A New Yorker in Oslo

Monday, June 23, 2025

Summer solstice blessing

I don't know who the author of this little poem is, but it's a nice little poem for the summer solstice. Enjoy......

Saturday, June 21, 2025

Reflections on The Capture--a futuristic horror story?

We recently discovered this compelling thriller series on Viaplay (The Capture (TV Series 2019–2025) - IMDb, and I can only say that watching it will induce a fair amount of paranoia and surprise. Surprise that video surveillance using CCTV (closed circuit TV) has come as far as it has in Britain. London to be exact. I knew that there were video cameras everywhere, but I didn't realize the extent of the surveillance. To sum up the series, it deals with the use of video surveillance to track the movements of potential terrorists and anarchists, but in doing so it unsurprisingly tracks the movements of ordinary folk. Facial recognition technology using AI also enters the picture. What transpires is tantamount to a horror film about the future to come (or is it already here?), in that the video experts have developed a technique called 'correction' that allows them to manipulate video footage in real-time. So that what you think you're watching in real-time is not real; it has been altered (in most cases via sophisticated hacking) to suit the purposes of those who want 'corrected' footage. In the first season, the counter-terrorism group, in order to prosecute a suspected terrorist, had altered video footage in order to 'include' said terrorist. This was done in order to be able to introduce the footage into a court of law, since recorded conversations and the like are apparently inadmissible. The person in question was actually a terrorist, so the argument was that even though recorded conversations could not be admitted into a court of law, altering a video to include the terrorist was ok because he was actually a terrorist. The main story of the first season is about a young soldier whose lawyer ends up dead, and he is accused of murdering her. Except that he hasn't done so, but there is video footage showing that he has attacked her and that she never got on her bus to go home. She was kidnapped by persons unknown. We know that the soldier isn't the culprit; that's established early on. The problem is proving it, and that proves to be difficult.

It's not difficult to imagine how this technology can be misused, especially when AI enters the picture. The point was made early on in the series that China and Russia were already using 'correction'. How real is it? We all know about/have heard about deepfake videos and the like. I'm going to include Wikipedia's description of deepfake in order to reveal just how far deepfake has come:

Deepfakes (a portmanteau of 'deep learning' and 'fake' are images, videos, or audio that have been edited or generated using artificial intelligence, AI-based tools or AV editing software. They may depict real or fictional people and are considered a form of synthetic media, that is media that is usually created by artificial intelligence systems by combining various media elements into a new media artifact......Deepfakes have garnered widespread attention for their potential use in creating child sexual abuse material, celebrity pornographic videos, revenge porn, fake news, hoaxes, bullying, and financial fraud.

In the series, the point is made that democratic societies began to use correction technology to counter the misuse by non-democratic societies, but of course we know that it's only a matter of time before the misuse infiltrates the democratic societies as well. Because in real life there are always villains and people on the take, grifters willing to sell out their country for a good sum. In addition, MI5 and the CIA are always involved in these series (often in very questionable ways), and the picture is never pretty in terms of what they do to people who oppose them. It's actually quite scary to think about a world in which you perhaps possess the 'true' video footage of an event, only to be told that the 'corrected' video footage is the real footage. It's your word against theirs (the police and counter-terrorism folks). And the little man or woman does not win against the tech-savvy folks. The little folks are suppressed and threatened with career destruction/slandering/destruction of reputation. In the worst case, their lives are threatened. There is no shortage of assassinations in The Capture.

So how much of this is true, and how far has the technique of correction come? Britain is apparently the most video-monitored country in the world. CCTV began in the 1960s as a measure to monitor crowd activity, traffic, and eventually criminal activity, and to the latter end it's been fairly effective. What makes me nervous is realizing that the use of CCTV requires a huge number of people who sit and monitor footage 24/7. Are all these people reliable, honest, and good? It's not possible since we are only human. So the potential for misuse, for data manipulation, for altering the 'truth' is real ‘The public have a right to be concerned’: the real story behind BBC One’s surveillance and technology thriller, The Capture – The i Paper

We are moving towards a strange new world where AI will dominate much of our lives. A brave new world? Some might say that it's going to be survival of the fittest. I used to say that if you have nothing to hide, being monitored won't bother you. But now I'm not so sure. The true horror lies in what you can do to politicians, famous people, celebrities, etc. by misusing data technology. The true horror is what will happen to democratic societies when no one is sure of what is 'true' anymore. We have reached that point in politics, and it makes me wonder about the presidential races during the past decade or so. What is the truth, really? Who can tell us? I would argue that we know deep down what the truth is, but as is often said, reality is stranger than fiction. I hope not for the future of society.

