Lee.org

Sudden deafness update:
Last Sunday I woke up from a nap having completely lost hearing in my left ear, followed up with severe vertigo the next day. I’ve been doing “Epley Maneuvers”, tilting my head to make the positional vertigo go away and I think that’s 90% finished. I still have persistent vertigo, a 2-3 out of 10, which means I can walk but not drive. And I still can’t hear.

Oral and intratympanic (an injection in my ear) prednisone are the best bets, and I’ve been getting those. Next best bet is getting hyperbaric oxygen therapy. I got 2 120 minute treatments over the weekend at a great place, Holistic Hyperbarics in Emeryville. Monday I’ll switch to the one my insurance approved, Hyperbaric Medicine & Wound Care in Walnut Creek. I really like the first place so I’ll try to get my outside referral changed.

Each treatment take something like 3 hours, plus some travel time so this is no good for me working. It’s supposed to help within 10-20 days. The window of opportunity for repairing my ear damage is rapidly closing…. something like at the 10-30 day mark. So I just have to keep at it!

I was hoping the hyperbaric oxygen therapy would unlock some superpowers but none have revealed themselves yet, except for the awakening nature of making the time to read a book for the first time in a while. I’m reading Big Magic by Elizabeth Gilbert, all about creativity, inspiration, and art.

So, my work is on hold ’til my balance comes back (any day now?) and my hearing is on hold until it comes back in 10-? days.

Megan continue to be awesome. Abigail continues to be awesome. Messages of support continue to be awesome. Kaiser Permanente medical and hyperbaric oxygen and lots of googling is going well. (I had to suggest to my doctor that we try the hyperbaric, but he followed through with it!)

Ugh.

I got the sniffles last week and over the weekend I suddenly went deaf in my left ear and got severe vertigo. I’ve gotten medical treatment for the deafness, a prednisone injection in my ear, oral prednisone and sinus clearing meds to decrease inflammation in my inner ear. I got PT for the vertigo and it’s helping, mostly the epley maneuver to relocate calcium crystals that became dislodged in my inner ear. But I’m still dizzy and can’t drive. Recovery time for the dizziness is “days to several weeks, probably”.

Did I mention, “Ugh”?

Megan and Abigail have been amazing through this!

Expedia asked me what I thought of their service. Here’s what I had to say:

A few months ago, I was scammed by Routes car rental at FLL airport. It wasn’t a disagreement, it was a scam they very intentionally perpetrated on myself and every other person in the car rental center there at 6:00 in the morning. I have an audio recording of the entire terrible experience. After working with Expedia for a few weeks (several emails and 3 long telephone calls) I finally got the scam charges removed from my account by Expedia. I am thankful that Expedia did that for me! It is sinful that Routes car rental is still allowed on the Expedia platform. Here are details about my experience: https://www.lee.org/blog/2026/03/12/routes-car-rental-scam-at-fort-lauderdale-airport-fll/

Routes car rental’s predatory practices tarnishes the reputation of Expedia and costs you money in refunds, unhappy customers, and customer service calls. Please strongly consider dropping them as a service provider.

The Routes agent told me that she handled all of the calls for Routes Car Rental, NextCar, Mex, and Advantage Car Rental. I assume these companies are as shady as Routes.

The 2026 Rav4 has terrible interior lighting. The front interior overhead lights are tiny, under-powered, overly-directional. Being small lights, they cause glare. Being underpowered, they don’t light up the cabin sufficiently. At night, the lit up cabin looks “dramatic” but you can’t effing see anything in either the front or back seats. I mentioned this on reddit

The dashboard and infotainment system flicker terribly. If you are one of the rare people like myself that are bothered by flickering LED lights, you will want to stay away from the Rav4. But everyone’s eyes are different so you’ve got to try this for yourself.

My neighbor’s 2026 Rav4 in a driveway at night that bothers me, in 8x slowmo https://photos.app.goo.gl/o2ZFUaCs1JP3DLBS9

My 2021 crv that doesn’t bother my eyes much: https://photos.app.goo.gl/HCoFwKZcc81bmaQv9

The 2024 Honda pilot we just bought that doesn’t bother my eyes much: https://photos.app.goo.gl/h13Zvitv9rqpEPbg7

I am a big fan of Boomerang for Gmail. A few years back, my domain name had misconfigured email. So spammers were using it to send up to, and I’m embarrassed to say this, 50,000 spams a day. I fixed the problem, but my outgoing email was still often going to people’s spam folders. With Boomerang for Gmail, I can track whether a person has opened an email! This is good, so I know if they never saw my email because it went to spam. It’s also really good because then I know if they’re checking their emails.

And actually, the primary purpose of Boomerang for Gmail, the boomeranging part, is really good. I send an email, and if the person doesn’t reply within a particular amount of time, then the email gets pushed to the top of my inbox. That means I won’t ever lose an email thread!

Well, lately, Boomerang for Gmail has had a little bit of trouble. Many of the emails that I sent out with tracking went straight to spam, BECAUSE I was using Boomerang for Gmail! That is no good! I contacted the company, and they wrote back this:

Hi Lee,

Thanks for reaching out – I’m so sorry for the trouble!

Google recently made a change which led to them incorrectly flagging tracked emails as spam. This was not due to any change or error on our end – our tracking links were fine. We were first made aware of this issue about a week ago, and we reached out to Google to get their help resolving it.

Google had assured us the issue was fixed on Wednesday, and it was working correctly on all of our tests on Thur & Fri last week. Our testing earlier this morning revealed the problem had returned, and we immediately reached back out to Google for additional assistance.

Google has made a new temporary fix for the issue (basically a bandaid while they continue investigating to find the root cause). While our own testing has been successful again, I personally would advise holding off on using the tracking feature until we have a more concrete fix from Google.

I’ve added a $30 credit to your account, as an apology for the trouble this has caused.

I will update you as soon as there is a more concrete resolution from Google.

Kind Regards,
Maria

It is as honest and forthright a response as I could get. Though I wish they had been a little more proactive about telling their users about the problem.

I will keep using Boomerang for Gmail, but my use of the tracking feature is on hold until they get back to me!

Our principal for the last five years at Madera Elementary is retiring! David Ranch has been, as far as I’ve seen, an excellent principal that has helped our daughter Abigail become who she is! Thank you, Mr. Ranch!

Here’s a kudoboard with a lot of great public photo memories.

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If your loved one is in a nursing home and may outlive their savings, find a funeral home that will let them prepay their funeral expenses, putting the money into an irrevocable trust. Medicaid won’t see that money, leaving enough money for the family to perform a proper service.

All County Funeral Home in Florida, an excellent, no nonsense place, offered that to us for about $100 in paperwork cost. Two far fancier funeral homes, Cochran Funeral Home in New Jersey and Aycock Funeral Home in Florida had never heard of such a service.

Death is the mother of beauty – Wallace Stevens

TSDR;

Vaillancourt Fountain at Justin Herman Plaza, this bold, beautiful piece of living art is being removed from downtown San Francisco. I enjoyed it during its heyday and even when it had been left dry. Now, with its passing, it’s more beautiful than ever. Knowing that something will die is integral to its beauty.

For 2+ years, I have been the chair of the Madera Handy Helpers. We do all manner of odd jobs at my daughter’s elementary school. It’s a joy to help her and her school prosper and grow!

Over the next few months, I’ll be handing off the job to two newer, excited parents.

I put this plug into the Madera Monday Message. I’m happy with it.

Props to my neighbor Vinny Abeygunawardena who made the hats!