Direct TV........

After 10 years with Direct TV, last night we have moved on....... Goodbye DTV, you will be missed.

Approximately 10 years ago we had Time Warner Cable as our supplier for our television viewing pleasure, but we left them because it seemed every few months they would raise the rates or change the programing selections, and thus remove something that we enjoyed watching. As the price climbed and climbed and the service fit our desires less and less we made the tough choice to leave Time Warner and try out the relatively new concept of Direct TV. We were happy with them, their prices and their service until last night. Last night, the unthinkable happened....... We hit a television viewing crisis and DTV was unable to respond to assist us. We had finally found the fatal flaw, the Achilles heal of DTV. What is it you ask ?

DTV has no brick and mortar stores that you can work with to resolve you equipment problems. If a part goes bad, they Fed Ex you a new one, in 2 to 5 working days. You can't upgrade the shipping, due to 'contractual obligations'

So, here is the story.

Last night as I walk past the television it is happily showing my lovely wife's favorite channel ( DIY ) and then the screen goes black and prints a little message at the bottom saying the receiver needs reset. This is not a huge surprise because we get this little glitch about once a week. You press the little red reset button and the sun, moon, stars and satellites all check their locations in the universe, calculations are performed and the universe comes back into balance. This takes about 4 minutes, then you have you program back on and life sludges along as normal once again.

Upon re-entry into the room I discover that the precious receiver is no longer receiving power. The little blue light of joy is not shining any longer. I immediately drop to the floor and begin to attempt to necessitate it. I work tirelessly to bring life giving electricity back to the precious receiver. Upon exhausting all possibilities of immediate assistance I call the DTV version of 911 ( Tech Support ) and I speak with a fine young fellow named Tyler.

Tyler : thank you for calling Direct TV, how may I be of service to you ?

Me : Tyler, my receiver is dead, DEAD I say, it will not receive power, the blue light ( the blue light of joy ) is not on.

Tyler : have you tried plugging it into a different receptacle?

Me : yes, yes I have ( duh )

Tyler : let me check diagnostics on my end, ( canned computer like noises now whirr and grind away as I am on hold ) sir, you are correct, your receiver is indeed dead. Lets look at getting you a new one.

Me : yes, yes lets look at that... how do we do that ?

Tyler : I am showing two receivers, one is leased one is yours, this is the leased one, I can wave the new part cost and Fed Ex you out a new one that will arrive in 2 to 5 business days. There will ONLY be a shipping fee of $19.95 to cover the shipping cost...

Me : uh, Tyler... that's not going to be a workable solution. I know you're tech support and you're doing your job, but what I just heard was that your equipment failed and you're going to charge me to replace it, and I have to wait 2-5 business days at that. I am willing to pay for shipping only if its an upgrade to next day AM, otherwise no, and why would you charge to replace faulty equipment that is yours anyway.... I know you probably can't do anything so can you bump me to someone who can?

Tyler : well sir, it is just the shipping you need to pay, not for the part........

Me : I heard you, pay was the word I don't want to hear...

Tyler : I understand, I will transfer you to billing now..... have a great day and thanks for being such a long time customer........

Me : thank you Tyler, and I hope I get to stay that way.....

Hello, this is Becky, how may I help you ?

I repeat the situation to Becky, express my gratitude about Tyler doing his best and that his best was simply unacceptable. I then ask if she can do better. Long and short of it is that Becky discovers that I am listed as having two receivers, I only have one television and one receiver and she fixes this problem but can't help with anything else.

Me : so you cant wave the shipping charge and you can't upgrade the shipping at no charge or otherwise?

Becky : No sir, we have a contract with Fed Ex, everything ships the same and we can't change it. There is no place for you to go pick up a receiver unless you want to go to Best Buy and buy one instead of leasing.

Me : my wife is behind me dialing Time Warner Cable at this moment and if you can't do any better than that .....

Becky : Sir ( interrupts me with a new found sense of urgency in her voice ) let me transfer you to the retention department.... they have more access to things they may be able to do to help you..

Me : transfer away.....

Hello , my name is Danielle...... I see you have some faulty equipment issues , how can I help

(" Hello, my name is Inego Montoya, you killed my father, now prepare to die" " stop saying that " )

I run through the issues one more time. Daniell adjusted my bill, gave me a discount, removed the shipping charge but still could not upgrade the shipping or get me the equipment any faster.

