1995 - European Vacation Part 1

European Trip 1995

In the previous post I described the upcoming 2-week tour of Europe with my then new girlfriend Rachael. Well, here goes:

Day 1: Take CT Limo from New Haven to JFK airport. We checked our bags at the Virgin Atlantic counter, and proceeded down the moving walkway to the terminal. It was at this point that I began my lifetime hobby of videotaping our vacations, often at inappropriate moments, such as walking backwards on a moving walkway at JFK airport. Get the picture?

We boarded our plane, and having never been on Virgin Atlantic before, we were very impressed with the goody bag they give you. I don’t recall many details of the flight itself, but no doubt we arrived safely at Heathrow. We claimed our bags and used the FREE luggage trollies to move to customs. Did I mention the luggage trollies are FREE? I recall Rachael and I commenting how tired we were, and then we began singing “I Wanna Be Sedated” by the Ramones as we walked.

Somehow we arrived at our hotel, either by bus or taxi. The room was nice, two single beds, and a toilet in one closet, a sink and tub in the other. Wild!

Seeing as it was mid-morning, it was out on the town we went. I believe we went down to the embankment via the Underground, saw the Houses of Parliament, then went into a pub for lunch and a pint (this was slightly before my pint drinking days by the way). Then we went off to Oxford Street to do some shopping. At the Virgin Megastore I bought some CDs not available in the US, one from Van Halen in a round tin, and another from the Yardbirds featuring Jimmy Page. Current stuff obviously.

At around 6pm we went over to the Royal National hotel to meet up with our Contiki tour group. It was hot and dark down in the bowels of the hotel, but I do recall we were introduced to our tour driver George, and given really cheesy Contiki backpacks, and given the opportunity to purchase money packs for our tour.

I don’t remember dinner, it may have been Indian, but that may have been on the way home.
Hey this is 11 years ago, you should be impressed I remember anything!

Now what was I talking about.....?

The next morning we checked out of the hotel, and went to meet our bus outside the Royal National. We loaded our suitcases underneath, met our driver Blackie (no, really) and climbed aboard. I think we grabbed the front seats.

As we drove around London, George began his two weeks of rattling off factoids. The only one I remember was a description of a grassy knoll near Parliament which had previously served as both a pasture as well as a dumping ground for people keeling over from the Plague.

We were then invited up to the front of the coach to introduce ourselves using the PA system. Being somewhat of a nutcase, I went first, and instead of saying my name and where I was from, I began making up my own factoids about the passing scenery(something about sleeping cows), much to the chagrin of Rachael. I then went on to say who I was, and that I had met my girlfriend Rachael on the internet (in reality, AOL was not and is still not the internet, but most people don’t really know the difference.)

After an hour or so, we arrived in Dover for the ferry ride over to Calais, France. We spent the journey up on deck, I believe I videotaped the entire journey in real-time. It was windy. Actually we did have breakfast in the on-board cafeteria, I think I had rice crispies with milk.

We arrived in France, and left the ferry the same way we boarded - by luxury motor coach.
I don’t think the bus stopped anywhere in France, and soon we were in Belgium. There we stopped at a highway rest stop for the restroom (they don’t use the word bathroom in most of the rest of the world actually) and some souvenir shopping. Then back on the bus until we arrived in Amsterdam.

Our hotel was actually in a suburb called Hamsterdam.

Ok that’s not true, but it was something-dam. Our hotel was on an inlet of some body of water. If I were actually researching the facts in these blogs I could tell you the exact longitude and latitude, but I’m testing my long-term memory here, so let’s move on.

Our room was pretty cool. We had a large feather bed on a tile floor, with a sliding door leading to a balcony overlooking the previously mentioned inlet of the Amsterdamian Sea. We had a private bath, and above that a loft, with additional sleeping for more people.

