I have a large collection of old home movies (films, not videos… well, I might have those too - or maybe Brian has those). For a while I’ve been thinking about how to make them available to people so we can actually watch them. There are services out there that will convert them - and the prices vary a lot. None of the prices are particularly low and there seems to be some controversy about which methods of conversion are best.
But, I figured it would be worth it to send off some reels and see what I got back. I didn’t have time to dig into my collection so the two I grabbed were fairly random. One is a fairly long one that seems to be centered around Grampa at the Academy - I think near the time of graduation (although there are beach scenes and Christmas scenes on the same reel). The other one was much shorter and contained mostly shots of Mom and a dog - some in Amberly and some at Princeton. I think that puts the film at 1968 or 1969. The interesting thing (to me anyway) is that the shots of Princeton just happen to contain the windows of two different dorm rooms that I lived in - what are the chances of that?
Anyway, I will bring the full DVD to Mom’s on Christmas. Below are some excerpts from both reels to give you a sense for the quality and content. Enjoy!
December 19, 2007 at 2:43 pm
· Filed under General
I’ve given different people different Pearl updates but I’m not sure who I’ve told what so here is a quick overall update.
For a couple of weeks now the doctors have felt like Pearl’s lungs are doing a lot better. The week before last the pulmonologist looked in Pearl’s nose with a video scope and determined that her right nostril was very constricted. He couldn’t really tell if it was a physical problem with her nose or some mucus or what but he sent us over to the pediatric ENT.
The ENT we saw last week also looked in Pearl’s nose with a scope and at the time concluded that there wasn’t much of a hole there at all. She had us schedule a CT scan to look and see if the problem was bone or tissue - but that either way it seemed like surgery was the way to fix it. However, the next day, after consulting with other ENTs in her practice, she decided that there were some other things we could try before doing the scan.
So today we saw the ENT again, along with her more senior colleague, and he feels like we really shouldn’t do anything right now. The techniques they use to open up the nasal passage apparently don’t usually take too well on infants and doing surgery when the passage is so small is inefficient (they would probably have to do it again when she gets older). Plus, they say there’s a chance that she’ll just grow out of it. So, as long as her other nostril is working fine (which it is) they don’t think we should do anything until she’s older (like 7-9 years old) - and even then only if it’s still a problem.
So overall this is great news - the ENTs aren’t worried about the problem so we shouldn’t worry. For me it’s a little frustrating to the extent that it’s not a cut and dry resolution to the problems we’ve been seeing. However, we see the lung doctor again tomorrow and if Pearl’s oxygen levels are looking good then we might be in a position where we can just wait things out without worry too much.
Here is Coral performing the song Rudolph the Red-Nosed Reindeer. Notice her baby sister watching intently from her play mat on the floor. Also, please note that we don’t usually keep a fridge in our living room - we recently got a new fridge and that’s the old one (which is currently for sale on Craigslist).