Angie, my lovely wife, then gets hold of Time Warner, announces that she is an upset DTV customer, and asks what can they do for her.......

Time Warner then proceeds to offer us more channels for less money and upgrades our Internet service for free for a year as an incentive......

Angie then calls DTV and cancels the service as well as the new receiver... Someone comes on the line to attempt to talk her out of it. This gentleman offers her a $200 credit to our account as well as keeping the current arrangement of no charge shipping and a reduced bill, but he still cant get the receiver to us any quicker either.

FAIL......

Why is time such an issue....... well........ its bowl week for one thing and UK is playing Louisville on Saturday. With New Years being a day or two away and January one being on a Saturday we could expect that receiver sometime between the 3rd and the 6th of January.....

While I was writing this Direct TV just called to ask why they just received an order to cancel and offered to not cancel. I explained to them, again, the reason why. This time they offered to send an installer to the house today to put in a new receiver........

I told her that might have been of interest last night but we were told repetitively that the only way was to wait for the Fed Ex truck to arrive........ At this point, Time Warner is coming between 4 and 6 today to install and upgrade our Internet at the same time.....

possible pit falls........... still to come.........

Time Warner has a habit of wanting to charge for odd things........ if they try to charge for installing and becoming a new customer we will have to have a chat about that.....

Direct TV says they will send a final bill in seven days, that bill should only be about $20, if it is much greater then they are trying to charge a fee to disconnect my service or some such, then we will have to have a chat about that as well......

oh what fun.....

Of what use are the trees?

Girls and boys are different. Duh, I know. Women and men are different too. Whoa, not exactly a revelation either.

I have made an observation however that might not be quite as obvious.

There is not nearly as much of a difference between a girl and a woman as there is between a boy and a man. This is just my opinion as observed from my perspective.

Girls seem to become women rather abruptly, it just kind of happens one day. It is a common understanding that girls mature faster than boys, but I submit to you that the reason is because they never really have to change as much as boys do.

Before you go getting all Grumpy Guss with me, this is complimentary towards the finer gender.

Girls ( metaphor warning ) are like flowers. When they are young, they are beautiful little buds. As they mature they become blossoms, and then as they age they open up into mature beautiful flowers. Some flowers are strong and hardy and stand up well to wind, rain, drought, and frost, while others wilt easily. Some flowers thrive in harsh conditions while others only grow with constant nurturing and fertile soil. All are beautiful flowers none the less.

The boy to man transition is not nearly so attractive. Boys are ( another metaphor warning ) like nuts laying on the ground. They look almost nothing like what they might grow up to be, a tree. Boys first must learn to not get eaten by squirrels or they will never take root. Most do take root, but then we spend years and years growing o' so slowly as a sapling. During the sapling stage our outer protective skin is thin and scars easily, but this is wear the bark comes in. If we scar too much as a sapling we grow think and nearly impenetrable bark in our maturity. As young trees we are still green and relatively flexible, but as we age we become stiffer and harder and we don't conform as well as we used to. The transition from nut to tree is extremely different than from bud to flower. It is a whole lot slower for one thing, and it is a bigger transition from start to finish for another. ( again, this is my male opinion )

Another difference is that flowers have purpose, but trees have uses.

What kind of flower a girl becomes does not seem to affect the fact that she is a flower. ( not in my eyes anyway, but some might argue ) In contrast, however, what kind of tree a man becomes affects how the world views him.

Of what use are the trees, do we bear fruit? Are we cut for lumber ? Do we just drop our nuts randomly around the forest ? Do we stand strong against storms but still have enough sap in us to bend a little with the wind? Is our bark so thick and ugly that we go unnoticed? Is our canopy full of dead branches that fall and litter the ground? Are we to be burnt up to keep others warm ?

Of what use are the trees ?

The popular culture is so all consuming at times. It surrounds us with what we come to believe and understand as normal. Certain things envelope us every now and then and as the envelope encompasses our very being we don't always seem to understand the strangulation that this envelopment is causing. We find it difficult to resist the encroachment, particularly when we don't see anything amiss. We see what seems to be our entire world engaging the normal as if it were normal yet we don't feel right about something, somehow. We see our brothers and sisters whom we respect and seek guidance from following suit with the culture, yet we seem drawn away for some reason.