Dinner was not for an hour or so, and Rachael wanted to rest, so I and some of my new friends went for a walk around Whateveryoucallitdam. It was a quaint little village, complete with its own canals and pretty bridges. Somehow people managed to parallel park tiny automobiles along these canals. Then back at the hotel we had a group dinner featuring Lord knows what. I think there were some vegetables and meat-by-products, but I’ll never know. Those crazy Dutch.

After dinner, we boarded the bus for our night tour of Amsterdam. As we approached each new country or city, the tour director George played a cleverly selected song for the umpteenth time, but the first time for us, to set the mood. Tonight he played Roxanne by the Police. Up until this point, I did not exactly grasp the meaning of “Red Light District” nor did I understand that line from the song. That was about to change.

We arrived in Amsterdam proper, and as a group made our way to the Red Light District, which in case you also don’t know, is where young, mostly Asian women have little houses in which they entertain. Suddenly it all became very clear. Crystal clear. I don’t think I blinked for the next hour.

Speaking of not blinking, the next stop was a theater, where we as a group were pre-booked to see a show featuring local entertainers. Great, I thought, some authentic Amsterdam culture, music, dancing, etc. We took our seats, the lights dimmed, and the flashy lights and music started. It was the Batdance by Prince. Ok, maybe this is the pre-show entertainment. Out walked a man wearing the Batman cowl and cape - and little else. I suppose that was hit Bat-a-rang hanging from his utility belt. Open mind, Mike.

Next a woman who I guess was Catwoman appeared, she was in a cat-like pose anyway. Then....then.....ummm....time passes and it was morning. Whew!

During that passage of time, let’s just say that there were many new experiences for both of us. Use your imagination, that just might come close.

Somehow we managed to navigate the public tram system after midnight and made it back to the hotel.

Our next stop was Germany. Rachael has an expression when she sees a worried expression on my face, the “Germany Look.” Here is where that came from. Around lunchtime, we stopped at a highway rest stop somewhere in the Rhineland. We went to a food counter, and since everything on the menu was in German, we ordered by pointing to breaded specialties in a glass case. Was it chicken, pork, meat or otherwise? No idea whatsoever. I was as close to a mental collapse as ever before, and Rachael helped by ordering something for me. It was beyond disgusting.

We then arrived in our first German destination, St. Goar, a beautiful village on the banks of the Rhine. Once again, our hotel room had a breathtaking view of the scenery, mountains, castles, river and street below. This hotel room was the model of European hotel rooms. Feather bed, duvet, private bath with a modern pushbutton toilet and carpeting!

It was off to a wine tasting at a wine cellar-like place. It may have been a wine cellar. The host showed us a slide presentation, and we ate bread and presumably drank wine. I recall making animal shapes with the bread and dancing them in front of the slide projector’s light beam. This got a good laugh or two. Grow up man!

We must have purchased some wine, then it was off to a bar for a night of drinking (apparently this is what twenty-somethings do on these tours). There must have been another inedible dinner in there somewhere. I soon became bored with the drinking, and took a walk up the hill to the gates of an old castle/hotel with some of the other tour people. By the time I got back, Rachael and the rest of the gang were ready to leave, and it was off to sleep.

The next morning we did some cuckoo-clock shopping (apparently the cuckoo-clock was invented around here) as well as beer steins. Breakfast was forgettable, crusty rolls appear to be all they have here. So it was back on the bus for another few hours of fun on the highway. Now would be a good time to mention that each tour group was known by its official song. Each morning on the bus, we were treated to “Good Vibrations” by the Beach Boys. I don’t know if it was the same song every tour group with each George-like tour director, or if they all chose a new song for each group. Whatever.

We next arrived in Munich, the New York City of Germany. We of course checked into our hotel, a cookie-cutter SOFITEL model with no elevator, or perhaps a very small one. First stop, Glockenspiel, the all too famous clock featuring marionettes and splendid bells. As we were walking back, Rachael’s ankles swelled up so drastically she thought she might have DVT’s from the plane. A chiropractor in the tour group suspected this diagnosis as well, so he suggested we get her checked out. Upon hearing this, I became light headed and may have actually seen dancing unicorns and yellow duckies floating around my head. Once I got ahold of myself, we took a BMW taxi to the local Nazi-era hospital. Did I mention the taxi was a BMW?

