi drivers with half of José’s vision don’t have the insight to find a different job…

misc life

Back in the heyday of Intel 80486 processors, there were many opportunities to run software on underpowered hardware. I remember those days when Doom! required a math co-processor (DX chip), for its polygonal rendering. Most of us still had the standard SX chips. We found ways to bypass that, as well as the 4mb extended memory requirement. In the end, the software ran, albeit sluggishly.

It seems like hardware has caught up the power race, and most desktop systems are capable of handling all but the most processor-intense applications. I’ve been one to believe that current computers are overpowered for their intended purposes. Who needs a dual-core with 2gb memory and 1gb video ram to browse the ‘net and word process? Indeed, there is no role for this in routine use, but I recently discovered that new hardware helps even with light software use.

I recently installed Microsoft’s Visual Studio with SQL Server onto my 1.7ghz Thinkpad. The installation burned through about 15gb of disk space (out of a 40gb disk) and took over an hour to complete. After the ancillary drivers were installed in place (.NET, Powershell…etc), the laptop ran like a 500-lb man after going through a Vegas buffet. I promptly uninstalled the software.

It’s probably time for an upgrade.

computing rant, tech

On average, I’d say my clinic patients spend at least 3 hours in total at every appointment. Sometimes they are here even longer, if I send them for imaging. Most of the time in the clinic is spent waiting. Additional, many patients arrive at least an hour before their scheduled appointment, adding to the wait.

I try to explain to them that there is no need to arrive so early, especially if the normal wait is already painfully long. Apparently there is a loss of communication. I suspect that there is a rumor among the patients that arriving early at an appointment translates to leaving early. This is as likely to happen as winning at Pai Gao Poker.

I once had a patient who I needed to follow daily for a herpetic corneal ulcer. After four days, he simply stopped showing up. Later, he told me that it was impossible for him to work if he spent hours at the eye clinic daily. Other patients of mine come to clinic ad lib, for prescription refills only. Then there’s the majority of them who sit patiently for 3 hours in the waiting room to be sent to fluorescein angiography for 2 more hours for a proliferative diabetic retinopathy (PDR) workup.

Indeed, to be a clinic patient is to be a special patient.

medicine medicine