I know it is not against my brother that I should be fighting, but against principalities, against powers, against the rulers of the darkness that my fight lay against. The ignorance that is possessed blinds me from the truth that I seek, but as I endeavor to alleviate the ignorance of myself I find that my hand has been firmly planted on a bowl and that bowl covers a lit candle. As more of my ignorance leaves me during my walk to seek the truth the bowl becomes hotter and hotter until I must lift it and discover the light that is wanting to emanate out but I was keeping it in. The flame burns hot, but once I remove the bowl the radiance of the candle is warm and comforting. I feel pain if I keep the bowl too close to the flame now, so I wish to set the bowl aside and be done with it. When I do, I see things more clearly I think because the light floods the room. As the light floods the room I also see the things that I should avoid coming into contact with. I see the bricks sticking up out of the uneven floor just laying there waiting for me to stumble over them. Even knowing they are there, I must watch my step or I will trip and fall.

Having discovered the source of the discomfort in my hand, I also discovered the comfort and warmth of the light. I am eager to share this with my brother who is still shivering in the cold. I grab up the flame and take it to him but its radiance seems to burn his eyes and he recoils away from me. I feel sad because I have caused my brother pain, but I also feel confused. Why did the flame not burn my eyes, but rather burnt my hand until I let go of the bowl. I didn't mean to injure my brother, but he is wanting nothing to do with the light that is giving me warmth. He doesn't like the cold, but he doesn't know what the warmth feels like because he has not come close enough to it to feel warm. I am not discouraged, I take my discovery to another of my brothers to show him and share with him instead. I again grab the flame up and go running to him and exclaim," come , come see what I have found, this light, it helps you to see, it helps you to stay warm. " Again, this brother too covers his eyes and curses at me, he tells me I am a fool and I know not what I do. He asks me why I play with such foolish things, it wastes time and hurts people, surely no good can come from this.

I am left to wonder why as I approach my brothers , they will not hear me out. I wonder if my brother is not right and all I am doing is hurting others. I cant help but to wonder why they feel so differently than me. I think about picking the bowl back up and covering the light, but even as I reach toward the bowl it is now glowing red hot and I simply cannot pick it back up now. I do notice one other thing, as I was taking the candle to my brother, as I lifted it up, the higher I lifted it, the brighter it burned and the warmer the room felt.

I look around at all my family, my brothers and sisters. Many of them are cold and are stumbling around in the dark. Some of them seem to be able to find their way without falling, and seem to happy with their lives. Still others have no difficulty in life at all, never stumbling, never struggling, not seeming hungry, thirsty or cold like me. I notice these family members last because they seem to have not a worry. I respect them and look to them for guidance. I decide to take one more try to share my discovery and take the candle to a sister whom I respect. She does not shun me or flee as I approach with the light. I offer to let her hold it and feel its warmth and see the beautiful radiance that it puts off. She looks at it carefully and tells me she has no need for such a light. She has all she needs and while she isn't burned by the light like my brothers, she isn't warmed by it either. She tells me that she is fine fitting into this world, she has a flashlight to light her way and lots of clothing to keep her warm. She tells me that she is just like everyone else and it is okay if I want to be different, but she doesn't want to be different and carry around a candle. I pick up the flame a little higher and notice that it is very dark around her, but the things that are in the dark places don't worry about her. They just keep behind her as not to get in the way of her flashlight.

I wonder to myself, to me my sister looked cold and yet she has no use for the warmth I might bring to her. My brothers seem to struggle but I injure them by trying to show them a path. I cannot hide the flame that I have found because it hurts me to try and hide it again. What do I do with this candle now? After spending some time enjoying the warmth of the flame and sitting staring at its beauty, I again feel a chill in the air. I know that the flame burns brighter and hotter when I lift it up, so I find a loft in the room and climb up to the top, taking the candle with me. Once I reach the loft I sit the candle down in front of me, and it is burning brighter and warmer than ever before. After some time I notice a brother and a sister climbing up the ladder to meet me in the loft. They have seen my candle from off in the distance and wanted to come see what was making that light. They commented that the light felt warm and comforting to them and they wanted me to tell them where I found it. I shared with them my whole story, and they listened. Then my brother seemed to be uncomfortable all of the sudden. He and I both looked down at his hand, in his hand he had a bowl. I told him, pick your hand up and see what is under there.