Thursday, June 19, 2025

Grateful for the gift of life

I have been going to cardio training classes for the past two months, and am very pleased with the results thus far. I have better endurance and balance, both of which I needed. I'm still tired from time to time, but since my operation, I'm less tired for each day that passes. We train outdoors on a grass lawn in the vicinity of the local hospital that is responsible for the training that is conducted by licensed physiotherapists. When the weather is nice, as it has been for the past month, it is nice to look up at the blue sky and feel the wind that blows through the tall trees around us. The sun and the wind make me feel grateful for being alive so that I can experience them. It's hard to explain if you haven't been through a major heart operation, but being grateful for being alive is one of the feelings that dominates each day. Being alive is a gift. Mitral valve surgery (in my case--repair) was not a given forty or fifty years ago. It's 'routine' surgery now, but in order to have become so, it has evolved over the years from attempts at repair to successful repair mostly due to the development of the heart-lung machine in 1953. I am grateful for all the cardiologists and surgeons who have dedicated their lives and careers to bettering the lives of others and to keeping heart patients alive. They are amazing individuals who deserve all the praise they get. Men and women in my parents' generation were not so lucky, since the technique was still evolving.

The best thing about the classes has been being together with others who have gone through the same or similar heart operations. Our class consists of about twenty or so persons, split more or less evenly between the sexes. Most are older people, but some are middle-aged and young. When I started, the physiotherapists told me I could proceed at my own pace and do the exercises I felt that I could manage. When I started, I had poor balance. Not anymore. So it's eye-opening what training can do to improve one's physical form. The others also do what they can. I like the smiling faces I meet the days I'm there, and talking to some of the people in the class. I hope I meet some of them again when the class ends, as it will before summer vacation. I've been offered a spot in a more intensive cardio training course after the summer, and I've accepted it. I hope I meet some of my fellow 'travelers' there. I am grateful for them as well, for showing me that fear and nervousness can be overcome. It's been valuable to experience that together with others who are in the same boat with me. I'm grateful too for the physiotherapists who motivate us to continue, who tell us that we're doing well, and who guide us through the exercises. They're worth their weight in gold.

Friday, June 13, 2025

Wise words from the new pope

I do like the new pope. He says it like it is.

Wednesday, June 4, 2025

Closer To Home (I'm Your Captain) by Grand Funk Railroad

I heard this song yesterday, and it brought me right back to that time in my life when we were teenagers and discovering music. And there was so much good music to discover. So many good bands, not like today with mostly one-hit wonders who score it big and then go and do something else after having earned tens of millions of dollars. It seems to me that music was less about business then compared to today. And I'm glad for that. Enjoy this song from 1970. I'm including the lyrics as well.

[Verse 1]

Everybody, listen to me

And return me my ship

I'm your captain, I'm your captain (Alright)

Though I'm feeling mighty sick

[Verse 2]

I've been lost now, days uncounted

And it's months since I've seen home

Can you hear me? Can you hear me?

Or am I all alone?

[Verse 3]

If you return me to my home port

I will kiss you, Mother Earth

Take me back now, take me back now

To the port of my birth

[Instrumental Break]

[Verse 4]

Am I in my cabin dreaming

Or are you really scheming

To take my ship away from me?

You'd better think about it

I just can't live without it

So, please don't take my ship from me, yeah, yeah, yeah

[Instrumental Break]

[Verse 5]

I can feel the hand of a stranger

And it's tightening around my throat

Heaven help me, heaven help me

Take this stranger from my boat

I'm your captain, I'm your captain

Though I'm feeling mighty sick

Everybody, listen to me

And return me my ship

[Pre-Chorus]

I'm your captain, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah

[Chorus]

I'm getting closer to my home

I'm getting closer to my home, oh

[Instrumental Break]

[Chorus]

I'm getting closer to my home

Sunday, June 1, 2025

Having gratitude

Thursday, May 29, 2025

Saying goodbye to Don

A bittersweet post today, as it will be about the passing of the last of my bosses, Don, from my Memorial Sloan-Kettering Cancer Center days. I think about those years from time to time and reflect upon how lucky I was to have worked there and to have had the bosses that I had. They are all deceased now. It was a different world then, and while I wouldn't return to it, I know too that the work world now is very different than when I was starting my career in the early 1980s.