The hospital was a menacing stone number straight out of Nuremberg. I was seated in a stark marble echo chamber of a hallway alone on a wooden bench as Rachael was taken away by Nurse Mengele to who knows what sort of torture. Meanwhile someone came out and took down Rachael’s vital information, apparently so they could send her parents her remains. I don’t know if they did an ultrasound or what but they released her many hours later, and it was back to Democracy! Incidentally later that year Rachael received a series of letters in German, eventually learning that she owed the hospital for her treatment.

We found our way to the massive Biergarten where we had agreed to meet the others. This was in fact a massive beer drinking hall. I ordered a mammoth bowl of soup - at this point I would have eaten that meat-like breaded object from a few days ago. I also ordered and consumed a 1 liter mug of beer. There was singing and dancing, accordion playing, picture taking and so on. Not an unpleasant way to end this bizarre day.

The next day it was back on the bus, Good Vibrations, and off to Austria. The scenery was breathtaking. So lush and green. Our stop this day was white water rafting. Rachael and I had wisely decided not to do this. So we and a handful of others from the group had a leisurely afternoon at the park-like area where the rafting tour was to conclude. It was actually nice to chill out, play some volleyball, each some greasy hamburgers, lie in the sun and generally relax. You need some of that on a vacation, and the tour was not yet half over.

Then we were back on the bus and into Hopfgarten, our little ski-resort village for the night. Our hotel was another beautiful one, with a great room and view out to the hills. We took the ski lift to the top of the non-snow covered hill for a great vista of the town and surrounding hills. Rachael was surprised to learn that the ski lift does not stop to let you off at the top. We survived. Back at sea level we walked around the town, bought some trinkets including the famous blue schnapps (I still have a bottle unopened I think) and some exotic dessert called flan. Actually I had seen flan before back 1987 when our family took a vacation in England, but this was as good as new to me.

Then it was back to the hotel for another forgettable German-like dinner. Next the group went out to a bar for a night of darts, schnapps tasting and general mayhem. Well by now you should know my affinity for bars, so at one point in the night I decided to go back to the hotel. I thought Rachael understood that when I said “I’m going” I meant back to the hotel. So while I was snuggled up in bed, she and the others were frantically looking in the bathrooms and the surrounding alleys for me. Eventually Rachael found her way back to the hotel, knocked on our door, and proceeded to rip me a new one.

Guilty as charged.

I don’t think we kissed and made up at this point, but we did stay together. It was dicey however.

The next day it was back on the bus, Good Vibrations, and bad traffic. We sat on that bus for most of the day in bumper-to-bumper traffic as we entered Italy. I will say that the highway rest stops got progressively better as we left Germany’s influence behind. Rachael introduced me to Prosciuto Crudo sandwiches. I did not like them at first, but it was worlds better than Schnitzel and meat-like objects enjoyed by our neighbors to the north.

Finally we arrived in Venice. Before getting on the water taxi to St. Mark’s Square, we were instructed to change into pants if we wanted to visit any churches. On the dock there were pay restrooms, essentially outhouses with a hole in the floor. Very sanitary. Then onto the boat. As Indiana Jones said “Ahh Venice.” It is an amazing city.

First stop was the glass blowing demonstration. I should mention that the tour director, indeed the tour company, has a deal with shops in each city we visit. I presume the tour director gets a piece of the action, as he leads us to the preferred shops as the first stop after leaving the bus. Of course we bought something at each shop, as we presumably got a slightly better deal than elsewhere.

After that we were on our own for a few hours. First we sat down at an outdoor café in St. Mark’s Square, where there was a symphony playing. We had ice cream and watched the famous pigeons in the square. It was about this time that we started talking to each other again. As I said, it was dicey.