My brother lifted his hand and under it was a candle with a flame. I explained to him the newest thing I had learned. Lift the candle up and allow people to see it and come to you, if you chase after those who are not ready they might flee. Share your candle with all who wish to see it, but you will only injure those who you chase after. Let them see your life by keeping the light held up high and let the light chase away the darkness and bring your brothers to you. Don't try and point out their faults while the heat is still chasing the chill from your own bones.

It is hard to be in the world and function in the world without becoming like the world. Many of my brothers and sisters carry a light that shines into dark spaces, but most of us do not carry the light high enough to shed light across large places.

I still have much ignorance left to shed and my candle has made it to the loft but not yet to the roof and certainly not yet to the mountains peak.

A day at the hospital

Spending the day at the hospital is never going to be a fun experience, but today did have its moments.

Here is the background. Angie was in for another 'procedure' today. We arrived at 9:30 for a 10:00 o'clock appointment and she was scheduled for surgery at 12:00. The surgery was supposed to last about 1 -1/2 hours so she was to be in recovery before 2:00. As is normal with the normal chaos that is our lives, at 6:30 they begin the process of moving her to a room so she can spend the night. Instead of being home before dinner, we are hoping to be home before lunch tomorrow.

So, since I have so many hours to kill, what am I going to do? Well, I can't leave until she gets into her room so I have until almost 7 o' clock to kill before taking Gracie her overnight bag and then beating a path back to the room to watch Angie sleep for a while. I don't have many options for entertainment so I settle on updating facebook regularly and watching the other folks who are populating the waiting room. Ah people watching, my favorite sport....

After Angie goes back I slide down to the cafeteria for a quick change of scenery and 1/2 cup of the worst scrambled eggs I have ever come across in life. I mean seriously people, how do you make scrambled eggs so tasteless , what is the trick with that ? While questioning from what foul these eggs were commandeered from, a young lady comes walking into the atrium. Now, let me paint the picture for you, I am alone in a room with about 15 tables. This room is off to the side and away from the main dinning area. I am perched up against a wall with my laptop out and my faux eggs minding my own business when a young blond lady walks into the room. She reminds me of Red Fox , or to be more accurate, she reminds me of Fred Sanford. She comes in holding her shoulder and neck and staggering around a bit. She walks to one edge of the room and grabs her shoulder and moans, well yells a moaning type sound. She then walks back across in front of me to the other edge of the room and has another yelling moaning episode. She then walks over to the table one away from mine, right in front of me and from a standing position lays her forehead on the table and lets out more yelling, sobbing moans. Over dramatic does not even touch this one as a description. I am sitting there debating what to do, I am thinking I should ask her if she requires any help but am not sure what to say. I start running over options in my head to try out what they sound like.

1. " what is wrong with you " ( nope, no way to make that sound good )
2. " do you need some help of some kind ?" ( nope, that's even worse than the first one )
3. " Miss, is there something I can help you with ?" ( closer, but still crass sounding )
4. " Is your name Sally ? and if so, were is Harry and have you two met yet " ( uh, no )
5. " Ma'am, can I be of some help to you ?" ( still a bit awkward, but passable )

Just as I had worked out what to say she turns to me before I have had a chance to speak and she starts talking. I think she was tired of waiting for me to process everything, but I wanted to be cautious not to seem a flirt, or seem a curmudgeon so I wanted to process things first, I guess she didnt have the patients for that, anyway, she starts.

" Oh, I am sorry, I am sorry, I don't usually cry in front of people ( cry, cry !! your yelping like a wounded water buffalo during peak mating season ) I didn't know what they were gonna do to take that x-ray. It just hurts, it really really hurts. Can I ask you something, I have asked like 30 people already and they all said no and I know you will say no too but they just wouldn't listen, would you listen to me please, my son is trying to raise money for a school fundraiser and they have all this neat stuff in here, if you would just look through it I would appreciated it, do you mind if I go get a cup of coffee, I'll be right back., oh it hurts , it really really hurts, I don't mean to talk so much I just talk when I am in pain and OHHHHH, I 'm sorry sorry sorry, I'm gonna get a cup of coffee and , I , they told me no caffeine with the pain meds, but, I'll be right back, do you mind if I get a cup of coffee? "

Now, she is gone for a few minutes, while she is gone I would like to point out that the entire above spoken paragraph was said in about one breath, maybe two but that would only be due to the brief pause to add more theatrics. To shorten this up, my friend is 29, has two children, thinks her neck is broken, and is hocking stuff in the hospital dinning room. While she is gone I here an intercom message come across about a clean up in front of the coffee shop. Yep, you guessed it, she spilled the first cup of coffee, too much pain to carry hot coffee with shaking and spilling it. We talked a little , we talked about church and she was going to take Angie's name to her prayer group tonight, I bought a bookmark and donated it to one of her prayer group friends, and she moved on to another table in the other dining room. Well, its 10:15 AM right now, this is going to be an interesting day at this pace.

