Two years have passed since my last post on the subject, and the few readers left may want to know what happened since then with my eye troubles.
There have some relatively minor complaints. The Diamox pills I was using to keep eye pressure down turned out to have noxious long-term side-effects and I had to discontinue them gradually. Some side-effects (dizziness, weakened voice and reduced coordination) I had attributed to lack of physical exercise and old age ? but they’re gone now, it’s a relief.
Fiddling around with eyedrops to find the least irritating ones is an ongoing process, complicated by two bouts with small corneal injuries — probably caused by forgetting to blink while using the computer.
The remaining problem is a macular edema that appeared over a year ago, causing blurred vision. After it proved resistant to eyedrops, a subtenonian triamcinolone injection relieved the condition for several months, but it seems to be coming back. It’s still undecided whether repeating the injection will be worthwhile.
In the meantime, the eye is still drier than usual, painful towards the end of the day, and the dilated pupil makes me avoid the sunlight; I’m still getting used to these — apparently permanent — conditions.
On the development front, I’ve decided to start writing software again in the near future; maybe not for publication, but purely as brain exercise. None of my old apps seem to be doable for the recent macOS versions; Apple has tightened restrictions on what can be done by third-party apps.
Also, I see that most of my Objective-C experience is now obsolete and Swift has progressed beyond my feeble CS skills. But it still might be fun to try to catch up! To that end, I’ve purchased a reasonably configured M1 Mac mini running macOS Monterey and have slowly been migrating my normal apps to that; tricky as I was still depending on some 32-bit utilities, so my trusty “Late 2014” iMac will still be in use in parallel for several months.
Things are more positive on the general health front. We’re both fully vaccinated with a booster shot, and have been able to start regular gym sessions again, with encouraging results. This has also been producing excellent results in our table tennis training, and we have even been twice to special training sessions in nearby Varginha. This weekend I’ll play the 10th TMB Challenge Plus tournament and have good chances to add a medal to my collection.