Then we took a gondola ride, with another couple from our group. This was amazing. We purchased some bread and Pinot Grigio wine ahead of time, and it made for a magical sunset ride through the canals of this amazing city. We were in love again!

Next it was off to dinner. Somehow we followed the map we had and found our way to the restaurant for the group dinner. Now this is eating. Antipasto followed by unbelievable pasta followed by veal or chicken or who knows what it was, but it was gooooood.

More gooooood please!

Off to the water taxi to our bus to our hotel and to sleep. Next morning it was bus, Good Vibrations, highway, Siena. Siena is a well preserved Medieval city, in which there is a yearly horse race around the town square, which is a huge piazza - with anchovies. Actually we did have really good pizza here. The symbol of the town is a large clock tower reminiscent of the one in Waterbury, CT. I should mention that early in our relationship Rachael and I started collecting rocks from wherever we visited. Carrying a Sharpie marker, I would write our names and the country or city name on the rock. In the case of Siena, I drew a picture of the clock tower. We have all of these rocks on a shelf in our bookcase! No doubt the European Geological Societé du Anthropoligiqué is onto us now.

Next it was off to Rome, marking the half-way point of the trip. And this will also mark the end of this post. Stay tuned for the rest of our European Journey. Adventure. Excitement. A Jedi craves not these things.

1995 - The Year we make Contact

1995 - The Year we make Contact

Anyone get the reference?

Well, 1995 arrived, and it was off to Seattle in mid-January. My production assistant was Timmy Baker, our video tape duplicator who got my job after I got the bump up to first class. Strangely enough, his mom worked for Signal, a company which owned imaging centers, including the Waterbury Imaging Center. More on this later.

We flew out of Westchester County Airport, a very convenient location just off 684.
The shoot was with Patchen Dellinger, for a vertical banded gastroplasty for morbid obesity. This was the precursor to the wildly popular gastric bypass operations you hear about these days. In this operation, the stomach is stapled into a pouch to limit food intake. The patient was so morbidly obese, that it took over an hour for intubation. This was the first operation in which I learned the purpose of surgical masks, as there was a spurt of blood emanating from the patient, which zapped both the surgeon and myself, since I was leaning over his shoulder at the time with my camera suspended from a boom. You know come to think of it, on an earlier shoot in Cleveland, a doctor flicked a piece of kidney tissue off his glove, and it landed squarely on me - luckily on my hospital scrubs, so I did not need to worry about getting that stain out with ALL detergent.

After the shoot we drove around Seattle, saw the famous Space Needle from the ground, unwilling to shell out the 10 bucks each for the ride to the top, and then had dinner at a restaurant up on Broadway. It was toward the end of the meal that we observed a lack of any women in the place, and a lot of couples of the same sex dining together. I’m sure they were all business travelers!

Then it was back to the airport for the red-eye home. I should mention here that a week or so before this trip, I happened to be in a chatroom on AOL, and another person sent me a private message. She liked something I had written in my profile. I immediately checked out her profile and read with interest a verse by some poet named Trent Reznor (I really thought she was into poetry). We chatted for a bit and found out that we both lived in Connecticut. I wish I had saved the text of those chat sessions. My screen name was VideoCT - hers was U2Kelly. We agreed to meet online again at a prearranged time to chat, and also exchanged e-mails. I told her I was heading out to Seattle. She advised me to wear flannel and drink lots of coffee. I offered to send her a postcard, and she sent me her name and address. That’s right, up until this time I don’t think I knew her name, but I could be mistaken. Anyway, it was Rachael Kelly, who it turns out worked at Greater Waterbury Imaging Center. I think I sent that postcard, but I don’t recall.

Over time we continued to meet up for chat sessions and exchanged e-mails, discussing many topics especially movies we both liked, but neither of us suggested exchanging phone numbers...yet.