Back to the waiting room I go. Nothing left to do but people watch.

Have you ever noticed that sometimes you just really can't tell who is who and how old people are. For example, two ladies and a toddler, oh, 3 years old max would be my guess. You look at the two women and think, okay, the younger, relatively attractive one, the one who looks like she showered this morning must be mom, and the older one who showers every spring whether she needs to or not over there looking haggard and grumpy, thats grandma. But when it comes time for the patient to go back and both mom and grandma start addressing the toddler in third person, you are reminded not to judge, and please dont guess, because this isnt one you want to get wrong out loud. " grandma will be right back, just stay here with momma ?" Yikes,,,,


You look around and put people with people sometimes because you have nothing else to do. The next group is what I call ," the herd ". If you have spent any time at all in hospital waiting facilities, you have seen some variant of , " the herd " . Today's herd would be what I would call the redneck herd, or perhaps the , " larry the cable guy " herd. The herd is what happens when just a few too many people decide its a good idea to hang out all day at the hospital. One is lonely, two is company, three is getting to be a crowd, 18 is a herd. This group had about 4 women who I would call, tired looking, if you know what I mean. Then there were about 8 men there and oh I am guessing about 6 or so kids running loose barefoot around the place. The men all look the same in a way. They are the kind of men who sit around and belittle each others deer stands and poke fun at each others Bass Boats. These are the kind of men that if you say " Dale Earnhardt " within their earshot, they all take off their hats and place them over their hearts. Yes, they all had hats, that is how I could tell them apart, Mr. Budweiser frog hat was proud of his Ranger Bass boat and Mr. John Deere hat was proud of his deer stand. Mr. Bass Pro Shoppe was proud of the fact that he could stand today after all he drank last night. Mr. Built Ford Tough hat was proud of his truck , and Mr. Chevy Nascar hat was just as proud as he could be of his new teeth. He didn't say, but after seeing his little missus, I think I know what happened to his old teeth. As the group got up to depart I heard Mrs. John Deere hat say, " grab you youngen and com'mon, we need to get up to you maw's room now. Ah, what good boys they are....

While driving back and forth between the hospital and taking care of Gracie's supplies I passed through Turtlecreek Township. I noticed that there was no creek, I didn't even see a town, and I didn't run across even one single turtle. I also passed a street called Circle Drive. It was a dead end street. Well, that is how I spent most of my day today....


It is now after 11 and I think I may try to sleep a little...

good night....

A billboard advertisement

Or more to the point , ( the point of my opinion of course ) A billboard advertisement gone wrong.

I am going to attempt to carefully touch on a somewhat sensitive subject, so please bare with me and understand I mean no disrespect to any party. I will attempt to keep my opinion firmly focused on the monetary ( IE tax dollar ) side of this issue. I in no way have any issue one way or the other with the act or process that I am going to be compiling the following verbiage concerning.

So, I ask you, what is the point of advertising ? I believe the point is relatively simple in its goal. The goal of any advertisement is to convince you to buy a product or adopt a certain point of view. It is intended, sometimes, to educate you on the availability of a product, service, or the existence of a viewpoint in some cases. I think this is a pretty simple and liberal definition of the concept of advertising.

People advertise so you know their products name, and in most cases , why their product is superior and should be purchased by you. People advertise their services for the same reason. Some advertisements are to sway your opinion on a subject, like a campaign advertisement for example.

Now, using the above as a reference, we now have some idea why people advertise and who might be doing the advertising. Now, let me pose this question, who is paying for the advertisement?

In most cases, the cost of the advertisement, in this case a billboard, is born by the person doing the advertising. If Coke wants you to buy Coke and not Pepsi, then Coke pays for the billboard to attempt to convince you Coke is better, or maybe inform you of a new product that Coke has and Pepsi doesn't, etc. Its that simple. Now, if a arm of your state government puts up a billboard, what is it they are trying to do, and who is paying for that?

