General Fear Ramblings

General Fear Ramblings

This is Loki, the mutatoe puppy.

Loki drinks gallons of water in one sitting, so a few weeks ago we took him to the vet for his shots and had some blood work and urinalysis done on him. Our vet was concerned because his urine was diluted (probably from drinking gallons of water), but she wanted to make sure there wasn't anything bad going on, and asked for us to bring him back in two weeks to retest.

We did... it was even more diluted. She started talking about kidney failure (nothing you can do for that in dogs), and I started freaking out, picturing the worst (of course). She suggested we go have him ultrasounded (is that a verb?) to make sure he had two kidneys, and all of his other organs, because he's a mutant paw puppy... what else is mutant?

So, today we took him to get his ultrasound. Really nice vet, great clinic. We got to stay in the room with him and hold him while they did it. The vet was pointing out things on the screen... like we'd know what we were looking at. "And here we have the gallbladder, and a pair of needlenose pliers". A friend was actually hoping for a mutant looking organ, perhaps in the shape of the blessed Virgin Mary that I could sell on e-bay and become rich.

Turns out that mutatoe has all his organs, and they appear to be functioning properly, and look normal (no Virgin Mary... crap, there goes dreams of being a millionaire) so we suspect he's just neurotic about drinking. He was found running down a busy street when he was only a few months old. We're pretty sure whoever bred him just let him go once they saw the deformed paw and figured they couldn't get bloated "papered" dog prices for him. Although that's a crappy way to get rid of a puppy, it's much better than other ways to "get rid" of a deformed puppy.

Water Main Break
I wake up sunday... ok, Meeshka woke me up at 6am on Sunday, I took the herd out and went to the bathroom. Flushed the toilet downstairs and it started making this gawd-awful noise. Great, I thought, another toilet dying on a weekend. Lifted the tank to see if the problem could be fixed with duct tape and a bent coat hanger, and discovered all sorts of muck burbling in there. Odd.

Went upstairs, and turned on the kitchen faucet to give the dogs some water, and it began spewing forth all sorts of muck in an explosive manner. Hmmm... went back to bed because these things just can't be noodled through at 6am on a sunday morning.

Got up, and sure enough, dirt and muck from the faucets. Turns out (after a call to the water department, who was actually there, and a real live person answered the phone on the 2nd ring), that a water main broke in our area. It was already fixed and the water should be clearing, he informed me. It's safe to drink, but don't do laundry. Um... ok. I didn't ask how long I couldn't do laundry, I'm actually seeing just how long I can go before hubby starts to complain.

Figure These Odds

I HATE Quicken 2005, and the U.S. Postal Service sucks.

Since 1994 I've paid bills using Quicken and Check Free (which wasn't, but it was pretty cheap and very reliable). Input the bills in quicken, hit a button, my bills were paid electronically.

Enter greedy Intuit, who decided they wanted a piece of the bill paying pile o' dough, so they bought out Check Free and created Quicken Bill Pay. I had no choice, if I wanted to keep paying my bills electronically, I had to use Quicken Bill Pay AND upgrade my version of Quicken to 2005. Intuit was nice (they should be), and sent me a free copy of Quicken 2005 Premier.

Before Quicken 2005, Quicken was a very simple program. Track your bills, track your accounts, life is good. When I installed Quicken 2005 Premier, the first thing I thought was "what is all this crap?" Charts, reports, bar graphs, annoying reminders (bill comes in, I pay bill, who needs more of a reminder), "simplistic" menus (my ass), and I can chart and track my stocks, bonds, how much fiber in my diet from the Quicken analysis of the food items I purchase at local grocery stores... ok, I can't do that, at least I don't think I can, as I haven't made it through the 3,000 page Quicken Quick guide yet.

I want to pay my bills. I want my bills paid on time. That's all I want.

The first problem with the upgrade was that it added 3 numbers to every payee zip code, then told me it couldn't pay my bills. I fixed that.

The second problem was, every time I said "pay a bill" it made it a check I needed to print out. No, I want you to electronically pay my bills... ok, I can do that... by sending a check to the payee. NOOOO, I want you to ELECTRONICALLY pay my bills. I can write a stupid check, why should I pay you 13 bucks a month to do what I can do?