In early March, with the approach of Grandma and Grandpa’s 50th anniversary, Jeff and I decided to make a video - the first in a 10 year odyssey of memorable family videos. We drove up to Pittsfield on March 11 and did some filming at their house, and all over town, getting shots of all the key locations. We had dinner with Maury and Zelda then drove home. The next day after Jeff left, I decided to give Rachael a call (apparently I did have her number by this point - I think we had decided to meet for a movie at a future date). I called, and thank god she answered. I introduced myself by phone, asked if she thought I would really call, and asked if she wanted to see the movie Outbreak starring Dustin Hoffman and Rene Russo. She agreed, and gave me directions to her house. I made a joke about being in a Delorean, a Back to the Future reference, but she didn’t get it. This was the first in a 10 year odyssey of memorable yet often incomprehensible jokes by yours truly!

I picked her up at her house, we shook hands, and were off to Showcase Cinema in Southington. I don’t recall if we got food or drinks, but probably. Since we both worked in medical related fields, we did a lot of commentary with each other during the movie about the virus becoming airborne and so forth. For the record, there was no hand holding or other monkey business (at this point - more on that later (Not!) ).

After the movie we decided to go to Friendly’s for ice cream. We talked about the movie, and I told her about some of the videos I had made in college. We also discovered that we both prefer bendy straws over straight ones, however I prefer no straw at all. Friendly’s always had nice bendy straws, and to this day whenever I use one, I think of our first date (I know, I am really weird). I took her home, shook her hand again (no, really), and we said good night.

I believe I called her the next night, and that was the beginning of a 10 year odyssey of...ok, that expression is getting a bit tired. That was the start of almost nightly phone calls discussing every manner of subject over the coming weeks and months. I won’t go into every date and activity here, as that is another blog for another day.

The rest of 1995 included other interesting trips. I visited St. Louis for the first of many videos with Dr. Jim Fleshman, a leading colorectal surgeon. This particular video was on repair of rectovaginal fistulas. Here is that warning about skipping to the next paragraph. Apparently for whatever reason, a fistula, or opening, can develop between the rectum and vagina, which you may recall from high school anatomy are adjacent to one another. Well needless to say this can cause all sorts of unpleasantness, so surgeons figured out how to repair it. It is mechanical, as much of surgery is, but still takes skill and superior knowledge of the pelvic anatomy, which is some of the most complex in the body (the next is a close second).

For fun, we (Sean McGovern, the boss’ brother) visited the famous St. Louis Arch. It is quite amazing that there is an elevator which goes up one side to the observation deck, and down the other. I guess it is quite plausible that you could have a Great Glass elevator which can move in any direction.

Incidentally, the surgery did not show up very well, so I went out again to shoot another case in June. That in fact was my first solo trip. Very exciting. I stayed at the Best Western near the hospital (Barnes Jewish Hospital) and having forgotten an XLR audio cable, had to find a Radio Shack to buy one before going to the hospital for the shoot. In 2004 I found myself in a similar situation, in St. Louis needing some audio peripherals before a shoot, and somehow managed to remember exactly where said Radio Shack was. Good brain, good brain, that’s a good brain. Sit, lay down...roll over....now where was I.

Growing up, I remember my mom kept in her wallet one of those metal discs you used to be able to make with a machine, where you can stamp a short message into the metal disc, around the perimeter, and on the other side is an engraving of whatever tourist attraction you bought it from. It is similar to those machines that let you roll a penny into a magical keepsake. Anyway, they had such a machine at the St. Louis airport, and being nostalgic, I made one for Rachael - a metal disc, not the squished penny.

Another interesting shoot was to Atlanta later in the Spring, maybe around April? I stayed at the Emory University hotel, and worked at that hospital with Ira Horowitz. This was not your usual video. I arrived somewhat late to the operating room due to poor directions, filmed a couple of cases (cervical cancer excisions) and then met with Dr. Horowitz to see what else he had planned. He showed me an outline of what he wanted to accomplish. Mind you, this was pre-PowerPoint, actually pre-computers for the most part. So I took the 35MM slides he had made back home with me, but first recorded him narrating each slide. Also had to record an on-camera of him addressing the audience. I think there was a Radio Shack run on this trip also.

