• One fine whine

    One of the advantages of US style health care is being able to obtain services without having to wait until the sun goes supernova (which could be a really long time, since our sun doesn’t have enough mass to go it alone).
    – common wisdom in the US. When I say common wisdom (an oxymoron in the US) I’m refering to the part about waiting for healthcare, not the part about the sun. Most Americans probably don’t know the sun is a star just like the other pretty lights in the night sky.

    My doctor wants me to see a neurologist about my headaches. Well, one of my doctors. I have several. In fact I’m seeing another one today, one I’ve known longer. She referred me to a practice in Tampa, the only one in the area specializing in headaches (so she says).

    I held my breath as I checked with my insurance to see if this neurologist, the lone sentinel standing against the headache blight, was blessed by the managed care gods. She was, so with a renewed sense of faith and optimism I called to make an appointment.

    They can squeeze me right in between Christmas and Thanksgiving – assuming they can get all of my medical records right away. Hah! Me and what army of copiers? Trees standing under the threatening eyes of pulp mills weep at the thought.

    How do you spell “ouch?”

    I’ve heard chronic headaches are pretty common in the US, though I haven’t taken the time to do the google for this post. That begs the question: where’s this free market everyone speaks so highly of? With all of this pent up demand, why isn’t there a headache clinic on every corner (next to Starbucks)?

    Oh capitalism! Why has thou forsaken me?

  • Bad taste and butchery

    I get a little uncomfortable when people start talking about “trimming” trees. My reasons break down like this: any jackass with insurance and a chainsaw can get a licence to trim trees in Florida, and Floridians in general don’t seem to like trees. That’s what I gather from the results anyway.

    I’m not against all forms or reasons for tree trimming. There are times when a tree needs to be trimmed for saftey’s sake, or for the tree’s health. But that’s not what’s happening here.

    I work(ed) in a large office complex on the water (Tampa Bay) with a lot of trees. The shaded, peaceful walkways felt more like a park than a place of business. Between the waterfront and the quiet atmosphere, I thought the setting was darn near perfect.

    That was before someone decided things needed to be “opened up.”

    Now my office feels like it ought to be a crime scene. There are dozens of formerly magestic oaks giving little or no shade, resembling palm trees more than the full hardwoods they once were. Now they look like pieces of modern art. Tall trunks stripped of all their limbs with any reach, with narrow, broccoli spear tops dot my view. Shaded court yards are now reduced to air traps – solar collectors for Florida’s already hot sun. Now we can go out and cook… or more likely, the once vibrant centers of congregation and conversation will be abandoned.

    People around me are oooing, and ahhhing over the new, open feeling. I feel like I’m the only one who sees the incredibly poor taste, or recognizes the crime taking place above our eyes.

  • Why do I hate thee, DST? How about I tell you

    • What was good for 1918 isn’t necessarily so great 90 years later.
    • Contrary to common wisdom, some studies show it causes an increase in energy consumption (especially for us poor folk down south) – partly because of a little thing called air conditioning.
    • How often does common wisdom lead us astray?
    • Shifting high noon to lower noon is just asking for trouble.
    • We have nothing to fear but time itself.
    • My microwave shows the wrong time half the year.
    • You ever try riding your bike to work in the black of night?
    • Do we really need another hour to play frisbee?
    • Do you know how freaking hot it is here when the sun is up? My time feels more leasurely in the relative cool of dusk.
    • As someone who rarely, if ever, strays from the good ‘ole EST zone, that hour really fracks me up.
    • EDST doesn’t have the same ring to it.
    • Loosing sleep, even if it’s once a year, and made up later, is a crime against humanity.