The Easiest Way to Check your Blood Glucose

 I was diagnosed as a type 2 diabetic more than two decades ago, and at the time, the most exciting breakthrough in glucometer technology was one with which you could draw blood from less sensitive areas, such as a forearm or the heel of a hand, instead of one's fingertips. Still it was a pain—both literally and figuratively—to have to do this several times a day, and it was a major aggravation to have to carry a glucometer, lancets, test strips, and a lancing device around with me. As a result, I didn't test my sugar nearly as often as I should have.

It took many years for a solution to this problem arrive, but in about 2018, my doctor suggested I try the new Freestyle Libre2 14-day blood glucose monitoring system. This was a game-changer. Wear a sensor on my arm (I like to refer to it as a Borg implant) and check my sugar by touching a monitoring device or smart phone to it. When I first started using the sensors, my smart phone was one generation too old to be compatible with the sensors, so I used a dedicated monitoring device, which looked like a conventional glucometer, and even accepted test strips as a backup, but eventually, I upgraded my smart phone to one capable of reading the sensors, where I could use it instead. Less hardware to carry around meant more frequent checks. Just open the Freestyle Libre app and touch my phone to the sensor. What could be easier than that?

The answer to that question came to me last December when I went to visit my doctor for my four-month checkup and he handed me a 'gift bag' containing a new sensor, the Freestyle Libre3. This sensor used Bluetooth technology to continually communicate with my phone, providing updates every minute and triggering alarms when my glucose levels go out of range, either too high or too low. All I have to do is open the app to see how I'm doing. As if that wasn't an improvement enough, the Libre3 sensor is considerably smaller than its predecessor, presenting less of a target to bump and get knocked off my arm. 

The only real issue I've had with the Libre3 sensors is getting hold of them. When my doctor first wrote me a prescription for them, the pharmacy I used didn't have them and didn't know when they'd get them in stock, so I temporarily went back to the Libre2 sensors. Eventually, they became available, but either the way the prescription was written or the way my insurance company has specified that it be filled, I had to get a large quantity at once. The first pharmacy I tried wanted more than $500 for an order of nine sensors. I later found them at another pharmacy, where I get six for what I'd previously paid for two Libre2 sensors. Better functionality for a third the price, I'll take it!

The net result of all this is I'm checking my blood sugar more frequently than ever, and using that information to make better food choices, which is a win all the way around. 

The last time I saw my doctor, we found ourselves speculating what innovations a Freestyle Libre4 sensor might bring. Thirty-day service life? Smart watch integration? We'll just have to wait and see.

UPDATE: A few weeks ago, I went to refill my prescription for Libre3 sensors and received the most unwelcome news that my health insurance no longer covered them. They wanted me to switch to a different brand, the Dexcom G7, but they wanted prior authorization before making the switch. This process has dragged out for more than a month; meanwhile, my doctor has kept me supplied with free "samples" of Libre3 sensors. 

Based on my reading, the Dexcom G7 operates essentially the same as the Libre3, except that it lasts only ten days, instead of 14, and it transmits data to the user's phone once every five minutes, instead of every 60 seconds. I think I can live with the less frequent data uploads, especially if that extends my phone's battery life, which has been significantly shorter since I started using the Libre3. The ten-day operational life is a little more of a wild card, as I have no idea how much the Dexcom sensors will cost me. If my copay is significantly less expensive than the Libre3 sensors were, then it will okay; otherwise, it will be a less cost effective solution. I'll make a full assessment, if and when the prescription ever gets filled.

The Night They Drove Ol' Robbie Down

With the recent passing of Robbie Robertson on August 9, I'm finding myself revisiting the music of The Band, most of which he wrote. Today, The Band is widely acknowledged as one of the progenitors of the musical sub-genre known as Americana, which blends aspects of country, rock, folk, blues, jazz, etc., into a uniquely American art form.

The Band's story is also unique. Instead of bursting onto the scene with their debut album, they quietly paid their dues, first backing rockabilly artist Ronnie Hawkins as The Hawks, then backing Bob Dylan as he controversially electrified the folk scene in the mid-'60s, eventually collaborating with him on the Basement Tapes project, while he recuperated from a near-fatal motorcycle accident.  

As a result, their first studio album, Music From Big Pink (1968) conveys a maturity, achieved through almost a decade of playing together live. It, and its 1970 follow-up, the eponymously titled The Band, make a good introduction to their music, and together contain many of their best known songs. 

