Unwired - and sad to be so.

I reckon most life happenings – birthdays, bushwalks, work tasks, farm chores, blog writing, or whatever – have three sequential phases, i.e. the before, the thing and the after. For example Sweetheart Vivienne’s oft said the planning and anticipation of a vacation can be more delicious than the vacation itself. Today I write of the epic and ground-breaking TV series The Wire [1, 2]. I can’t recall when we watched its first episode. Early 2009 perhaps. As it first aired on US TV in mid 2002, we had seven years plus of eager anticipation. Its giant reputation preceded it, so we could hardly wait until we were loaned the DVDs of Seasons One to Four. We were so excited when they were handed to us (in exchange loan for our set of The West Wing DVDs). We devoured those 50 episodes in a few months, becoming ever more involved with the characters, plots and themes. Then there was an excruciating wait until the Fifth Season [3] became available to us. We began it 11 days ago, and two nights ago we watched its 10th episode, the 60th overall, and the last ever. Compared with previous series we’ve watched [4, 5], The Wire’s almost if not the best. I’m sad we’ve come to its end. But I think it did all it could, and more would’ve been an anticlimax. My favourite Season? The Fourth [6]. My favourite character? Lester Freamon (pictured) [7]. Farewell, Wire. And thanks. For I’m much the better for having spent all those hours in your company.

farmdoc's blog post number 545

Here’s this week’s compendium. This week…

1. I learned that a man’s reason for not attending an appointment with me, was that his daughter had changed their clock’s time for daylight saving, and in error she’d changed the clock’s date too. Daylight saving started on Sunday 4.10.09 [1]. His appointment with me was on Wednesday 7.10.09.

2. a US study found that exposure to nature helps people to value community and relationships more, and to be more generous [2]. I’m not surprised. It’s something I’ve intuitively felt for many years.

3. Professor Ada Yonath, an Israeli working at the Weizmann Institute of Science, was awarded the 2009 Nobel Prize in Chemistry. She’s Israel’s ninth Nobel Laureate [3] – which given Israel’s population and economic and military situation, is a remarkable achievement.

4. darling Jarrah celebrated her sixth birthday with a cupcake party [4]. I’m so sorry I wasn’t there.

5. GetUp! released its iCoal 2.0 advertisement [5]. Clean coal’s an oxymoron. It’s never going to happen. It’s an abomination that the coal industry will be compensated in the proposed emissions trading scheme.

6. the Australian Grand Prix Corporation announced a loss of A$40M for the 2009 F1 event [6]. Though the 2009 loss is miraculously the same as the 2008 loss, it’s an absolute waste of public money. It’d fund 400 $100,000 p.a. jobs, or 800 $50,000 p.a. jobs.

7. a comparison was published of the administration of Barack Obama, and that of Josiah Bartlet in The West Wing TV series [7]. Let Bartlet be Bartlet.

8. the invitations went out for Sweetheart Vivienne’s book launch [8]. Also the media interviews began. Her excitement and success are mine too. How very wonderful she is.

Finally, I wish you, dear Farmdoc’s Blog readers, a wonderful week.

farmdoc's blog post number 414

The night after Sweetheart Vivienne and I finished watching The West Wing, we began Mad Men. Its website says: ‘Set in 1960s New York, the sexy, stylized and provocative AMC drama Mad Men follows the lives of the ruthlessly competitive men and women of Madison Avenue advertising’. We’ve now finished Season 1 in which the amount of smoking astounded us. It’s incessant. Was smoking that popular in the 1960s? If not, why is it depicted falsely? Or if so, why is it essential to the series that it’s depicted so? And either way, is paid product placement a factor? Though tobacco companies target teenagers because once they’re addicted, they’re life-long customers, little doubt they’ll target adult Mad Men watchers if it’s commercially beneficial to do so. Which is relevant because 31 May – eight days ago – was World No Tobacco Day 2009. To mark it, the MJA published this paper by two Americans who analysed the content of the first 18 seasons of The Simpsons TV show, which aired from 1989 to 2007. They watched 400 episodes and found 795 instances of smoking. I reckon an objective content analysis of Mad Men would document much more smoking. In Australia direct tobacco advertising’s been banned on TV since the 1970s and at sports events since 2006. Currently our smoking rates are among the world’s lowest. Frequent smoking in films and TV programs is arguably the tobacco industry’s response. It’s deplorable.

