Three Times Better?

If you ever had the chance to visit Japan, any number of quirky things might have jumped out of you. You would have noticed the vending machines with coffee in cans. You would have marveled how the crowds followed every crosswalk sign to the letter. And you would have been surprised at the number of people walking around wearing surgical masks.

Certainly this last item doesn't seem so quirky anymore. Ever since Dr. Wu Lien Teh's pioneering work in the 1910 Manchurian Plague, masks have been hailed by epidemiologists as a "principal means of personal protection" with respiratory illnesses. And so once scientists confirmed that COVID was indeed primarily passed through airborne transmission, masks and mask wearing became the primary line of defense for most people around the world.

In the early days they were in short supply. We were asked to stay away from commercially-made surgical grade models so that front line health care workers could have first crack. And so like many others I dragged out an old sewing machine and stitched together various composite contraptions using leftover scraps of old flannel shirts and shoelaces. We tied bandannas around our faces, and did origami with rubber bands and handkerchiefs. Then, as we settled in for the long haul, better seamstresses took over, and now they are as much a fashion accessory as they as they are personal protective equipment. 

But PPE they are. Most of us have long ago chucked the "any cloth in a storm" ones we started out with back in April, and have multiple versions purpose-built to filter out the bad stuff. Some are plain, some are fancy, some match our outfit and some our mood. But by and large they do the job. You don't have to take my word for it: study after study says that properly worn, properly constructed masks can reduce transmission in numbers up to 90%.

The devil, or course, is in the details. You have to wear them correctly, not below your nose protecting your chin. They have to fit tightly, with no gaps for air to get in or out. And they have to be made of tightly woven materials to trap particles, not an old AC DC tee shirt that was on its last legs. If it checks all those boxes, while you might not be vaccinated you still have a pretty good statistical chance of staying on the right side of the trend line.

But now there are some that say that one mask is not enough. The anecdotal argument seems to be that what one misses the second will catch. Also the second makes the first tighter and fit better. Never mind that the mask I wear is a three-ply device with three different materials, each designed to trap things a different way. And as to fit, why not adjust the first correctly? I've been taught to wear my seatbelt low and tight, which I do. I don't add a second one on the off chance I wear it high and loose. And now there are those that that say if two is good, then three must be even better.

Let me say that I am not questioning masks per se. I have no doubt that they are both necessary and effective, and would no sooner go without one than I would get in a car and not fasten my seatbelt. Additionally, as new information comes out, I am quite willing to adjust both my thinking and personal practices to reflect the best factual research that's out there. That's not flip-flopping to follow the crowd, that's learning to follow the data. 

And so show me the proof, and I'll add another layer. Or even two. But it calls to mind a skit that ran on the very first "Saturday Night Live." It was the heyday the Gillette TRAC II razor, a new product for shaving that had not one, but two blades. SNL's mocumercial touted a revolutionary new version, showing slick animation that mirrored Gillette's. It demonstrated the new product, showing that while the FIRST blade stretched and cut the hair, and the SECOND one trimmed it further before it snapped back, a brand new THIRD blade made an even finer trim, "leaving your face as smooth as a billiard ball." The tag line? "The Triple-Trac. Because you'll believe anything."

Hold that thought.

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Marc Wollin of Bedford has masks for work and for play. His column appears regularly in The Record-Review, The Scarsdale Inquirer and online at http://www.glancingaskance.blogspot.com/, as well as via Facebook, LinkedIn and Twitter.

Cat Connection

It might all just end there.

It was cute and fun and spontaneous and harmless. By now you have seen the story and video about the poor lawyer in Texas who borrowed his assistant's computer to join an online court proceeding. Seems it had been used for a prior Zoom meeting by someone who was having some fun, and forgot to restore it back to the normal settings. And so when Presidio County attorney Rod Ponton logged on, he came up as, well, a cat. The judge took it in stride, and tried to walk Ponton through the settings to lose the filter, as Ponton apologized and said with as much professional decorum as he could muster, "I prepared to go forward with it. I'm here live. I'm not a cat." Not quite "The Elephant Man," but there you go.

However, this is today. We're all sitting home with not much to do and plenty of time on our hands. And we have within a few taps of our fingers all the world's information and connections. And so while it's certainly possible that this is one of those viral moments that will disappear as fast as it happened, maybe not. As has been demonstrated by any number of recent stories, like the supposed connection between Dominion Voting Systems and deceased Venezuelan President Hugo Chavez, there is nothing – nothing – that can't potentially lead somewhere else if you have some imagination and the willingness to connect seemingly random dots. And so while odds are that by now you have all but forgotten Attorney Ponton's personal trial, there may well be more to it. As people start hunting and pecking, who knows what else they might unearth?

