Winter and construction

I was told many moons ago that there are 2 seasons in Ottawa ... winter and construction. The Addis version of that is the rainy season and construction. During the few months when there is no rain here, they go out of their way to fix what they can on the roads, and they do need some serious attention. A lot of the dips in the sidewalks for the entrance ways to driveways have been filled in with sloping depressions to the bottom where they meet the road, For ferenge that is HUGE. We did Chinese food at a new place near Dr. Paul's tonight and it was good. I then cabbed it back to Deker for my nightly dose of Tony and Carm. They have a habit of diffing large holes in the streets and walkways here and I finally figured out what the holes are for ... it's so they have enough dirt to put back in the hole they just dug :)

CT scan

I kept the images from the CT scan output and the gray matter in my head, just as expected, is made up of my wife and family, Pink Floyd, Boston, Steely Dan, Foreigner, bass and 6-string electric guitars, mustard, hot sauce, Honda 1100 Sabres, Seinfeld, Oracle software, and horseradish :).

Pressure on the optical nerve

The vision in my left eye was somewhat blurred over the past few days so I was a little concerned. I went to a clinic at Dembel mall and they could do nothing for me as they had no no doctor. They sent me to Adua clinic near the office and the doctor there did a whole bunch of tests, and gave me some drops to dilate the left-eye pupil. The doctor then had a look with a magnifying scope and light and suggested the optic nerve might be irritated. He showed me on his diagrams on the wall where the problem may lie. He suggested I get a CT scan as he was curious if there was anything applying pressure.

Two and a half hours later, I return to the Ethio-Canada imaging clinic and pick up the output of the scan. Nothing to note which is good. The doctor prescribed prednisone for me to take 10 tablets each day for 5 days, in batches of 3 or 4 at at time. This will assist reducing the swelling that appears to be putting pressure on the nerve. I will go back to see Dr. Michael on Friday or Saturday AM.

Tennis tennis tennis

The trip to the Hilton was entertaining. We went there about 11AM Sunday and as it turned out, Melaku was in a tournament and was playing his next match at noon. Once we got there he showed me the entry on the bulletin board schedule and it was at 1PM not noon. We watched the tail end of a match then a set or so of play between two women. One was noticeably stronger than the other, evidenced by the score.

Then I was informed that Melaku's match was about to begin on another court, so off the fan club trundled. Supposedly the guy he was playing is from the national team and a very strong player. Melaku had his problems right from the start. The first of which was that for the first 2-3 games, the guy did little or not moving around the court to return Melaku's ball. From his play that I have seen before, his as his frustration level increases, his racquet gets dropped on the court more often in parallel. After the two-set loss, Melaku told me he played like a beginner, and I quipped "You mean like me :)". We watched another set or so between two other very strong players whose serving and forehand were marvelous. I then went back to the guest house stopping at Blue Drops for a bite.

I looked up the ATP tennis final on DsTV and was told it started at 4PM in Ethiopia. I went down to Blue Drops but was unable to wrestle the TV away from a football show someone was watching so realized I would just miss the final. The phone rang about 6 and Melaku mentioned he was somewhere watching the start of the match. I went to Blue Drops again but the TV was anxiously being watched by many people. I called and asked him to let me know what happens and he offered to come pick me up.

We went to the Bolé 23 tennis club close to the airport, and the 6 birr beer coupled with the tennis was GREAT! The place was packed. Davydenko in particular but both he and Del Potro had amazing cross-court returns that seemed to travel parallel to the court and from a point close to top-left of the offensive court into the same location for the opponent to return (which was next to impossible). After the 2-set match, he dropped me at the guest house.

The Saturday seminar series

The meeting today was fruitful for the presenters and hopefully for attendees as well. The show got started a bit late. Coffee and other sustenance was slated for 8:30 but they did not arrive until closer to 9. The security was supposed to be tight at MoFED for the seminar. They wanted names of attendees in advance and would not let anyone in not on the list. So we get there about 7:40 and the front gate to the complex is open, as is the main building, and the guard house empty.

We got the 747 PC running early to ensure we did not have display problems with the presentations and just before we started, the AC died on the PC and while getting it started again, we started to have the familiar display issues seen previously with this machine. I ended up doing the first presentation without the slide show. I have probably given over 100 papers in the past 20 years and this was the first time I had no colour slides in a projector (circa 1991), Harvard Graphics-generated transparencies (circa 1994), or PowerPoint slides to work from. It was fun and I even managed to stay on topic with what I remember from last looking at the material.

I did my own paper next (the first was Dr. Paul's that I gave as he was already in the US). That was good too and the audience was very attentive. They smiled when supposed to and lapped up the very light humour I have a tendency of populating my talks with. Then John Jeunnette did his paper and the meeting broke up after a few closing words from the organizer.

I had a MoFEChat for a while with Tagel and then we went Chinese at East Garden, near the airport; as well one of the Chinese establishments I had not yet frequented. The food was good and the hot sauce exquisite. I watched Davydenko beat Federer at the early Barclays Final Tour match then hung out. I met Misha and Dora for a farewell chat at Blue Drops, then hoped to grab the late Barclays match but that never started by the time to depart.

Tomorrow will be one or two tennis matches hanging out with Melaku (no I am not playing, just watching). The second is at the Hilton and I am curious to see the facilities there. We are hoping to grab the final of Barclays at 5PM local time (I think) at Bliue Drops.

The Saturday Mofinar

At MoFED preparing for the Saturday AM seminar. I had trouble sleeping last night 'cause I had so many weird dreams. I tried playing on the internet about 3AM hoping everyone else in Ethiopia would be sleeping. That was not the case as the bandwidth was poor. My next spare-time mission is to figure out what the game of cricket is all about. I need a substitute for hockey, so figured I might as well try to master somethign simple like cricket (ya right). I will report on the seminar later. We are expecting close to 100 people.

As I've always said, truth is stranger than fiction.

I made a tpyo in my last post ... "too strong for Rafa. It was interesting, since ND's first server".

Notice the r in server; I meant to say first serve. Considering the business I am in, concerned with this server and that server not to mention the Oracle Server, no wonder I made that tpyo :)