Sunday, April 18, 2010
Once Upon a Walgreens
Well, I thought this was pretty hilarious.
As a quick word of introduction and background [skip if you’re bored of this story by now], seven months ago I, a perfectly healthy then-20-year-old college student, woke up with some back pain. Said pain increased, was accompanied by a high fever, and I was in complete agony. I was then misdiagnosed three times. When my fever would not subside, I was taken by my roommates to the University of Michigan in Ann Arbor where I stayed for a week while they decided what to do about the random, freak MSSA staph infection I had gotten in my SI joint – i.e. my left hip. I was put on IV antibiotics, Vicodin and then morphine sulfate, Motrin, Naproxen, etc. After a month of IV therapy I was put on an oral antibiotic [sulfameth] which I am still on. Additionally, I did a month of physical therapy because I was limping very heavily, as the infection was pressing on my sciatic nerve.
Four months ago I started to really hurt a lot, and since then I’ve been on controlled substances all day, every day. I was on Vicodin for three months, and I’ve been on Oxycodone [which is not the same as Oxycontin /Limbaugh] for the past month or so.
Which brings us to this past Monday.
I was running low on pain meds and so I left a message on the pain specialist’s machine to get a refill. I assumed that since the machine said they’d call it in to the local pharmacy, they’d call it in.
aha, foolish Kate
[aside : specialist is in Ann Arbor, which is ~1.5 hrs away]
I ran out of Oxycodone on Wednesday, and since I hadn’t heard anything from the doc I followed the instructions the machine told me. On Thursday, 72 hours after the call I went to my favorite local pharmacy to see if, y’know, my pills had gotten authorized and filled. That’s what the machine said to do [wait 72 hours] and so I obediently followed its instructions, expecting my good behavior to bear good fruit.
Nothing. Zero.
At this point I was in a lot of pain. Tylenol was grossly inadequate, as were Lidocaine patches, as was Icy-Hot. Little Kate hurt real bad.
Moreover, I play Scottish percussion and I carried a drum on Thursday evening on my left [the offending] leg. That really helped.
On Friday I called the specialist again and was told they couldn’t call in Oxycodone because it’s controlled or whatevs so they mailed me the script. Why they would not have told me this before, I don’t know, but they didn’t.
Not telling me fairly critical information is kind of the norm I’m finding.
At this point I had gone two full days without meds. Kate was now going through physical withdrawals. This wouldn’t have been so horrible, except I was also in agony. The sickness stuff is totally child’s play to me at this point, it’s the sheer pain that’s the issue.
Right? Great.
[Aside: I look forward to going through withdrawal without agony; I’d like to stop taking drugs.]
Anywho. Friday’s mail produced a script for 90 pills of 10 mg Oxycodone. Hallelujah! I buzzed on over to the pharmacy, gave them the script, and reported back 45 minutes later, anxious to get some drugs in me.
But.
The pharmacist said, “Well, you were given time-released Oxycodone last time, and this prescription is for the quick-release. I called your doctor to check if this is what he wanted and he hasn’t called me back. I want to make sure before I fill it.”
seriously
?!?!
So. I went back to my dorm room and collapsed on my bed, wanting to really really die get meds. The pharmacist called [and woke me up from a nap] two hours later.
“Your prescription last time was written for the quick-released, but we gave you the time-released. [i.e. they gave me the wrong drugs] I just wanted to make sure this was OK with your doctor, but he hasn’t called me back [surprise!] so let’s give them another hour or two [seriously].”
The doc didn’t call them back. I’m sure if you’re still reading by this point you’re super shocked.
It was now 6:30 p.m. This saga began at noon. Kate had been without sufficient pain killers for about two and a half days.
I headed back to preferred pharmacy where there was a new pharmacist on duty who had been briefed on my “case.” She told me that they didn’t have the quick-release 10 mg, but they did have the 5 mg. That would have meant I would have gotten 180 pills [90*2], but they only had 160. She called the other pharmacies, and the grocery store guy had plenty of 5 mg. I drove over there, and huzzah, he would not fill it because the script said 10 mg.
just break the rules cuz I freaking hurt ok
[The grocery pharmacy assistant lady said, “You don’t look very happy.” I responded, “I hurt and no one will fill my script.” It was a small miracle that no public crying occurred.]
Great.
I then went to the other less-preferable local pharmacy [across the parking lot] where they, ta-da, had the quick-release 10 mg in the proper quantity. Victory, right?
oh you naïve little child
The pharmacist filled it and rung it up.