My first encounter (and memory) of Don was when I interviewed for a flow cytometry position at Memorial Sloan-Kettering in the laboratory for investigative cytology. Don was a tall man and one who loved to eat, but he was slim, not at all overweight. While he was interviewing me, he was eating a hamburger and fries. That might have put some people off, but not me. I found it charming. He explained that this was his afternoon snack before dinner. He also told me that he got to work early each day and went to the cantina for a good breakfast. It wasn't clear to me whether he had eaten breakfast at home first, but it didn't matter. His folksy manner put me right at ease, and I knew that we would work well together. That was in 1982. In 1983, he and his family moved back to Brookings South Dakota where the Evenson family farm was located. He became Professor of Biochemistry at South Dakota State University and worked there for many years. In 1991, he and his wife Carol came to Oslo on sabbatical for a year. Don was friendly with Ole Petter, my boss in Oslo at that time, and we ended up sharing an office for a year and working together on his sperm chromatin structure assay projects. That year went by too fast, but it is filled with good memories of work and social activities. We and our colleagues often went out to eat in the evenings, or out dancing. Sometimes there were get-togethers at different homes. Carol ended up leaving for home in September of that year, but Don stayed until the end of the year. We celebrated Thanksgiving with another American scientist living in Oslo; there must have been at least twenty of us. Don promised he would bring the turkey and cranberries to make cranberry sauce. And he did, after visiting the US and smuggling a turkey in his luggage on his return trip to Oslo. How he managed that, no one knows, as it was a big turkey. Just one of many fun memories I have of him. He was never ruffled about such things; he just assumed they would work out, and they did.

He was a true scientist, interested in new technologies and techniques and how to apply them to his work with sperm chromatin structure. He was interested in helping infertile couples with his sperm chromatin structure assay (SCSA) technique, and he later founded a company to do this assay on human sperm from men who wanted to ensure that they could father children. He kept on doing research at the same time as he ran his company, and he traveled to many different conferences to present his work. I am proud to have been a co-author on several of his publications.

He and Carol loved to travel and had probably seen most of the world. One trip stands out in my mind; they attended a voodoo ceremony in Haiti, somewhere out in the forest. I remember asking him if he had been nervous about doing that. He said no. That was his attitude to most things, as I pointed out previously. If he had any fears, he hid them well. He trusted that life would treat him well, and for the most part it did. And he made the most of the life that was given him. He was a kind man, not given to anger, negativity, or cynicism. I believe that his faith in God kept him grateful and happy. He and Carol were married for sixty-two years at his passing at 84 in March of this year. I will remember him, Frank, Zbigniew and Myron for always. Smart men and nice men who treated women well. May they all rest in peace.

This is me (wanting more plants)

Tuesday, May 6, 2025

The angels among us

As a Catholic, the word 'angel' has always been a part of my vocabulary, but I would have been hard pressed previously to say that I believed in the presence of angels. Or perhaps it's more accurate to say that I believed in them but that I didn't really think about them or focus on them in any way. I've been in a couple of dangerous situations through the years and emerged unscathed from them, and when I look back, I believe that my guardian angel protected me from harm. We learn to pray to our guardian angel as children (Catholicism), but again, most of us say the words without really thinking about what we're saying. And that's ok; perhaps it's meant to be that way.

I was hospitalized for three weeks during the month of April, and during that time, I met many different people--doctors, nurses, technicians, aides, ambulance drivers, and other patients. All of the people I met touched me in different ways with their kindness and caring; I was well taken care of and I am very grateful for the excellent care that I received. I know that some readers will say that doctors and nurses should be kind and caring, but my feeling is that some of them went above and beyond the call of duty. I will remember them always, from the doctor at the urgent care facility who understood the seriousness of my condition and had me admitted to a hospital immediately, to the different doctors who patiently explained the different tests and procedures that I needed to undergo so that I could have a necessary operation, to the nurses in intensive care who monitored me 24/7, to the ambulance drivers who kept me talking so that I could focus on happier times. All of them were wonderful people and I can't thank them enough for what they did for me.