farmdoc's blog post number 409

We’ve finished. All 155 episodes over seven seasons on 42 DVDs. Last Wednesday night Sweetheart Vivienne and I watched the final episode of The West Wing. We’d planned to watch the three episodes on the last DVD at the rate of one each night. But after the penultimate episode on Wednesday night, we couldn’t help ourselves. So, it’s over. The fat lady’s metaphorically sung. Josiah Bartlet’s gone back to the New Hampshire farm with Abby. Matt and Helen Santos and their children are in the White House. Josh is President Santos’s chief of Staff and Donna’s the First Lady’s. Sam’s back. Toby’s been pardoned. And CJ, Debbie, Charlie and Margaret are unemployed. To me, unlike others I’ve watched, this series didn’t run out of steam. Or jump the shark, like I feared it may. Some say it lost its punch after its originator and creative spark Aaron Sorkin departed after season four. I disagree. I’ll miss its people. And I’m weirdly disconcerted I’ll never know the answers to lingering questions about them: Did President Santos achieve his ambitious legislative programme. Quo vadis Josh and Donna’s relationship. And Will and Kate’s? How did Arnold Vinick go as SecState? These questions are a sure sign of The West Wing’s quality. We’ll keep the DVDs. You never know when we’ll have a spare 130 hours to watch it again.

farmdoc's blog post number 328

Last Tuesday and Wednesday I worked in Hobart. I found the work there difficult: the people I assessed were medically complex, and they were less than totally helpful. So the going was long. And tough. At the end of those two days I felt wrung out. Dispirited, too – beset by apprehension that my medical skills weren’t up to the task. Simultaneously, Sweetheart Vivienne was fraught by uncertainty about her writing ability. I easily saw her misgivings as baseless, yet I couldn’t dismiss my self-doubt about my medical prowess. That night we watched two episodes in Series 5 of The West Wing. The character Josh Lyman (pictured), who’s arguably the most politically savvy of all President Bartlet’s senior staff, is sidelined due to what was perceived as a failed act of political brinkmanship. Then, when the President is unsure how to proceed in another political power play, Josh is summoned. He devises a strategy which is brilliantly successful, so resurrecting everyone’s confidence in him, and adjunctively uplifting both the President’s self-confidence and his public approval rating. This caused me to take a reality check on myself, and I decided that if I had difficulty with the people I assessed in Hobart, then every other doctor would probably have equal or more trouble with them. You can’t keep a good man down. I felt much better. Thanks, Josh.

farmdoc's blog post number 290

Karl Marx famously called religion the opium of the people. Maybe that was true once. But I think the contemporary opium is television. And I confess that from time to time I’ve been addicted. To series, mostly. Soapies: including Knots Landing, Hill Street Blues, St Elsewhere, LA Law, thirtysomething and NYPD Blue. But never Happy Days, so I didn’t see the waterskiing Fonzie jump the shark. That scene put ‘jumping the shark’ into the popular lexicon – meaning the point in a TV series where the plot veers off into an absurd storyline and/or the characterisation suddenly and inexplicably changes. Apparently it happens to every series. I don’t know why. It just does. Last Monday evening Sweetheart Vivienne and I watched episode 78 of The West Wing – about half-way through the 155 episodes. Titled ‘The Long Goodbye’, it’s about the Alzheimer’s Disease of a parent of one of the main characters. Compared with all prior 77 episodes it was so vastly inferior – in terms of storyline setting, development and credibility; dialogue depth and realism; attention to detail; and subtext – that I wondered if The West Wing jumped the shark with this episode. Time will tell. I’ll keep you informed. But it won’t be for a while, because we’ve returned to Arrested Development – the start of the second series. Stay tuned, folks. We are.

farmdoc's blog post number 204

I don't know why I started watching DVDs of the series The West Wing. I suspect I read about it in the New Yorker. Anyway Sweetheart Vivienne and I’ve watched episodes 1-15 of Series 1’s 22 episodes. As there are seven series (1999 to 2006), we’ve only just begun. So far we’re loving it – characters, content, dialogue, settings. All superb. The films (and books, and stories) I like best are those providing insight into subcultures or situations I know little or nothing about. The West Wing sure fits that bill. Its President Josiah Bartlet, played wonderfully by Martin Sheen, embodies the very best traits of a POTUS (President of the United States) – and thus, of course, he’s the antithesis of George W in every important way. My enthusiasm for The West Wing and its President Bartlet has sensitised my interest in Barack Obama. Not, I hastily add, in John McCain whom I knew wouldn’t win the election because I reckoned Americans would vote in the antithesis of W (i.e. someone like Bartlet), and not a facsimile of W albeit one a bit older and wiser. So Obama it’ll be – the 44th POTUS (excluding fictional ones), from 20 January 2009 for at least four years, barring the unexpected. I wish him success. The whole world must too, because our planet’s future depends on him. I’m quietly optimistic.