Perhaps the reason the problem happened was that the computer in question was not actually the assistant's regular machine. In the same vein as the Hunter Biden laptop story, maybe her computer was in the shop, and so she was given a loaner from the repair place. That computer had been just come in from being out with another customer. As Presidio County is on the Mexican border, it turns out that that other customer was actually part of a cartel that was trying to manipulate the tortilla market. The cartel had just had its winter meeting, and post Super Bowl were formulating a new strategy based on the slowdown in the demand for nachos. Per a recent article posted online in El Diario de Chihuahua, the daily paper of record in the closest Mexican city to Presidio, the head of the cartel is known as "Gatito Grande" which translates as "Big Kitty." Hmmmm.

Couple that with our lawyer's prior brush with fame stemming from a notorious case in the early 1980's. As you will find on the third page of Google search results referencing Ponton, he was featured in a documentary on Netflix called "The Confession Killer." Seems he represented Henry Lee Lucas, a convicted murderer who subsequently confessed to over 600 unsolved cases. Turned out that Texas Rangers were letting Lucas look at files before investigators interviewed him as a way of clearing cold cases, and Ponton's work showed Lucas could not have been guilty, resulting in revised ways of handling evidence and confessions. For the record, this extrapolation has nothing to do with that. But in the nether world of Lawyer Kitty, that hardly matters.

Maybe one of the cases Lucas "confessed" to was the theft of a car belonging to Mrs. Daisy Rodriguez of Marfa, Texas. An internet search of Texas motor vehicle registrations for 1981 shows a 1977 Dodge Warlock pickup was stolen on February 9th of that year, 40 years TO THE DAY after Ponton's more recent brush with notoriety. And if that's not suspicious enough, the truck was recovered in good shape, save for a rough etching of an animal on the right rear quarter panel of the vehicle. Officer's notes said that the scratchings "resembled a cat." Is it mere coincidence that Ponton's internet avatar was also in the bottom (or "rear") quadrant of the zoom call? 

Take all of this together and what do you have? Is there some kind of feline/car theft/tortilla cartel connection? It's all online so it must be true. Or to paraphrase, and with apologies to Freud for something he never actually said, sometimes a Zoom cat might be just a cat.

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Marc Wollin of Bedford has nothing better to do but imagine "what if." His column appears regularly in The Record-Review, The Scarsdale Inquirer and online at http://www.glancingaskance.blogspot.com/, as well as via Facebook, LinkedIn and Twitter.

On Your Wedding

Dear Allison and Dave;  

I know this isn't the way you wanted it to be.  

That seems such an obvious statement, but it succinctly captures the situation. On the day of your wedding you didn't want there to be a pandemic. You didn't want Allison's parents to be stuck in California, us in Bedford, and all your family and friends in their places. You didn't want to have to use the term "virtually" in a sentence about the most important day in your lives. What you wanted was for all of us to be able to gather and celebrate, drink a little, dance a little, and send you off to a new life with a round of applause and a raised glass. But at this point in time that's just not in the cards. And so let us accept it as the immovable object and go on from there.

The bottom line is that while the venue and style for the event are certainly different, the tone and tenor are not. At its heart it is still about you, and your love for one another. It is about your community coming together to recognize, acknowledge and celebrate that fact in a most public way. And it is about you making a commitment to each other that, whatever hand life deals you, you will face it together. In a way, perhaps more than ever, this past year has made that last point not an academic discussion but a true test, one you have easily negotiated and passed.  

In fact your time together, both before this past year and indeed more recently with our enforced togetherness, has hopefully taught you numerous lessons about how to do that successfully, lessons that are easy to articulate but hard to practice. Yes, many are simplistic and trite, but that doesn't make them any less true. Listen more than talk. Give space and closeness in equal measures. Love quickly and anger slowly. Speaking for myself, after 36 years, I am still discovering them and trying to put them into practice.  

A more recent take comes by way of Scott Galloway, who wears many hats from professor to speaker to entrepreneur to podcaster. He is known for his ability to cut through the noise and elucidate the heart of a matter, be it technology or business or politics. As to marriage, his observations are no less direct and realistic, and at least as a good roadmap to follow as any other. He says never let your other be cold or hungry. That might mean a blanket or a Powerbar or a hug, but being warm and sated is the key to all of us being happy. Don't keep score.  Marriage is not a zero sum game. You will inevitably overvalue your contribution and undervalue the other's. It's a partnership, not a transaction. And constantly express affection and desire. We all want to feel we are the one, the chosen. Say it often in word and in deed. Yes, I love you. But just as importantly, I choose you.  