So... for some reason, in October, Quicken decided to send Office Depot a check. Before that they would pay electronically without a problem, but October appeared to be check month.
On October 20th, I get a letter in the mail from the U.S. Postal Service, inside was the check that was suppose to go to Office Depot (on the 1st). The letter said: "we process 8 million letters a day, and well, we screwed up on this one, as it was found damaged and stuck in one of our machines". Nice. Ok, so you processed 7,999,999,999 letters on that one day, and hosed up mine, but why did you send it to ME? Why didn't you send it to who it was addressed to? On October 23rd I put the check in a new envelope and mailed it off to Office Depot.

Sunday I go to pay some bills. Three bills that I sent off to be paid came back and said "hey, don't forget to print me!" I DON'T WANT TO PRINT YOU, I WANT YOU TO BE PAID ELECTRONICALLY! So I demand they get paid electronically. To which one of the bills said "I've already been paid, but I'm just not going to say that." Now every time I close Quicken, it says "you have bills to be sent". No I don't. Yes, yes you do. No I don't. I'm arguing with software now. Fine, send it. "Oh, I'm sorry, but that's already been paid, but you have bills to be sent, would you like me to send them?"

Tuesday rolls around. I get the mail. In the mail is a letter from the U. S. Postal Service. Inside is THE FREAKIN CHECK FOR OFFICE DEPOT FROM OCTOBER!!!! The letter inside says: "we process 8 million letters a day, and well, we screwed up on this one, as it was found damaged and stuck in one of our machines". TWICE? THE SAME CHECK?? How is it that a check gets sent from one place, gets stuck in a machine and mauled, gets sent back to me, then I send it from another place and the same thing happens? Out of 8 million letters A DAY, how does this one keep getting caught in a machine and mauled?

The check is no good, past the 90 day expiration. I racked up a late fee from Office Depot the first time it got sent, and now... Oh, it gets better. I open up a credit card and find that they didn't get the check sent by Quicken that was suppose to post on December 24th. Everyone else got their checks, but they didn't.

By now, I'm livid. I fire up Quicken (it reminds me that I have a bill to be sent NO I DON'T!), and start firing off nasty e-mails to them, which they, of course, have not responded to. I'm sure they'll say that the Office Depot fiasco is the post office's fault, not theirs (it wouldn't have been if they had paid it electronically which they started doing again for no reason in November), that because of the holidays, and the fact that the other credit card check will invariably come back to me mangled won't be their fault either. I'm sure they'll even go so far as to blame me for the "you have bills to send" message, or tell me to upgrade to a new operating system (a whole other tale of woe).

I don't want this bloatware on my computer anymore. I don't want them to pay my bills anymore, I'll pay my bank to mess up my bills and only have to deal with one excuse generating autoreply when something doesn't get paid (instead of Quicken fingerpointing to my bank, the post office and some wino on the corner for their lack of organization). The only problem is... much like crack (I hear) it's literally impossible to wrestle yourself out of the many talons of quicken bill pay once you've started. I'm going to start cancelling my auto-pay stuff one by one, starting with our mortgage the moment the next payment gets sent (to Alaska and gets stuck in a machine there). Little by little I will get away from that bastion of incompetence, and if I have to, dammit, I'll write checks myself for the postal service to lose.

what a bunch of crap, on top of everything else going on.
Alpacas... Kansas... here I come.

This is Clyde

This is Clyde

Since I had posted about him, I figured I'd share a picture of him, asleep in his recycle bin condo. Poor Clyde possum!

Stupid People in the News

So I'm watching CNN the other morning. They were talking about the freak weather in the west, and one section got like 16 feet of snow or something ridiculous like that. They interviewed some guy that was in the process of using a snow blower to blow the 6 feet of snow he got away from his truck. He said he was going "layer by layer, and although it would take him a few days to dig his truck out, he was going to keep at it"... AND GO WHERE?