We finished up in his office around 11pm, and I enjoyed a delightful vending machine dinner at the hotel - Soda and Andy Capp’s snack mix. Had I known, there are numerous fast food joints just around the corner. Remember, this was pre-internet, so short of calling AAA, it was difficult to get any info before such a trip.

Later in the year, as Rachael and I became inseparable, we decided to take a vacation to Europe in August. Rachael had a bunch of brochures from Contiki, and travel tour company. They had both a one week and two week trip all around Western Europe. We decided the 2-week trip looked fantastic, but as a relatively new employee, I wasn’t sure I could get the time off. Well I asked and was given the time off. As the Summer passed, and we did mini golf, lots of movies, camping trips to Hamonassett, and various other activities, and I also got to know her parents Mike and Elizabeth, we prepared for our trip. That, however, will be the next blog, because for me it is time for beddy-bye.

1994 Excitement

Past Travels

At the moment, I am between a busy travel schedule and the next busy travel schedule. So I thought I would bring you the reader up to date on the past 11 years of exciting business travel. I apologize if some of the dates are out of sequence. I will admit I am no fact checker. My mind is fairly accurate, although in some cases I have either changed names or simply made up names of places.

1994 - The year I graduate college.

I guess I can actually start with my Spring Break trip. My parents were nice enough to send me out to Vegas for the NAB - National Association of Broadcasters annual convention. This trade show includes displays of every broadcast related company out there. Granted this was 1994, so things like computer-based nonlinear video editing were just getting warmed up, and companies like Grass Valley, Tektronix and Sony were still pushing edit controllers, component switchers and so-called black boxes - $50,000+ dishwasher sized machines with one function, such as character generator or digital video effects unit.

Anyway, it was fascinating to see all this gear, especially since I was at that time anticipating a career in the field. I was lucky enough to be traveling with my mentor, Mike Martin, the then TV studio technician at UHA, who taught me all the technical mumbo jumbo such as setting up a remote video studio, how to read a waveform and vector scope, and how to operate a composite video switcher and DVE. My roommate was the guy who ran the cable studio in Pittsfield, MA. I do not remember his name, but I do remember that he snored something fierce, and brought with him a white noise generator, which was just as annoying. Staying in the other room were Mike Martin and Mike Graziano, who I believe did video work for the Massachusetts Archdiocese. At a different hotel but on some of the same social events were my boss at the time, Ric Serrenho and his wife Annalisa.

Well the night I got there, flying in from Florida where I had visited Grandma and Grandpa for the week, I arrived in town around 7pm local time. I explored my hotel Harrah’s, and immediately lost about 10 dollars in the slots. At about 8pm I met up with the gang, who informed me that they had acquired tickets to Splash!, and musical show featuring scantily clad showgirls. Sweeet! In addition to the topless conga line, they actually had a large water tank on stage in which the half-naked ladies could swim in formation. This initiation to Vegas was followed by an all you can eat buffet, which while not very good, was only $7.99.

The next day was a full day of walking the NAB floor, picking up some cool literature on new products, and actually getting some hands-on with the latest video cameras from Panasonic. That night we attended a cocktail party put on by one of the vendors my travel companions patronized. The reception I should mention, was in Liberace’s house, which apparently is rented out for these types of affairs. Having the run of the house, including the gold-fixture-appointed bathrooms was very exciting.

The rest of the trip included other meals including frogs legs at the Cajun themed lounge in Harrah’s, and the last night we visited Treasure Island (pirate show with explosions and cannon fire), Excalibur (monorail ride from Treasure Island), the new MGM Grand mammoth hotel and the coolest one of all, the pyramid shaped, xenon emitting Luxor.

The next day I flew home, borrowed my mom’s red Mazda MX-6, drove to CT for my interview at Cine-Med, got a speeding ticket on the Mass Pike, then home and eventually back to school to finish up Senior Year.