Well, the answer to this question is simple, the tax payer is paying for the billboard. What might they be attempting to accomplish? Why, the greater good of course. This has shown itself in the past with billboards reminding us to buckle up, don't drink and drive etc. I can see the point here, maybe we do need reminded that we should have our belts on, or face a ticket if nothing else. Maybe we do need reminded that drinking and driving is not real smart. Okay, I will buy that theory, even if its a bit of a stretch, I can see the greater good, or at least the greater good intentions there. If the billboards cost were to save so much as one life, or even minimize one persons injuries, its worth spending a few tax dollars on.

Now, to the reason for this random post. There is a billboard just down the street from were I work that bugs me every time I see it, and I have run out of patients with it today. The billboard is paid for by W.I.C. ( Women Infants and Children ) An honorable and worthy cause I am sure. I point out who paid for it only because it means it came not only from our tax dollars, but came out of their budget as well. Budget monies that I am sure could have been used for some other purpose. My question to you, and my problem, is this, is this billboard worth the money it cost to put up? Should that money have been used someplace else more productively? What are they trying to accomplish ?

Before trying to answer this question, let me tell you whats printed on the billboard.

No kidding:

BREASTFEEDING

WE DID IT, SO CAN YOU !

Okay , is it just me? Refer to above reasons to advertise, what are they hoping to do? And more to the point, why? If I was trying to decide whether or not to breast feed my child ( not that I have that option mind you ) would this at all suggest to me that it was a good idea? No, I think I would be offended by the phrase. I can find no legitimate reason to spend budgeted tax dollars in this manner.

Again, I am not making any statement about whether or not a women should or should not breast feed, that is entirely a decision that should be made as a family unit with some minor input from the husband, but ultimately the sole decision of the mother. I just think that when a Government funded agency wastes money people should ask why........

What are you looking forward to ?

Feeling a little melancholy and reminiscent today. Had dinner last night with a friend from high school. It was good to get to know each other all over again. It did, however, kick start my brain into thinking about things. So, I pose this question, what are you looking forward to in life..... I will list a few of mine in no particular order.....

1. Gracie's graduation from college,, or seminary. I cant wait to be sitting in the audience and hear, " Marilyn Grace Wilson....... Magna Cum Laude........ " and watch her walk across the stage. That is one thing I am looking forward to.
2. I am also looking forward to holding my wife's hand and wiping away her tears at Gracie's high school graduation.
3. I am looking forward to growing old in a small beach side condo on the edge of the Caribbean Sea with my wife living with me and my daughter collecting a lot of frequent flyer miles.
4. Living long enough to hear the words, " I love you Grandpa " That's one thing I am looking forward to.
5. Sitting with my wife at a big table and then getting called up to go dance with my daughter at the father daughter dance at Gracie's wedding. I hope I can still walk, but if I cant walk then I will just have to learn to fly because I will be dancing with my daughter on that day.
6. Standing with my wife OUTSIDE the delivery room as WE wait on the birth of our first grandchild. This is one day at the hospital that I am looking forward to. I know both Angie and I will tell Gracie, " I hope you get a child, JUST LIKE YOU "
7. Growing old with my true love, that is one thing I am looking forward to. We can share cholesterol medicine, we can share that seat thing in the shower, as long as we don't have to share dentures, I am looking forward to growing old together.
8. One day a nice boy will sit me down and tell me how much he loves my daughter. He will be a good boy with a job and a strong moral compass. We will talk about my daughter and what he needs to do to remain among the living. I will tell him about Jimmy Hoffa and how they still haven't found his body. This is something I am looking forward to.
9. One day I will be sitting in the sun and thinking back on my life, and I will be happy. The sun will feel warm on my face and the beauty all around me will permeate deeply into my spirit. I will fall asleep right here and be awoken a short time later by the words, " well done My good and faithful servant" This is something that I am looking forward to.

Just thoughts......

I didn't really have anything earth shattering to say or any one topic to bludgeon but I have not blogged in a while so I just felt the need to spout off about nothing in particular..