While jumping on at the beginning with those two albums has its virtues, another option for a broader view is the two-disc compilation from 1988 called To Kingdom Come. Released during the heyday of CD reissues, To Kingdom Come has one noticeable shortcoming shared by many digital remixes from that era, which consists mainly of bumping up the bass and drums in an attempt to give the music a bit more 'punch'. Nonetheless, the collection presents a concise but comprehensive overview of The Band's entire catalog, plus a handful of unreleased rarities. The three-disc box set, Across the Great Divide, is also excellent in its own right, presenting The Band in context with their earlier incarnation as the Hawks, along with a larger helping of rarities, but I tend to prefer To Kingdom Come because it is more focused and presents a solid collection of must-have tunes.

Also worth considering for anyone new to The Band is their live album Rock of Ages. Originally issued on two LP's, and later in several different CD configurations, this album captures The Band at the peak of their powers in a four-night run at New York's Academy of Music, culminating on New Year's Eve 1971. Performances on this set are generally more energetic than their studio counterparts, as would be expected from a band that cut its teeth on stage. A particular highlight is keyboardist Garth Hudson's Bach-inspired organ workout, called "The Genetic Method". CD versions of this album are many and varied. Its first CD version was a single disc that was missing a couple of tracks to fit it onto one disc, as was common practice in the early days of CD reissues. It later came out as an expanded two-disc collection that included most of guest artist Bob Dylan's performance with them, as they welcomed in 1972. The entire four-night run was also issued as a limited edition box set, and at the other end of the spectrum is a severely truncated 11-track CD titled The Night They Drove Old Dixie Down.

Honorable mention goes to The Last Waltz, the soundtrack to Martin Scorsese's concert film of the same name, which documented The Band's farewell performance on Thanksgiving 1976 that included a virtual who's who of popular music at the time, including Bob Dylan, Van Morrison, Neil Young, Joni Mitchell, Ringo Starr, Muddy Waters, Neil Diamond, and the Staples Singers, among others. Originally issued on three LP's, which later fit comfortably on two CD's, it also came out as an expanded four-CD box set titled The Complete Last Waltz. While it is excellent in its own right, it isn't as good of an introduction to The Band as some of the other albums mentioned, as the arrangements are often quite different from the originals and it represents a culmination of an era, and the final time Robertson would perform with The Band, although the other members would re-convene, tour and record, with Robertson's blessing but without his participation, on into the 1980s and '90s. 

The music world lost one of its brightest luminaries last week, but we can be thankful that Robbie Robertson's recorded output, both with the Band and as a solo artist, has granted him a certain measure of immortality.

The Next Phase of Chrome OS

One of the unique aspects of Chromebooks is the tight integration of the Chrome Web browser into the ChromeOS operating system. This architecture has both been lauded as elegant in its simplicity and derided as reducing those computers to a 'browser in a box'. I have to admit I fall into the latter category, and have always regarded Chromebooks as lesser computers with severely limited functionality. 

Fortunately, Google has been steadily moving toward expanding Chromebooks' functionality, first by making it possible to run Android apps on them, and more recently by allowing Linux apps to run in a virtual machine environment, code named 'Crostini', but also referred to as the Linux Developer Environment. It's a little clunky and requires at least rudimentary knowledge of the Linux command line interface, but once you get everything set up, you can run almost any Debian Linux application, including LibreOffice, Thunderbird email client, GIMP photo editing software, and Firefox Web browser, on your Chromebook. Officially Google says it's just for developers, but in reality, it marks a huge leap forward in functionality for those who prefer desktop apps to their Web-based counterparts.

Google is now poised to take the next step in the maturing of ChromeOS by separating the Chrome browser from the operating system. The project, known by its code name Lacros (Linux and ChromeOS) is intended, according to Google, to extend the useful lives of older Chromebooks by allowing them to receive browser updates even after they pass their official 'expiration date', after which ChromeOS updates will cease. This project has been under way for a couple of years, and has been available under an experimental flag that gave users the choice of running the integrated Chrome browser or the separate Lacros browser, which is actually a natively running Linux application that does not require Crostini for life support. 