$42.50
Now, you have to understand that I am an impoverished college student. I could have payed for it, but that would have rendered my life for the final weeks of school impoverished. Additionally, my generic prescriptions cost around $8 at my fave pharmacy. This is quintuble the cost because, huzzah, they did not have the generic.
I looked at the pharmacist and said, “Are you serious? 42 dollars? There’s no way.”
[Aside: I’m very not-confrontational with salespeople, so the fact that this happened is clear evidence that I was losing it]
Turns out that was the discounted price with insurance. It was over $200 without.
I told her to keep it.
I returned, defeated, to the first pharmacy, where the nice pharmacist [I’m looking at you, grocery guy] gave me the 160 5 mg pills, which means I’ll be about a week short, but I did not care by this point. I am now not in agony, and praise God for that.
Hilarious.
Nothing political or religious or anything.
That’ll be tomorrow. Or, whenever I remember to post, which isn’t very often.
The Scourge: A Report From Epsilon Eridani III
Those boys over at NASA have not been idle. Oh, no, sir. In fact, very recently telemetry and images returned from a highly classified interstellar probe, launched way before we hoi polloi even knew there was such a thing as NASA. Those data have the agency agog; its leading lights fear that if they were released to the general public, it might mean the end -- of everything.
Around Epsilon Eridani is a solar system much like our own. The third planet out is an Earthlike world with an oxygen atmosphere, a flora and fauna much like our own, and a remarkably humaniform race of scientific and technological sophistication comparable to our own. However, they're far ahead of us in certain sociological respects.
These people have internalized the Golden Rule to a degree we Terrestrials have never approached. They genuinely believe in allowing every man to do as he pleases, as long as he harms no other person. They have no wars. Their law codes are slender, mainly prescribing the penalties for what any Earthling would recognize as a crime against one's fellow man.
Well, except for one thing. Their corpus juris makes it a high felony, punishable by a lengthy imprisonment, to make, consume, or distribute, whether for compensation or for free, even the smallest quantity of marshmallows.
The Eridanians are so determined to wipe out the scourge of marshmallow crime in their society that the key ingredients for making marshmallows -- gelatin, sugar, salt, and vanilla -- are heavily restricted, available only to specially licensed medical practitioners and never dispensed except with a prescription countersigned by the local chief of police. The secondary consequences are, of course, severe, especially among bakers, bartenders, and women with soft fingernails, but Eridanian society is resolved upon the elimination of this scourge...or so its leading lights tell us.
Despite the draconian provisions of this law, Epsilon Eridani III suffers an enormous marshmallow underground, through which flows many billions of dollars' worth of traffic per year. It's estimated that perhaps 10% of the public frequents the black market, both for "finished product" and for the ingredients for "home brewing." Every year, families are ripped asunder when one spouse walks in on the other in a marshmallow-induced fit, or when a mother, innocently seeking only to check the cleanliness of her teenager's underwear, disturbs a mound of never-worn exercise garb and discovers a cache of gelatin powder. The police of every locale are easily corrupted by the immense profits to be made in protecting traffic in marshmallows and their fixings. Cross-border traffic in sugar has been particularly hard to quell. The prisons themselves are hotbeds of marshmallow abuse, inmates and guards "partying down" together and everyone up to the wardens in on the gravy.
Nor does the marshmallow plague begin and end with the consumption of the vice. Eridanian "literature" is rife with marshmallow content, both allusive and explicit. Take for example this passage from a recent "Victorian romance:"
She beckoned him to the door of her chamber and threw it wide to reveal an enormous mound of marshmallows. Big ones suitable for campfires! Little ones made for hot chocolate! Red, green, gold, even blue! Without hesitation he plunged into the mass, headfirst and mouth wide open. For a long interval she heard nothing but the sounds of gobbling and swallowing, until at last his head poked out of the ruined mountain of sweets."I love you," he whispered. "Come to me."
The administration is understandably reluctant to allow this news to come to light. Earth's own smugglers, ever alert for new possibilities of profit, would be too likely to enter the space-exploration game.
However dedicated to their anti-marshmallow crusade the Eridanians may be, their efforts appear nowhere near to success. Just last month, a leading candidate for president was spotted at lunch with his closest advisors, eating sandwiches from which a viscous beige effluent was seen to drip. Later analysis of the leftovers revealed the goop to be 85% peanut butter and 15% Fluff®.