• Health care reform has passed. The means of passing it were more than a little ugly, and people seem to be genuinely surprised that the people have reacted bitterly and in more than a few cases violently. Please don't insult us by faining surprise. Politicians will pay with their offices come the next opportunity, and that will be true regardless of how they voted on health care. The system suffered a high profile systemic failure. Everybody (almost) wanted some kind of health care reform because most people realize the system sucked and was broken. This is not a fix, however, its a control issue. What passed ( and really, who knows what passed, nobody really even knows yet ) doesn't even claim to have a mechanism to reduce the cost of insurance or the cost of health care or the cost of prescriptions. It does have a system to 'force' everyone to have insurance. Don't misjudge that statement either, the government is going to give you insurance, subsidise part of your insurance or just verify that you have insurance if you can afford it. Guess who decides if you can afford it, the government. If you cant afford it, guess who decides how much of a subsidy you get, the government. Guess who decides who gets a free ride, again, the government, in their infinite wisdom of course. Some people would argue that employers are going the be the ones paying, so why do I care. Even if your employer did pay before, they are going to have to pass the cost on somehow to someone, and if they didn't but are pickled into doing it now, its going to cost you. Yes, there are some nice things allegedly in the bill, pre-existing conditions being eliminated is one of them. That is nice, and yes it is a good thing, but it is also an unfunded mandate so what makes anybody think its going to make the cost go down? The prevailing theory seems to be that since the pool of participants will go up the cost of insurance should go down. In a free and competitive market this would be true, and we can debate how free the market is (its not) but there is no real competition at all to even attempt to drive the cost down. The second theory is that people will stop using emergency room services that they end up not paying for because now they can just go to the doctor instead and still not pay for it. This Ponzi scheme does shift the funds around (slight of hand though it is) so that the hospitals can avoid getting stuck with the tab and the doctor actually gets paid, but I ask again, what is the impetuous for either the hospital or the insurance company to lower the price. Yes they will have more paying clients and less waist, which might might might mean they make more money and higher profit margins so they could afford to spread the wealth back down and lower the cost, but without competition to drive that your asking the scorpion not to sting the frog on the way across the river. Its not gonna happen. This bill does come with some interesting funding as well. It taxes tanning bed users a 10% surcharge. While on the surface I have no issue with placing a specific tax on a specific item to generate funds for a specific and applicable reason, this one is a stretch in that it is based on loose science and statistics. Most people will buy the thought that tanning beds increase the risk of skin cancer, proven fact or not. The problem lies in following the pattern the rest of the way, are these folks then a drag on the medical system in large enough numbers that they should need to defray the cost? With smokers, this makes sense, but with tanning bed users the equation seems to fall apart, except in the reality that somebody was grasping at straws trying to find funding for their personal legal triumphs. As a side note, I don't endorse random violence, but please dear government and media please understand something, your dancing with flame in a gasoline suit right now, people feel betrayed by you in large enough numbers that something has to give. If there is not a mass exodus of personnel out of Washington with the next vote, look for more violence and destruction to follow as the frustrated subjects rise up against the broken system.


• Gracie has made great progress this year in school. She is reading now very well. She has a standing homework assignment where she is supposed to read for at least 20 minutes each day. She has mostly been reading her Junie B. Jones books. ( Mrs. looked up at the ceiling, I looked up there too but I didn't see anything) but she also made a request of her parents the other night. She made us and offer we couldn't refuse so to speak. Gracie knew that two of her friends had gotten new bibles, and she knew that dad was going to church early now so he could take a men's bible study class before service started. She asked that if she went to the kids class and read her bible could she have her own big girl bible. Color me suckered 'cause she has a new bible. It is admittedly not a King James version, but it is far from a story book bible either. Its a real live chapter and verse bible. Gracie has made it thru Genesis 3 at this moment. The deal is she reads for 20 minutes and then dad reads to her what she just read in case there are questions or things that require more effort. I am so proud of her I could bust, even if I did get suckered into spending 40 bucks.


• Gracie has also signed up for a one day, and one NIGHT youth camp through our church. This should be interesting. Gracie has only slept away from us twice and both times it was just several houses down the street. This is going to be miles away. A camp like this is going to be really good for her, she will have to build more on those independent functioning skills and rely and trust more in herself and learn the ability to seek help from her peers when required, all those growing up things. Its a safe place with lots of youth workers, volunteer staffs, councilors, and youth pastors, so I am fine with the idea, but having my Boogs so far away for a day and a night is going to be tough on mom and dad, probably worse on us than her truth be know, but don't tell anybody OKAY !!