The separation process will begin with ChromeOS 116, out next week, where Lacros will be turned on by default, no flag required, but it may be a little while before the integrated Chrome browser goes completely away. At that point, the Lacros browser will be renamed as Chrome and will sport the multicolored Chrome icon, instead of its present yellow Lacros icon. Once the process is complete, average users will hardly notice the difference.

That is all well and good, but I see an even larger possibility that I hope Google decides to leverage. If they can make a Linux version of Chrome run natively without Crostini, how hard could it be to allow other Linux applications to run natively as well? ChromeOS is based on Gentoo Linux, after all. To my mind, this would truly turn Chrome OS into a 'grown-up' operating system, in which the user can choose to run full-featured Linux applications with ease, just as one can with any desktop Linux distribution. 

I realize this move is not without some controversy among the Chromebook faithful, many of whom regard ChromeOS' Web-based approach as the future of computing, and see the separation of the browser from the OS as a step backward, potentially eviscerating what makes ChromeOS unique, but thin clients aren't for everyone, myself included. In fact, I avoided Chromebooks for almost a decade after they came out, because I felt I wasn't missing anything. I could do everything on a Mac, Windows or Linux machine that I could on a Chromebook, plus a whole lot more. And although I am now a Chromebook owner, I still feel that way, and only use it for specific tasks.

I don't have any special knowledge about the future of ChromeOS, but I am hopeful that the implemention of Lacros in ChromeOS 116 will be a decisive step in the evolution of the ChromeOS platform. 

UPDATE: I wrote the above shortly before ChromeOS 116 landed on my two Chromebooks, and the most amazing thing is how little of a difference it has made, day-to-day. Chrome behaves just the same, and because I had opted to use Lacros exclusively when I activated it in the previous version of Chrome OS, it implemented itself as the default, and the only way to know the difference is to check the version of the Chrome browser I'm running. So far, I'm pleased.

A Brighter Idea

 A few years ago, I had the bright idea to purchase a new, fairly high-tech light fixture for my front porch. It had built-in LED's and a light sensor to turn it on automatically at dusk and off at dawn. It worked flawlessly for about six or seven years, until one day a few years ago, it just didn't. At that point, it became an expensive mistake. Instead of replacing a bulb, I had to replace the entire fixture. 

Not one to make the same mistake twice, I opted for one that took screw-in bulbs, LED's of course, and decided I'd just have to accept the fact that I'd have to turn it on manually at night. A few days after I'd installed the new fixture, I was grousing to a friend about the loss of the light sensor, and they suggested a screw-in socket with a sensor. 

It sounded like a great idea, but when I priced them, they cost more than I was prepared to pay, and it appeared they'd add enough length to the bulb to make it stick out of the bottom of the fixture. Fortunately, that wasn't the only option. I ended up buying an LED bulb with a built-in sensor instead.

The unit I purchased was made by Sylvania and not only was it the only one on Amazon that carried a brand with a recognizable name, it was also one of the least expensive options. The same size as a normal bulb, this nine-watt LED bulb puts out as much light as a 60-watt incandescent bulb, albeit with an icy, bluish white hue that makes it seem even brighter. It doesn't do much for ambience, but it's great for nighttime visibility.

When turning the light switch on for the first time, immediately after installing the bulb, it came on for about one second, indicating that it works, before being shut off by the sensor, which detected afternoon sunlight. Several hours later, it turned itself back on in the encroaching darkness.

Although slightly more expensive than a comparable standard LED bulb without a sensor, it and the new standard fixture together cost significantly less than buying another sensor-equipped LED fixture, and replacing the bulb will require far less effort—and expense—than replacing the fixture. Also, as a hedge against inflation, I went ahead and bought two sensor bulbs, so I’ll have another one ready to go whenever this one fails, which I hope won’t be for a long time. Speaking of which, I cannot make any claims regarding the bulb’s longevity, as it has been in place for only a few days, but I'm pleased so far.

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In other light bulb news, I also have an LED bulb in a bedroom lamp that seems to be slowly failing. It's fairly dim when it first comes on, but then it comes up to full brightness after a few minutes. The thing is, I kind of like this malfunction. The first thing in the morning, when I turn it on with my "Hey Google" speaker. The dim light allows my eyes to gently grow acclimated before it comes up to full brightness. At which point, I'm ready to get out of bed. I don't know how long it will (mal)function in this manner before it quits completely, but I'll enjoy it while I can. I guess a dim bulb isn't always a bad thing.