It's 6 feet of snow? Where's he going to go? Does he plan on snowblowing a path to the store? Dude, go back inside, make some hot chocolate, spend some time with your dysfunctional kids and relax for 10 minutes.

More on Mom's Visit

I don't know when it happened, or why, but for some reason my mom has turned into a nudger. She'll say something "hey, what do you think of that?" and nudge you with a hand. "How about some coffee?" nudge. EUUUUUW! Is this an age thing? Is this the new mid-western craze? When I grew up in Indiana, you didn't come within 2 feet of a person for fear of invading their space. Hugs? NO WAY! What's up with this nudging stuff?

Oh, when she made it back to her bat infested house, she did call to say that she made it home safely... on my cell phone, after I wrote the number in really BIG numbers in her little address book. Ooh, that reminds me, I need to send pictures of the RAV to her Ceiva frame so my sister can see it and be all jealous. I feel like putting in text on the bottom of the picture: "If you get a job, maybe you can afford one of these".

Latte Tsunami

There's some serious weather-related bad mojo going on with the world lately. If its not killer waves in the far east, it's devastating snow storms in the Midwest, floods in the west, and here in Maryland, it's suppose to get to 70 degrees on Tuesday... in January... this is insane. Then... killer latte tsunami!

Thursday was the 1 week anniversary of Clyde Rav. I decided to celebrate by going to Starbucks before work (ok, who am I fooling, I go to Starbucks every morning before work), and got a latte. As usual, I say goodbye to hubby (we go together, different vehicles). As usual, I open the driver's side door and reach in to place the sacred venti latte in the cup holder... but this time, things went seriously wrong.

Like out of a Sam Peckinpah movie, the cup slowly begins to tumble from my hand. My splinted left hand does nothing to stop its fall except propel it toward the center console of the RAV. In slow motion, it strikes the console, the lid flies off, torrents of hot latte spew out and up, splashing everywhere, the cup comes to a rest sideways on the driver's side seat.

I have a total mental meltdown. I rush to hubby's truck before he pulls away, fling open his back door and scream "I SPILLED MY FUCKING LATTE ALL OVER!", grabbing a box of tissues before running back to the scene. I'm cursing now for not getting leather seats after seeing just how wonderfully absorbent the cloth ones are. Hubby tries to console me, bringing some wet cleaning clothes to help with the disaster. I'm sobbing uncontrollably, kicked the venti cup and splashing more latte on the door panel.

He suggests grabbing some napkins from Starbucks, which I do, and we sop up as much as possible. When no more would sop, we give up, I use my jacket to sit on so my work clothes aren't saturated, and drive to work, totally dejected.

Everyone at work was compassionate (not laughing at first, thank you), and a good friend even called a detailing place to see if they would come clean the mess up for me. Funny thing about mobile detailers: they don't mobile detail in the winter, you have to go to them, and the one place close enough only did it by appointment on Thursdays. Ok, fine, but it's almost 60 degrees (in January) you'd think they would see how pathetic my situation was and help me out, but NOOOOOO!

I steamed cleaned the seats and back myself this afternoon. It was pretty disgusting, sucking up latte, finding out that a majority of it ran down the drivers side seat and into the back flooring. Now my seat is all wet from steam cleaning. Tomorrow I have to take out some shamis and see if I can't dry it. I'll stand there with a blow dryer on it all day if I have to. The thought crossed my mind to go buy a leaf blower (we had one, and used it to dry the dogs after baths... they loved it, but then during the great pipe burst of 2003, it got ruined).

So now (as literally everyone has explained) the pressure is off. The "new" truck is now my truck, it's had its baptism by fire. It could have been worse I guess. A ding, scratch, dent, shattered something. I'm lucky a steam cleaner could put it almost back to normal, but still....

Introducing: Clyde RAV

Introducing... Clyde RAV4

After many phone calls to insurance companies, banks, filling out forms, pacing, keening, and wailing, I went out on Thursday along with my co-signer hubby, and bought this stylish, ultra cool new RAV4, which I've decided to call Clyde after poor Clyde Possum. It's the least I could do after kicking him out of his swank recycle bin condo.