• Big Lots has some nice and reasonably priced patio furniture. This random fact brought to you only because it caused a temporary cease fire in the nagging process. By temporary I mean momentary, or actually perhaps it was imaginary. Yep, that's it, an imaginary cease fire in the nagging process. Focus switched instantly to the accoutrement that goes with a patio set, including but not limited to a fire pit. Oh, the ' replace the carpet that has been dog ruined, but paint the whole upstairs first, I am not nagging but are you done yet" also started this weekend. Wasn't nagging cause for stoning in biblical times? Could we look into bringing that back please? I think the Supreme Court is still male dominated enough that they would uphold such a thing, don't you?


• I borrowed an electric chainsaw to cut down some bushes in my yard this weekend. ( yes it is part of the project mentioned above ) There is something oxymoronish about an electric chainsaw. There is something inherently unmanly about it. No gas fumes, no mixing oil and gas and releasing puffs of blueish greenish smoke into the air because of the mixture being off. No smell of the chain lube cooking off as it burns against the motor body. No dead spot in the grass where you spill the poorly mixed oil and gas mixture. None of the manly man stuff that goes with a chainsaw. I felt like I should be in heels, hose and a skirt while I was chopping down these shrubs. Actually maybe the term should be electrically sawing the shrubs down. Chopping implies a much more manly endeavor than what I did. Anywho, the mass o' dead shrubs ( dead because me kilt 'em ar ar arrrr) has been dragged to the street. ( should that have been drug, drugged, dragged, or dragathed to the street?) I just hope that the waist collection people feel it in their hearts to haul them off this week. I have been told that they will do so, only if I tie them up first. Tie what, its a whole bush, 7 whole bushes to be exact. Each one is too big to tie to another bush and tying up just one bush doesn't maketh sense to me, its not going to get any easier or smaller, just because I engage in a bondage scene with mother nature. (ewww, I know, too far) If I do end up having to bind them up, I think I will go purchase some yellow ribbon and tie it in a bow, maybe the neighbors will at least get a chuckle that way.


• If you have to cross your legs to avoid flashing your who who at the pastor, your skirt is way to short. Just sayin'.


• I purchased 6 solar lights shaped like itty bitty pagodas to go around the patio. ( again, an imaginary nag stopper ) Is there something just wrong with the phrase , " solar lights " or is it just me. It seems redundant or something. I realize there are lunar lights, artificial lights, florescent lights etc etc. but solar lights are not lights of the sun as the name implies. Lunar lights are light from the moon, artificial lights are light caused in an artificial manner, one would think that solar lights would be sun light, but no. They are really artificial light that is powered by a battery that it just so happens was charged by the sun. I think we should call them wireless lights and get it over with.


• The madness of March is almost over. I have survived yet another year. Its not that I don't like basketball really, its an okay sport. It's mildly entertaining for the most part. The thing that gets my boxers in a bunch is just the shear volume of it all. You have all the tournaments that precede THE tournament. All those po-dunk ( pun intended) conferences that you don't care about any other time. Those conferences with George Mason, IUPUI, Southwestern Idaho Agricultural and Knitting University and the like. These are immediately followed by a selection show in which the field is narrowed down to only, ( yes only) 64 teams. ( actually its 66 teams since the added a play in game) Then the talking heads of sports spend the next little bit of forever arguing about the 3 teams who didn't make it. This continues for weeks or until some Cinderella makes the case that they can actually play, then everybody shuts up. At the same time, in interest of gender equality, the same thing is happening in a women's league. AND at the same time, the NIT, or Not In Tournament tournament is getting underway. AND the division 2AA II NIAI or whatever division it is also is playing on ESPN 18, subtitles in Spanish. Just in case this is not enough ( its enough already ) they have a 3 point competition and slam dunk contest just to kill a few minutes between games. Next year, rumor has it, that the tourney is going to expand one whole tier, that's 128 teams, or 130 if they keep the play in game. Next years play in game will be the Ag-ed nuns from St. Agathas vs. the winner of the prison league play off in Idaho. Go Ag-ed nuns go......... Good thing is, its almost over, bad thing is the only thing on television will now be baseball. Oh dont get me started on that primadona train full of losers.......... ( sorry Patti )

Well, this has been random, but this blog is called Normal Chaos so you should be used to me by now.