4/24 In the end, the interim ring arrived about one hour before the replacement ring, and that only because the drivers had different payloads to work through on their ways up Manhattan.

4/23 My oura ring broke. More precisely, it stopped sending data some time around 4 yesterday and has been unresponsive since. Apparently it’s a well-known problem, a faulty batch of rings, and customer support told me almost immediately I’d get a replacement. 

Turns out I’m pretty attached to this ring already, after three weeks, especially for tracking my messed up sleep patterns. I read that a replacement takes 1-2 weeks to arrive, and that bugged me so much that I decided to order another ring from Amazon for the interim, which will be delivered tomorrow, and return it once the actual replacement arrives. 

Yes, this feels a little like cheating, although there is zero chance Amazon won’t accept the return. The interim ring will certainly get some tiny scratches in those one or two weeks, and I doubt it will be resellable as new. Then again, I’m sure they have some processes for using such returns as display units, or as refurbished units in different markets or later in the product cycle.

The original ring and the replacement ring are brushed silver, so I ordered the interim one in stealth grey, just so I wouldn’t mix them up, and also to remind myself of the intent. Stunningly, though, the tracking emails suggest that the replacement might be here even sooner than the interim, even though it comes from – unbelievably – the Netherlands, while the interim is in a warehouse right outside the city.

I did feel very sad about not having a working ring as I took the train back into the city tonight. It occurred to me only then that I could indeed wear it as, even though it’s not working, a ring.

4/22 Basically every time you press the gas pedal the percentage of the battery goes down. The range is 20 miles, enough for maybe 3-4 errands a day. I sure hope I will see the day when we look back at this unbelievably primitive technology and admire the humans who put up with it.

4/21 Uneventful work day. Silent errands with the electric Jeep. Another doctor visit. No time for diagnosis today, we’ll do that next week.

4/20 Good sleep, although only in the morning hours and then until noon. Running and gym, took the Jeep to Newburgh at five. In a somewhat adventurous take, we removed the roof panels in a parking lot and drove with fierce and loud wind on the interstate, not quite expecting how cold this would be as the temperature dropped another four degrees towards Newburgh, and we had nothing warm, just t-shirts. Piano at night, touched it for the first time in a week.

The one car that’s getting pulled over in the morning rush hour while everyone is going above the speed limit: taking one for the team. The one zebra that’s getting caught by a lion while a big herd is crossing the savannah: taking one for the team.

4/19 Second march from Bryant Park, this time to Central Park South. Almost nobody is masking up, and those who are can easily pass as covid-concerned. It’s good vibes everywhere, and in fact, there’s one sign that says “if Kamala was president, we’d all be at brunch”.

4/18 Again facing the question whether to protest anonymously or show my face, and the decision becomes harder, but the outcome remains the same.

Writing a message and putting it out there is as basic an act as taking a cardboard box and cutting a window into it to turn it into a theater.

4/17 Jetlag without a jetlag. I have already gotten up at four, after having slept only till two, I have already taken the shuttle bus in the dark from the airport hotel to the airport, I have already stood in the security line and then in the global entry line, I have already waited half an hour at the gate and then boarded the plane in the dark, taking seat 2A in first because of my upgrade. I have already opened the blinds of the two windows right in the middle of which my seat was situated, I have taken off and climbed above the clouds and seen the morning sun illuminate fine vertical scratches in the window, about which I wonder whether anyone has anticipated or thought about them. I have already wondered about the many lakes of Connecticut, and I have already come in over Manhattan on a bright clear morning at seven, as the plane quite literally used the entire length of Manhattan Island to descend, then make a left turn over Governor’s Island and go all the way back up again before making another left turn to land at LGA. I have already wondered how the people in the vast white corridors of the new LGA look just like the computer simulations that were posted for years to show what the new LGA, which never seemed to materialize, would look like. I have already taken a ridiculously sized black Infinity into Manhattan, already got stuck several minutes on West 91st behind a long line of other SUVs chauffeuring kids to school at precisely 8.10, before we pulled up in front of my building and I walked into my apartment, then the bedroom, wanting nothing but sleep a little longer this morning.

4/16 Montreal. Snow flakes and freezing cold after those few spring days in New York. Gave two presentations. Dinner in a restaurant which the Canadians specifically selected because there would be a projector and a screen on which they could watch the ice hockey game. At my table: India, Kuba twice, Kanada, Texas. Having gone from Germany to the US feels, in this perspective, as if having basically stayed in the same country. Oh yes, the Cubans laughed compassionately when I said I’d become a US citizen last summer.

4/15 Flight to Montreal in the evening, with some 1.5 hours delay at the gate, because a part which the captain assured us was redundant still had to be replaced, but that somehow did not succeed and a message that had appeared somewhere kept reappearing. At one point, the plane had to be turned off and then on again.

Many news I saw today and I just could not comprehend how this is ever going to turn out, how this can ever be fixed.