I've driven it twice so far: once from the dealership, once to Starbucks and back with my mom. I have to say, it's been a while since I've had a new car, especially one that I picked out and is officially "mine", so the pressure is incredible not to scratch, dent, ding, or wreck it. It drives sweet, very quiet, peppy, sporty and just plain fantastic.

Car Shopping and Other Neurosis

This morning I woke straight up at 3 am. Ok, the dogs had to go out too, but I had that "HOLY CRAP" car payment fear.

I have to buy a new car. The evil Jetta was totalled in an accident (can't talk about that yet), so I have to get a new car.

First it started out with, ok, I'll get a reliable used car so the payments aren't bad. I went to look at a 2002 Toyota RAV4. I want a RAV4, mainly because I've always wanted a jeep, but in Maryland it snows, and gets cold, and frankly the little plastic jeepy covers just don't maintain heat well enough for me. Plus there's always that roll over thing, where the little plastic jeepy cover does really nothing to keep you from flinging out.

Before the accident I had toyed with getting a Cooper Mini, which are adorable, but after the accident, I'd prefer something a bit more tank-like.

After doing the Consumer Reports research, e-pinions research, and generally looking around, the RAV4 is both reliable, affordable, and damn cute, plus it has 4 wheel drive, which in Maryland... it snows.

So I did a Carmax search and found the 2002 RAV4 and decided to give it a try. Went to the dealership, dragging my mom along and sat in it. It's... used. You could tell it was used. While the dealer went to copy my drivers license for a test drive, hubby noticed that one of the back seats wasn't locked in. He fiddled with it. The dealer fiddled with it. Finally, after about 15 minutes of fiddling, I felt that was definitely a sign that this RAV4 was destined to become Satan III, and ran away screaming.

It was at thought point that I went from "I'll buy a cheap used car that will get me to and from work", to "Hey! 2005 RAV4s aren't that expensive, the payments would only be $100 more than a used one!"

Found a cool blue one with cloth seats (I hate leather seats), with all the bells and whistles that I want. Stil within my pre-approved loan amount with the insurance settlement check. Now I'm looking at not only another car payment, but a larger one.

So, I woke up this morning thinking "should I buy a cheaper car?" We could use the extra money to pay off bills, and save money. HAHAHAHAAAA! Who am I fooling? We'd only spend that "extra" money on more toys and junk. At that point I realized that debt is what life is all about. We'll never be out of debt, it'll just keep piling on and on and on. I have a friend who sold their house for a zillion bucks, paid off their debt, moved to Florida and just got a home equity loan to fix up their new house the way they want. They went from debt, to debt free, to debt again. It never ends.

So, if we're going to be in debt, and continue to be the gerbils in the wheels working to pay off that debt... I might as well be in debt and drive around in a kick ass blue 2005 RAV4 with really cool cup holders that actually hold a Starbucks Venti cup.

Where's My Mother?

Since my dad died three years ago, my mom has been travelling by train out to Maryland to stay with us for Christmas. She loves the train, even though a plane would get her here in 2 hours, and if she wants to sit in a train for over 16 hours, then whatever.

The first year she arrived at Washington Union Station. We shlepped to a MARC train on Christmas Eve (it snowed that year), rode the MARC to Union and drug her back up to Maryland with us.

The second year she arrived at Baltimore Penn Station, so we shlepped up there and got her.

This year we said "why don't you just hop a train from Union Station and go to the Amtrak station at BWI which is 5 miles down the road from us", so that's what she did... well, sorta.

First of all, the weather sucked in the Midwest, so her train was 4 hours late arriving at her station. I kept watch on the internet for her progress, and determined that she wasn't going to get to BWI by 2:30pm, but would probably make it around 5:30pm.

At 5pm, we ventured off to get a festive Christmas Eve latte and Starbucks, then mosied over to the Amtrak station. It's a very small station, hard to miss anyone. We get there as her train rolls in. People get off, people get on, train leaves, no mother. I call our home answering machine, and there's a message from her saying she had arrived. At least that's what I think she said because even with her teeth in, she's still hard to understand. I think she says "I'm in Baltimore... BWI". Great, for some reason she's ended up at the airport, so off we go to the airport.