A few weeks later I got a call from Cine-Med offering me an entry level job duping tapes and going on video shoots as a production assistant. The rest is history...and here it is:

Providence Hospital. Met up with my predecessor Jim Jackson at his apartment in Middletown. We drove to Providence, where we needed to record an on-camera with Kirby Bland, and record the narration to his video “Evaluation of Conditions of the breast” or something to that effect. Jim was impressed that I was able to setup and break down the Betacam deck, camera, Teleprompter and lights, with no instruction on his part. It was about 2 months later that Jim recommended me for a promotion when he decided to leave the company. Thank Jim, by the way.

Boston - New England Deaconess Hospital. We did a video shoot documenting several pacemaker implants with Dr. Thomas Nessa. He was at the time the team doctor for the Celtics, and a specialist in all things cardiovascular. The video we were making was on the use of conscious sedation, such as Versed or Midazolam, in interventional cardiac procedures. The next week we went down to the Miami Vascular Institute to shoot some similar procedures with Barry Katzen, one of the innovators of using stents in these procedures, and a pretty famous guy in some circles. Miami was incredibly hot and humid. We actually stayed at a Marriott in Dadeland. We walked in the stifling tropical armpit to a barbecue joint, which was equally sticky. This was in the days where we shared hotel rooms (not a bad cost saving idea actually) and I remember Jim and I laughed at the fast pace of the Miami local newscast. Incidentally Dr. Nessa passed away o f aheart attack a little while later.

Another interesting shoot, my first real blood and guts experience, was to Cleveland, Ohio to the world famous Cleveland CLinic. You will notice I capitalized the L in Clinic. Over the years as my touch typing has increased to 50-60 words per minute, my use of the accidental double-capital has also increased, usually if the first word of a sentence or someone’s name has O, K or L as the second letter. Oh bother.

We were working with two surgeons. One, Dr. Jeff Milsom, who is now a well-known colorectal surgeon, was doing some sort of proctocolectomy. This was in 1994, so laparoscopic colorectal surgery had not yet been perfected, so this was your typical stem to stern incision, plus the other end too. It was here that I began to learn some medical terminology, beginning with Anastomosis, or the joining of two parts, such as the rectum and colon after removal of a malignant portion. Basically (skip to next sentence if you are eating or have ever eaten) if someone has a tumor in the colon or rectum, the offending portion is removed (these days laparoscopically), then the two remaining ends need to be put back together. While it is possible and effective to hand suture these ends together in several layers of running sutures, the more common approach is to secure an anvil into one end, then pass the stapler throught he anus either into the rectum or directly into the colon or small bowel and make a new connection, similar to joining two garden hoses.

The other procedure with Dr. Novick was a partial nephrectomy, or partial kidney removal, also for a cyst or cancer, not sure which. It was in this procedure that I saw Argon Enhanced Coagulation. Most people are somewhat familiar with electro cautery, or electro surgery, which uses electric current to dessicate or vaporize tissue during surgery. Well Argon goes one step further, Argon gas is used to propagate the electrical energy, which looks like a lightsaber, but is only about 1-2cm in length. Very cool if you ever see it. Very effective to coagulate bleeding in very vascular organs such as the liver or kidney. Less effective in fighting Sith Lords.

Cleveland gets kind of a bad rap. Each time I have visited, I always seemed to have the same routing. Fly into Hopkins airport, drive directly to the Cleveland CLinic guesthouse, eat at the New York style deli in the hotel, go to the Flats for dinner, have a crappy TGI Fridays or Houlihans meal, and wonder what else there is to do in Cleveland. The Flats are a revitalized warehouse area, like most cities added to their decrepit industrial areas in the late 1970's (see Omaha, Oklahoma City, Dallas). In the opening number of the Drew Carey show Drew and company are dancing to “Cleveland Rocks” on the boardwalk down on the Flats.