There are some few people with whom I interacted that I would say were angels, in the sense that I felt that they were sent to me by God for a reason. Angels are considered to be spiritual beings (without a physical body), so my question is whether all angels 'know' who they are and if they can manifest themselves through humans. The first person was a seventy-eight year old woman named Vigdis, who was my roommate the first weekend I was hospitalized, and then after I was moved to another room, was someone I would meet for lunch and dinner in the hospital cantina. She said it best, that we liked to 'skravle' (to talk a lot and for a long time about many things). She had been through four hip operations, had had a broken back, and had lost her husband to cancer. She had a sense of humor that carried her through most of life's trials, and I so enjoyed talking to her. At one point, I realized that she was sent to me to take my mind off my own trials, and I told her that because I felt it so strongly. I had a very strong sense of being protected by her. She understood what I meant, and then we went on to talk about other things. When she was about to be released from the hospital, I met her to say goodbye, and she just said to me "give me a hug", which I did. And then we said goodbye and wished each other well.

Two of my many nurses, Kaia and Nashia, were also sent to me for a reason. I knew that whatever happened to me under their care, that they would protect me. All of my nurses were very good to me, but they extended themselves in ways that made me feel that there was something extra surrounding our interactions. On Easter Sunday, Nashia asked me if I was religious, and I said I was. So she arranged for me to attend an interdenominational service led by a female priest named Berit, with whom I connected immediately. I told her how much I enjoyed the service, and when I met her the next day in the hallway, she told me that she had been thinking of me. I told her that I had been thinking of her as well because I had told my husband how much I enjoyed the service, and that I wished that my church would allow female priests. She excused herself for several minutes, and came back with a pair of rosary beads that she offered to me as an Easter gift. We talked about the pope for a while (he had just passed away and she had great respect for him), and then we parted. I will never forget her kindness to me; something in people's eyes that you can see. 'The eyes are the window to the soul', as has been said previously. They truly are. But again, I sensed that feeling of being protected, this time that my soul was protected. It's hard to describe it any other way.

I could relate many more stories about the people I met during the three weeks I was sick, from the Iranian woman named Fatemeh who wished me well and told me there was something very special about me, to the nurse who, a couple of days after my operation, asked me how I had slept. When I told her that I had dreamed about eating a toasted buttered roll with scrambled eggs, she had the cantina prepare that for me. She didn't have to do that, but she went out of her way to make me happy. Then there was Liv, a very nice medical doctor doing research for her PhD, who asked me to be part of her research study since I fit the participation criteria. Since I was a cancer researcher before I retired, it was easy to say yes to her and to discuss her project with her. It's those extra little touches of kindness and caring that made me feel that I could get well again, that I will get well. I hang on to those moments when I feel a bit down. I hang on to those feelings of being protected.

These I Can Promise--a short poem by Mark Twain

A short but lovely poem by Mark Twain.....

Tuesday, April 29, 2025

It's been a while--an update

It's been a while since I wrote any posts for my blog. It's not because I didn't want to, but because life threw me a curve ball that I spent the month of April dealing with. Suffice it to say that the curve ball was health-related and that I spent nearly a month in the hospital. I'm back home now and recovering from a heart operation. My doctors tell me that I will be fine, and I trust them since they're the experts. But I wanted to let you know that I'm still writing my blog and I'll be posting more soon as time goes on......

Thank you for your support, always.

Monday, March 31, 2025

Deep Forest - Forest Hymn

I loved this song from the first time I heard it!

Sunday, March 30, 2025

Bridge of Sighs (2007 Remaster)-Robin Trower

Just a great song!

Thursday, March 27, 2025

The current state of affairs

Tuesday, March 18, 2025

The Youngbloods - Get Together (Audio)

Another time, another era--hard to believe it actually existed when you see all the hatred around us now.....Rest in peace, Jesse Colin Young.

Lyrics to Get Together:

Love is but a song to sing

Fear's the way we die

You can make the mountains ring

Or make the angels cry

Though the bird is on the wing

And you may not know why

Come on people now

Smile on your brother

Everybody get together

Try to love one another

Right now

Some may come and some may go

We shall surely pass

When the one that left us here

Returns for us at last

We are but a moment's sunlight

Fading in the grass

Come on people now

Smile on your brother

Everybody get together

Try to love one another

Right now

Come on people now

Smile on your brother

Everybody get together

Try to love one another

Right now

Come on people now

Smile on your brother

Everybody get together

Try to love one another

Right now