Listen: there's a hell of a good universe next door, let's go

  This may seem like something of a nothingburger to most people, but I just made a phone call. I've avoided the phone for most of the last twenty years.  The most frustrating moments in my life have been trying to hear and understand on the phone.  It affected me personally and professionally (I actually used to have people who worked for me come to my conference calls with me so we didn't miss anything).  Once I was on a call about a contract that directly affected my site, and the legal team was asking me questions about how to structure it and I couldn't participate in the call functionally.  I had to pass it off to my colleague from corporate sourcing - and then I hung up the phone and quietly lost my %$# for a few minutes.  I've had co-workers on calls with me, and when I was trying to schedule my CI surgery, I had our HR manager, who was a friend, on the call so I could hear. I LOATHE telephones. But I needed to make a call today.  We booked a t...

  Today was my second trip to the University of Minnesota campus in a week; today I went to the big medical center where the audiology clinic is and had a bunch of testing done to see if my hearing is still what it should be after the new processors. My last scheduled appointment was for early 2020, and never occurred because of Covid lockdown.  I just never got around to scheduling another appointment, because everything seemed to be working. Then I submitted my request for an upgrade, and the insurance people insisted that I see my audiologist, and when I was in to see her about the upgrade she suggested that about a month after I received and started using my new processors I should go in for a round of testing. So I did, and it was fine - the results were comparable to late 2019, and as noted in the title up above, the audiologist said I really should come in at least every other year. So I will.  And maybe in two years some of the road construction will be finished. ...

  Here I am again - seems like this is my CI summer.  Today I drove into Minneapolis again - I got an email from K at the university, where they're doing studies to learn more about how cochlear implant recipients hear and understand with their devices.  Basically, it's the interface between the implant and the, er, wetware inside the head. Although it was a bit last-minute, I thought, well, why not?  I'm retired and don't have a schedule to speak of.  The only accommodation needed was for us to do our Costco run to St. Cloud yesterday so I could go to the U today.  And the only real drawback was that summertime in Minnesota is when they do highway construction.  Lots and lots of highway construction.  In the area around Shevlin Hall (where the hearing labs are) there are two roads closed for construction, overburdening University Ave, Washington Ave, and Oak St., which are all main arteries on campus.  So I tried to avoid it by going around....

  So as noted, I received new processors a couple of weeks ago.  I've been slowly learning what all they can do (other than sound better) and today I decided to test out the connectivity features. The processors themselves have Bluetooth, so depending on the device I can pair directly and have the sound delivered wirelessly.  I know that Bluetooth isn't new technology, but it's new in my processors, and it's exceedingly cool. First I paired them to my phone.  I have Audible on my phone - I'm not wild about listening to books rather than reading them, but I did it as part of my rehab when I was first implanted, and I kept the app (though I don't subscribe - Audible does too much without telling me, which I don't care for).  But I opened up one of the books that I already had and listened for a bit, and it's incredibly clear and easy to hear!  Maybe I'll consider audiobooks on planes?  Possible.  Though books are portable too. Then I tried to pair t...

  Relying on technology to hear means that though you get current and top of the line equipment, research continues and new models get released and before you know it, your cool new tech is old. I had a version of that going on when I was using hearing aids too - I'd get new ones on average every five years, and every time I did I was amazed at how much better they were - and it was a good think too, because my hearing was degrading.  For a while it felt as though they kept up with better performance, but then of course they didn't, and I ended up getting implanted. And if I'm honest, my processors have been wonderful, they gave me better hearing than I ever though I'd have again.  They sounded good - I listen to music whenever I'm in the car (well, mostly when I'm in the car alone), and they're reliable.  I was provided with all kinds of replacement parts in case I needed them, and the only things I've had to buy were filter covers (for the air filters ...

  Last year I drove into the city a couple of times to participate in some studies being done at the University of Minnesota that were designed to help the researchers understand how people with hearing impairments - and specifically, cochlear implant recipients - fill in the blanks, so to speak, when the speech they're hearing isn't understandable. Knowing how we can successfully fill in those blanks better from context could lead to the development of ways to help CI users develop that ability.   Today I received an email from the audiologist that I worked with in the study, and she sent me a link to the paper that they published.  I'll admit that so far I've just skimmed it but just receiving it, knowing that this study, this learning, could result in better speech comprehension results for people with CIs is just wonderful.  I've been lucky enough to participate in studies to improve cochlear implants themselves, at the MedEl offices in North Carolina, and now h...