The other times I did this routing was in 1998 for a nursing video shoot, and also in 1998 to film a Shouldice Hernia Repair. In World War II, Canadian men were lining up by the thousands to enlist in the army, but many of these men had inguinal hernias. This was in the days before implantable polypropylene mesh, so most hernias were tissue to tissue repairs. Dr. Shouldice devised this simple, multi-layer repair, which created a strong repair, and allowed many men to join the military, and no doubt go off and die for the freedom of humanity. Thanks guys. In this day of laparoscopic extraperitoneal hernia repairs, no too many people are doing these tissue repairs, but it is still a popular procedure with some surgeons. Incidentally, when we visited the Canadian War Memorial on the coast of France, no doubt there were some brave men with repaired herniae buried nearby.

The final visit to Cleveland was in 2001 for yet another high-tech procedure. This was a Laparoscopic RF Ablation of Liver Metastases with Dr. Siperstein. In other words, let’s say someone has cancer of the colon, prostate or lung, and they get metastases or spread of the disease to the liver, the usual approach would be to remove the affected chunk of liver. Now granted liver tissue can regenerate itself, but it is still something you want to avoid, removing chunks of organs. So some genius came up with RF ablation. Basically, a metal probe, under ultrasound guidance, is passed into the center of the mass. Then tines are expanded from this wire, out in a radial pattern, to extend beyond the borders of the mass. Then RF energy is transmitted into the probes, and the energy cuts off the blood supply to the mass and a margin around it. A laptop computer attached to the RF dookicky monitors the temperature of each tine to make sure adequate ablation occurs. So the malignancy is killed from the inside out, without major resections or a big abdominal incision. Pretty cool.

Ok, back to 1994. Another interesting project was something called Ocean of Symmetry. This was a 3-part video series on treatment of immune disorders. The first volume described the functioning of the immune system. The second volume dealt with how antibody drugs work in the immune system, and the third volume actually discussed specific diseases such as the dreaded Takayasu's Disease and their treatments using drugs called IVIG - Intravenous Immunoglobulins. Very high level stuff. The theme for the video was that the immune system works much like the oceans, with many systems interacting and feeding off one another. We intended for the doctor who authored the content to be the on-camera host, walking on the beach, narrating the video. Easier said than done. This doctor worked at Robert Wood Johnson Hospital in New Jersey. So we trekked out to Sandy Hook, an old missile range turned public beach, to do the setups. Problem was, there were heavy winds, and no way in hell to get the shots. So we got some beauty shots, and then high-tailed it back to CT to start editing.
Later that month we hired a proper actor to be the host/narrator, and filmed him on a beach in Fairfield. He used an earpiece to listen to and read his lines, as he walked casually along the beach, quite a distance from the camera. It was still pretty windy, but it worked well with a wireless mic. We then recorded the rest of his audio in the car, and sent him on his way. The video included tons of animation, and came out pretty well after many weeks of tweaking.

I should mention that for one scene we needed to show the injection of drugs IM or intramuscularly, which is often done in the buttocks. My colleague Clem took one for the team, and allowed his buttocks to be injected with saline from a mighty big needle. Good job.

Well that is just about it for 1994. Oh one last thing. We also were making a fund-raising video for New Milford Hospital. The on-camera hosts were Skitch and Ruth Henderson. For those of you born after 1950, Skitch Henderson was the original band leader for the Tonight Show, and was conductor of the New York Philharmonic Orchestra, and long-time New Milford resident. That was my first and only brush with celebrity, unless you count meeting the fat guy from Miami Vice, and that time I waited for the rental car bus with Tom Brokaw at Palm Beach International Airport. Oh, and I met Marc Summers, host of Unwrapped and Double Dare. Oh, I met that guy with the question-mark suit who advertises “free money from the government” on late night tv. Let’s not forget our brief run-in with Carol “hello Dolly” Channing at Spago in LA. If this counts, I recorded an on-camera message with Gov. John “Hot Tub Johnny” Rowland. But I digress...

Next time, the all too exciting 1995!