Ever try finding someone at an airport on Christmas Eve? Impossible. We call my sister back in Indiana and ask if she's called there, as we seem to have misplaced her. No call there. By this time I'm ranting about the fact that I've given her my cell phone number 800 zillion times, and yet she calls the house. We give up at the airport, and head back to the train station for one more look (what if she was in the bathroom when we were there), searched the bathroom, no mother.

As we head home, I check the home messages again, this time a message (slightly frantic) saying she was in Baltimore. Ok... there are only a zillion train stops in Baltimore, and mom has a tendency to call everything Baltimore. She could have been in Richmond, VA and call it Baltimore.

We go home, feed the dogs, wait for another call to pin down exactly WHERE in Baltimore she was. No call, nobody answers the station phone, nobody answers the payphone where she called from. By now I'm picturing her locked out of the train station being accosted by crack ho's. We change the answering machine to say call my sister, we're coming to get you, and off we go to Penn Station, on Christmas eve, at 7:30pm.

Drunk drivers all OVER the place, weaving around the major highways. What fun, ho, ho, ho. Of course, even with the nav system, we make a wrong turn, end up who knows where, and eventually reach Penn Station to find my mother, sitting like a lost waif eating a cookie. She proceeds to tell us about her trip... in the train station... um, hello, wanna get out of the train station?

Apparently when their train got to Union Station, they herded everyone onto another train without asking anyone where they were heading. She almost got sent to Boston (and hey, yes she's my mother, but I would have to leave her there), but some people raised a stink and they threw them out at Penn Station (merry christmas). She said she tried calling my cell phone... except she was about 5 digits off on the actual number. Who knows what phone was ringing, or where.

So, she's here. The dogs have sufficiently mauled her in welcome, and it's the start of a wonderful christmas time for us.

Our Night Out on Friday

On Friday, I was working at home (as usual) in my comfy sleepy pants and shirt when hubby IM'd me and asked if I wanted to go see "National Treasure" with some of his co-workers.

A.) I HATE Nicholas Cage
B.) Glowing reviews such as "a half-hour too long" and "utterly ridiculous" don't compel me to spend a handful of money and mortgage the house for popcorn to see a movie.
C.) I'm in my sleepy pants, this would require me to actually get dressed and go out.

I ask who is going, hoping that it was just some guys from work, to which I would tell him to go have a fun "guys night out" while I go blow money at Costco (if I managed to get enough strength to change out of said sleepy pants and go somewhere). He replies that it will be two co-workers and their wives (one wife I happen to know, and all she does is bitch about her ex-husband). On top of that, after the movie we're all going out to eat. Oh, crap. It all hinges on one co-worker arranging for a babysitter.

A.) This will require me to be nice to people and chat about the movie
B.) This will require me to listen to the one wife bitch about her ex-husband (who she's been divorced from for about 10 years)
C.) This will require me to listen to them talk about their kids, where all I have to offer is a detailed explanation about Nova's ass mass and how he took a healthy poop today.

I call on friends to cross fingers and sacrifice anything to the babysitting gods to strike all available babysitters dead where they stand... to no avail. It's a go. Friends tell me to come up with excuses: migraines, spleen attack, anything. I do point out to hubby when he gets home to pick me up that our 15 year old dog Nova hasn't eaten all day, and is very creaky. That's the truth, he was creaky and acting stiff, and he hadn't eaten all day (not for a lack of me trying).

A.) The theater we're going to is at a mall
B.) It's almost Thanksgiving

Parking took for freakin ever, and the walk to the theater was exhausting.

We get our tickets and get refreshments ($2.75 for a normal sized bag of M&Ms, bite me) which consisted of stale popcorn and a coke that turned out to be diet coke (ack).

The movie, as predicted, could not suck enough and it wasn't a half hour too long, it was two hours too long. I had brought my iPod along, but out of consideration, I didn't plug it in, but wished I had. Two hours of my life I'll never get back. I won't go into details, other than saying IT SUCKED!