Your Curmudgeon's sources have assured him that America is in no danger from this albatross around the neck of Eridanian society; our demographics alone are proof against it. Yet only last week, he surprised his Salvadoran housekeeper humming Guantanamera while stirring a pot of boiling gelatin, pausing now and again to add a spoonful of mashed avocado and a slice of jalapeno pepper. Given the severity of the asset-forfeiture laws, rather than discharge her on the instant he's sworn her to secrecy and double-layered the claymore ring around the Fortress. We await further developments. Beware!
From the Wife’s Joke Purse
In keeping with Our Curmudgeon’s recent pronuncimento, I relate this tale of a Rare Medical Condition:
A man and a woman were sitting beside each other in the first class section of an airplane. The woman sneezed, took out a tissue, gently wiped her nose, then shuddered for ten to fifteen seconds.
The man went back to his reading. A few minutes later, the woman sneezed again, took a tissue, wiped her nose, then shuddered violently once more.
Assuming that the woman might have a cold, the man remained silent. A few more minutes passed when the woman sneezed again. As before she used a tissue, wiped her nose, her body shaking even more than before.
Unable to restrain his curiosity, the man turned to the woman and said, “I couldn’t help but notice that you’ve sneezed three times, wiped your nose, and then shuddered violently. Are you OK?”
“I’m sorry if I disturbed you. I have a very rare medical condition. Whenever I sneeze I have an orgasm.”
The man, more than a bit embarrassed, was still curious. “I have never heard of that condition before,” he said. “Are you taking anything for it?”
The woman nodded. “Pepper”
PS WHO STOLE THE PEPPER SHAKER IN THE CONFERENCE ROOM?
Saturday, April 17, 2010
What if Gamers had Fought WW II?
*Hitler[AoE] has joined the game.*
*Eisenhower has joined the game.*
*paTTon has joined the game.*
*Churchill has joined the game.*
*benny-tow has joined the game.*
*T0J0 has joined the game.*
*Roosevelt has joined the game.*
*Stalin has joined the game.*
*deGaulle has joined the game.*
Roosevelt: hey sup
T0J0: y0
Stalin: hi
Churchill: hi
Hitler[AoE]: cool, i start with panzer tanks!
paTTon: lol more like panzy tanks
T0JO: lol
Roosevelt: o this fockin sucks i got a depression!
benny-tow: haha america sux
Stalin: hey hitler you dont fight me i dont fight u, cool?
Hitler[AoE]; sure whatever
Stalin: cool
deGaulle: **** Hitler rushed some1 help
Hitler[AoE]: lol byebye frenchy
Roosevelt: i dont got crap to help, sry
Churchill: wtf the luftwaffle is attacking me
Roosevelt: get antiair guns
Churchill: i cant afford them
benny-tow: u n00bs know what team talk is?
paTTon: stfu
Roosevelt: o yah hit the navajo button guys
deGaulle: eisenhower ur worthless come help me quick
Eisenhower: i cant do **** til rosevelt gives me an army
paTTon: yah hurry the fock up
Churchill: d00d im gettin pounded
deGaulle: this is fockin weak u guys suck
*deGaulle has left the game.*
Roosevelt: im gonna attack the axis k?
benny-tow: with what? ur wheelchair?
benny-tow: lol did u mess up ur legs AND ur head?
Hitler[AoE]: ROFLMAO
T0J0: lol o no america im comin 4 u
Roosevelt: wtf! thats bull**** u ***s im gunna kick ur asses
T0JO: not without ur harbors u wont! lol
Roosevelt: u little biotch ill get u
Hitler[AoE]: wtf
Hitler[AoE]: america hax, u had depression and now u got a huge fockin army
Hitler[AoE]: thats bull**** u hacker
Churchill: lol no more france for u hitler
Hitler[AoE]: tojo help me!
T0J0: wtf u want me to do, im on the other side of the world retard
Hitler[AoE]: fine ill clear you a path
Stalin: u arsshoel! WE HAD A FoCKIN TRUCE
Hitler[AoE]: i changed my mind lol
benny-tow: haha
benny-tow: hey ur losing ur guys in africa im gonna need help in italy soon sum1
T0J0: o **** i cant help u i got my hands full
Hitler[AoE]: im 2 busy 2 help
Roosevelt: yah thats right biznitch im comin for ya
Stalin: church help me
Churchill: like u helped me before? sure ill just sit here
Stalin: dont be an arss
Churchill: dont be a commie. oops too late
Eisenhower: LOL
benny-tow: hahahh oh **** help
Hitler: o man ur focked
paTTon: oh what now biotch
Roosevelt: whos the cripple now lol
*benny-tow has been eliminated.*
benny-tow: lame
Roosevelt: gj patton
paTTon: thnx
Hitler[AoE]: eisenhower hax hes killing all my ****
Hitler[AoE]: quit u hacker so u dont ruin my record
Eisenhower: Nuts!
benny-tow: wtf that mean?