With the presumptuousness that comes with owning a few published inches, let me say that I think I can speak for all who know you two that none of the above will be an issue. That's not to say that there won't be moments along the way: if the last year has taught us anything it's that we can't even imagine the curve balls we sometimes get thrown. But anyone who has spent any time with you both knows how deeply you care for each other, how respectful you are of each other, how much you only want what is  best for each other. If that's not the truest definition of love, then I'm not sure what is.  

So for now, let us just look at it as if we are hitting a pause switch on our celebration. A year from now we will hopefully gather as one, and pick up where we are leaving off. We'll gather from far and wide, and be able to say maskless and in person what we are all saying now, just from a distant remove: we love you, we congratulate you, and we wish nothing but the best as you start this new chapter in your lives not as two, but as one.  

With much love, me.

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Allison Hess and Dave Wollin will be married on February 14, 2021. Dad-in-law's/Dad's column appears regularly in The Record-Review, The Scarsdale Inquirer and online at http://www.glancingaskance.blogspot.com/, as well as via Facebook, Linked+In and Twitter.

No Peeking

It wasn’t that long ago that if you were curious about anything you would find info or a picture or an ad to answer your questions, and it would be your little secret. Research of the most rudimentary kind, it started when you were a kid. Your guide might have been World Book or Encyclopedia Britannica, or just as likely Playboy or National Geographic. It gave you a chance to look at things your parents couldn’t or wouldn’t tell you about. So you waited till they went out or hid under the covers, and you dug in. How else were you going to know what boy parts and girl parts actually looked like?

As you got older it was no different, but the objects of your curiosity were wider. For sure there were still questions about sex, but it went far beyond that. It might be about a band or a weapon or a drug, a lifestyle or a religion. Or it might be about some darker world that you had heard of and just wanted to see what all the fuss was about.

The thing was that it was pretty easy to hide your exploration. You could take a book from the library shelves and sit in the back, or listen to a song late at night through headphones, or simply read the article or ad in the paper or magazine. When finished you put it all away or just turned the page, and no one was the wiser, except you.

No more. With 90% of our wanderings happening online, nothing is hidden. Sure there are ways of masking your activity, but most don’t bother. It’s not that we don’t know our every click is being tracked, it’s that most don’t care. If spite our protestations about being watched, we live our lives not just in the open, but in front of a bunch of accountants who are tallying our every action. We use Uber to call a car (where we are), Doordash to order food (what we eat) and Amazon to shop (what we buy). We think of all that data as being anonymous and innocent and useless, until, well, we really think about it. One acquaintance was on the phone troubleshooting a problem with his online provider and they asked if they could look at his search history. His response: “No! Look Away! Look away!” 

The bottom line is there is no more surreptitious looking. Everything is being recorded and noted in some spreadsheet somewhere. But it’s also true that 99% of that information is not being judged or considered or ogled by any living being. Bots, AI engines, algorithms? You bet. Actual people? Not so much. It’s like passwords. We select combinations we think no one can guess, while the “guessing” isn’t being done by anyone. As explained to me by a hacker, it’s not like someone is pouring over your profile and trying combinations of your birthday and kids’ names. Rather they set a computer program to rifle through every combination while they go out for pizza.

Still, it’s all being tallied. And so it can be disconcerting to click on something of a personal nature, and see the follow up. Surely no one is watching if you take a quick look at solutions for smelly feet or excessive sweating or hearing aids. No “one” is. But some “it” is. And that means the next time you go online to check the weather you’re presented with ads for “Odor BeGone” and “SweatBlock” and “Eargo HearClears.” And no matter how many times you refresh your screen, they will never, ever go away. Just when you least expect it, you will call someone over to watch a really cool video you found online, and before it starts there will be a 10 second ad that starts “If you still have that itch, go to stopthescratch.com.” Me? Nah, couldn’t be for me.

It’s all out there for the taking, but there’s no peeking. True, there’s also no judging, so that helps. But even if you don’t post it on your Facebook page, there is most definitely a record. Remember in elementary school how Mrs. Maransik used to threaten that if you weren’t careful your transgressions would be noted in your “master file.” Well, it really exists, except it's less about stealing Billy’s homework, and more about your curiosity over naked Justin Bieber pics. 

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Marc Wollin of Bedford sees endless ads for snoring remedies. His column appears regularly in The Record-Review, The Scarsdale Inquirer and online at http://www.glancingaskance.blogspot.com/, as well as via Facebook, LinkedIn and Twitter.