We get out of the theater, and start making plans for dinner, and I turn to Gil and say "I'm a little worried about Nova", and that's all it took. We bowed out of dinner to go home and check on him, I waved some soup, we all watched tv in bed and life was good again... with my sleepy pants on.

Not So Instant Gratification

I wanted a nightstand. I actually already had one, but a large fan was sitting on it, which meant nothing else could sit on it, therefore I actually wanted a larger nightstand.

Having purchased one at Lowes Home Improvement a few years ago (which my hubby snagged somehow, leaving me with a small nightstand with a big fan on it), I figured I'd check to see if they still had them.... and they did, according to their Web site.

Lowes is great, because they have a way for you to purchase the item on-line, then go in and get it. This is great for me because I HATE driving all over the world looking for things. I see that the nightstand is available for in store pickup, so I buy it, and as instructed, I wait for the confirmation e-mail, which arrives, and then we decide to go run some errands then pick it up, because their Web site says to give them two hours to get it to the Customer Service department.

We run our errands, then head over to Lowes. I hand the printed receipt to the customer service woman, she taps some numbers in... makes a phone call, then informs me that Lowes no longer carries furniture in their stores, it would take two weeks for it to get to the store. Excuse me? She points to the small print on the printed receipt that says "special order".

We've had this problem before with Best Buy. When the new Unreal Tournament 2003 came out, we found a copy at Best Buy on-line. It said they had two of them "in store". We waited for the receipt to get sent and then took off for Best Buy, where we stood in line (a big line) and were told "oh, it's not actually IN the store, it's actually IN the warehouse and it'll take 3-5 days to get it IN the store".

A.) When did "in store" change its meaning from "sitting in the store", to "anywhere BUT in the store"?

B.) In this day where packages are sent overnight, why does it take something anywhere from 3 days to 2 weeks to get somewhere? I can see if I was buying a hand whittled yeti tooth in the form of a rhino that had to be carried by a yak led by sherpas through the Andes mountains why it might take 2 weeks, but a nightstand that's mass produced and sitting in a local warehouse down the road?

C.) If customers came to a store and looked at an item, then wanted to buy it and were told "Oh, I'm sorry, we don't have that in the store, it'll take 2 weeks to get it here", there wouldn't be a lot of repeat business at that store, and yet merchants can't seem to grasp that this is exactly what they are saying to people who "purchase " items for in store pickup.

The only company that has mastered the art of "in store pickup" is Circuit City. You order it on-line and they even tell you if it's in stock, you drive over to the store, a conveyor belt spits out your purchases, the cashier scans the bar codes, bags it and you're out the door. PERFECT.

So, after telling Lowes to shove it, we drove around looking for a nightstand (which is the very thing I was trying to avoid), and came home empty handed. I then stole back my original nightstand, gave hubby the smaller one, and now have room to sit a cup of hot tea or a water bottle beside me at night even with the fan.

The only problem is... now hubby wants a bigger nightstand.

Normal Routine

Hubby has sufficiently recovered to go back to work tomorrow (whew, that 70% Short Term Disability payment really sucks... if we ever get it), and soon we'll be back into our normal routine:

Starbucks/Work/Puppy duty/work/home.

I can't wait.

Kaiser Rant
To continue my rant against Kaiser, last week (two weeks after hubby had been booted out of the hospital by Kaiser), a Kaiser representative called and informed him that he needed to see a doctor as soon as he was discharged. Hubby informed them he had been discharged two weeks ago, and they told him that they just found out.

Whatever, so he makes an appointment. We go to the appointment and are told we owe 10 bucks for a co-pay. The beauty of being covered under two insurance plans is that whatever one you aren't using will pick up the co-pay. Oh, but not Kaiser. The receptionist snootily informs us that "they don't deal with other insurance companies, you'll have to take that up with them". Fine.

Hubby gets called in, and his version of the visit goes something like this:

1.) he's handed a pile of forms to fill out
2.) doctor comes in and looks at the wound and says "wow, that's a big wound"
3.) doctor then asks him when he last had a complete physical, because it's important to make sure that he's healthy. Doctor gives him a form with phone numbers to call to schedule his physical.
4.) Hubby reminds doctor that Kaiser was suppose to supply us with medical supplies that have never arrived.
5.) Doctor tells him a nurse will bring some in, nurse comes in and hands him 2 tiny little packets of gauze.
6.) visit over.

Bank Rant

After our helpful Kaiser visit, we deposit some checks via the drive through ATM machine. 90% of all americans now own SUVs. 90% of all banks think that 90% of americans drive Cooper Minis. There's nothing like leaning halfway out of your truck window to jab at buttons and try to hit the slot to make a deposit. Of course, another check came in the mail when we got home from the bank, so I have to shlepp out AGAIN to the bank to deposit that one.

Just An Observation

We go all over the place and pay by credit card. It's very simple now, you swipe the card and sign the screen. Drugstores, Home Depot, Lowes, Office Depot... everywhere you sign the little electronic pad... but not at CompUSA. CompUSA makes you sign the receipt, even though it asks you to sign the electronic pad, they don't do that. Is it just me, or is there something strange about a computer store that doesn't trust electronic signatures?

Stop the Stupid People

At Arundel Mills Mall, if you go into the mall through Bed, Bath & Beyond, exit the store, turn right (heading toward Starbucks), you'll see a line of kiddie carts in the shape of race cars. Kid sits in cart, parents can put their purchases in a mesh bag in the back. The mesh bag says (in big, white print)

"DO NOT PUT CHILD IN BAG".

Do people really need to be told this?

Who is This Guy?

Every time there's an election, in the weeks prior, in the mornings, as I drive to work there's a guy standing by the side of the road with a campaign sign with his name on it, and he waves to people.

The name on the sign is Leopold (which always makes me think of the infamous Leopold/Loeb case... but I digress), and he seems like a nice guy, waving back when I wave at him.

I think he's either a very friendly guy looking for votes, or a very stupid guy for standing on the side of a busy road where people are killed on a daily basis by idiot drivers.

So this year I thought, fine, I'll vote for the guy, for whatever he's voting for, because at least he's consistent. I get my handy-dandy voter cheat sheet in the mail and I look to see what exactly he's running for... but he's not listed. Anywhere... for anything.

I want to stop when I see him and ask "what are you doing?", but if he's a loon....

Crazy people in Maryland.

Just Call Me Nurse

Monday

The visiting nurse came out. She shares our view about Kaiser (if you can't recall, our view is that they SUCK!). She also began to share our view of the rude surgeon that came in Saturday and discharged hubby, because she informed us that he must be insane to have told us not to pack the gaping icky wound. So she demonstrated, and my skills as a former vet tech came to good use, although I'd feel much better if hubby thrashed around and tried to bite me a few times while I was doing it.

Tuesday

Is a blur, I'm sure I have something to rant about, but frankly, sleeping in the guest room with two bed hog dogs is wearing me out. Hubby did feel well enough for a quick trip to Costco, where they have some awesome 250gb external fire wire drives for dirt cheap, so we bought one. They also had some scrubs in his size, so we bought two pair of those for him to wear around (sweats are too... sweaty).

I managed to get to be at a reasonable hour, and also managed to get a good portion of the bed after scooting the snarling Loki to one side. "AHHH", I thought, "finally a decent night's sleep". Then at 3:30 am the power went out for no good reason.

In our house, you know the power has gone out by the deafening sound of all the UPS devices beeping. Mad dash throughout the house to turn everything off. I thought fleetingly that my newly fixed XP would be fried (because that's just how luck goes), and after everything was powered down, I went back to bed... only to be awaken at 6:30 am by Meeshka, who was hungry.

Wednesday

Pretty good day actually, except for some dizzy spells that hubby had. I'm exhausted, trying to get some work done from home and FINALLY figured out a problem I had been having with something. The nursing duty hasn't been so bad, and tonight's soak went well. We went to Starbucks for decaf latte and met one of hubby's co-workers and gave him the horror story. He can sympathize, he's been through something similar. Got some tasty burritos at Baja Fresh and ate early.

The dogs must feel that he's making progress, as they've renewed their nightly riccochet throughout the house, minus the bed springboard. The bedroom is off limits until further notice, so they've modified their route to include the couch... but it's not the same.

Tomorrow the nurse comes back. Monday is his appointment with the surgeon. I hope my services are no longer needed shortly after that and I can go to work and nap.

The Shoe Drops

I knew the incredibly good week was too good to be true. Last week my hubby began experiencing some pain, and we both thought it was a boil. His doctor on Tuesday thought it was a boil, but as each day passed, he was in more and more pain until even Vicodin was doing nothing for him.

On Thursday I took him back to the doctor, who told him to go to the Emergency Room at our local hospital. She called ahead to let them know he was coming, and they took him right away, which was cool.

After the usual 300 questions, they took him to a bed, hooked him up with IV fluids and squirted pain meds in the IV. It did very little to give him comfort. A doctor came in and examined him and determined that it wasn't a boil, it was an abcess, and a surgeon would have to look at him.

Insurance Sucks

We're both covered under two different insurance companies. Hubby's is Kaiser, I have Aetna. I've never had a problem with Aetna. You get sick, you go to the doctor, they cover it. Kaiser, apparently, has a different type of plan. Kaiser has their own hospitals and doctors, which I find to be offensive and a HUGE conflict of interest. Kaiser threw a snit because hubby was not at one of their hospitals, but the ER doctor explained that he was in too much pain to move, so they hesitantly decided that he could stay there (how nice of them).

Go in for one thing, get another

We arrived at the ER around 1:30pm, and at 5:00pm hubby was wheeled up to a room, where a flock o' nurses surrounded him, asked him questions (which I mostly answered because he was in too much pain), and then the surgeon came to see him. Really nice guy! He was suppose to leave for the night, but when he heard what was going on, and how much pain hubby was in, he stayed to do the surgery. They wheeled him to surgery at 6pm, and I left to take care of the dogs because they had been locked up most of the day. When I returned at 8pm, hubby was back in his room and MUCH improved.

Friday

I go in to visit hubby, he's doing a LOT better! I leave to try to get some stuff done, but when I get back, hubby tells me that Kaiser called him in his room and told him that he's all better now, and they want to dishcarge him. Excuse me? He's hooked up to IV antibiotics, IV pain meds, IV everything, and has packing in a gaping hole where the abcess was, and they want to boot him out? I call Kaiser and yell at them. They claim ignorance. The surgeon was delayed until late and didn't see him until 8pm, but told him there was no way they were releasing him.

Saturday

Juggling dogs, hospital visits and some sleep, same thing happens, I go in the morning and the nurses say he's staying, I come back that afternoon and hubby has been told he's leaving. This time a pompous asshole surgeon comes in because hubby's surgeon is off that day, informs hubby that he's leaving, demonstrates (roughly) how I need to change the dressing, and gives us instructions to call his office and see the other surgeon on Monday. The nurses were pretty upset, hubby was upset because we're paying a butt load of money for two types of insurance and now they're booting him out.

We get all sorts of fun medical supplies to change the dressing, and prescriptions for antibiotics and pain killers. Hubby wanted a latte, so we stopped at Starbucks after the nurses took out his IV line and gave him a percocet. It's 4pm.

6:00 p.m.

Hubby is puking his guts out. We think it's the latte, but we're not sure.

7:30 p.m.

Time for a dressing change, hubby takes a percocet and eats some soup.

9:30 p.m.

Puke city once again. I'm thankful that for some reason my "join the party" puke reflex is on vacation. We decide that its the percocet and opt to hold off on that for a while to see if he can keep something down. Then we read the antibiotic instructions and find that those may make him urp too. Lovely.

A "day nurse" is suppose to visit once a day to look at the wound and stuff. That'll be fun. In the meantime, I'm there for bandage changes, fetching him stuff, and keeping the dogs from mauling him until he's maulable. Despite the puking, pain, and impending going to the bathroom for the first time event... he's in good spirits, and almost normal sense of humor-wise. I'm glad to have him back.

As far as work goes tomorrow... screw it, I'm staying home with him. He's my priority right now.