Eisenhower: meant to say nutsack lol finger slipped
paTTon: coming to get u hitler u paper hanging hun ****socker
Stalin: rofl
T0J0: HAHAHHAA
Hitler[AoE]: u guys are fockin gay
Hitler[AoE]: ur never getting in my city
*Hitler[AoE] has been eliminated.*
benny-tow: OMG u noob you killed yourself
Eisenhower: ROFLOLOLOL
Stalin: OMG LMAO!
Hitler[AoE]: i didnt click there omg this game blows
*Hitler[AoE] has left the game*
paTTon: hahahhah
T0J0: my teammates are n00bs
benny-tow: shut up noob
Roosevelt: haha wut a moron
paTTon: wtf am i gunna do now?
Eisenhower: yah me too
T0J0: why dont u attack me o thats right u dont got no ships lololol
Eisenhower: fock u
paTTon: lemme go thru ur base commie
Stalin: go to hell lol
paTTon: fock this **** im goin afk
Eisenhower: yah this is gay
*Roosevelt has left the game.*
Hitler[AoE]: wtf?
Eisenhower: **** now we need some1 to join
*tru_m4n has joined the game.*
tru_m4n: hi all
T0J0: hey
Stalin: sup
Churchill: hi
tru_m4n: OMG OMG OMG i got all his stuff!
tru_m4n: NUKES! HOLY **** I GOT NUKES
Stalin: d00d gimmie some plz
tru_m4n: no way i only got like a couple
Stalin: omg dont be gay gimmie nuculer secrets
T0J0: wtf is nukes?
T0J0: holy ****holy****hoylshti!!!111
*T0J0 has been eliminated.*
*The Allied team has won the game!*
Eisenhower: awesome!
Churchill: gg noobs no re
T0J0: thats bull**** u fockin suck
*T0J0 has left the game.*
*Eisenhower has left the game.*
Stalin: next game im not going to be on ur team, u guys didnt help me for ****
Churchill: wutever, we didnt need ur help neway dumbarss
tru_m4n: l8r all
benny-tow: bye
Churchill: l8r
Stalin: fock u all
tru_m4n: shut up commie lol
*tru_m4n has left the game.*
benny-tow: lololol u commie
Churchill: ROFL
Churchill: bye commie
*Churchill has left the game.*
*benny-tow has left the game.*
Stalin: i hate u all ***s
*Stalin has left the game.*
paTTon: lol no1 is left
paTTon: weeeee i got a jeep
*paTTon has been eliminated.*
paTTon: o ****!
*paTTon has left the game.*
The professor from Foggy Bottom
After reciting the obligatory Alinsky threat about words having consequences, CNN's Eliott McLaughlin's article goes on to quote Dr. Jerrold Post, a professor of political psychology—whatever that may be—at George Washington University, holding forth on what drives conservative activism:
Some may perceive that their values are under assault or "feel bypassed by an inability to cope with a rapidly changing world," Post said.
We can almost see this wretched wonk, pulling on his chin, looking over his half-glasses, as if confiding an insight usually reserved for select initiates of, say, every Psych 101 class in the western world. "Mr. McLaughlin," he intones, "blah blah ... feel bypassed ... inability to cope," now tapping his lower lip with a properly hued meerschaum, " ... rapidly changing world."
He pauses, then, "The tea, yes, I should tell you it's from Nepal, I get it delivered from the waterfront every other Tuesday." Then, leaning an elbow on a feather-painted faux marble mantle, "where was I? Oh, yes yes. You see ... "
In times of societal distress—be it a struggling economy or profound ideological disparities—knowing your enemy is comforting, especially when you can blame "them" rather than "us," he said.
McLaughlin basks in the professor's Windsor accent. He's put in mind of long ago nights, the old BBC, breathless broadcasts from basement utility rooms while the Luftwaffe has its way with London above. But Professor Post has gotten quite off subject, he's pacing in the manner of Groucho Marx, his pipe trailing costly wisps of Mac Baren Scottish Blend, " .. and so I said: Sir! If you persist in this I shall be forced to write an angry letter to the Times."
"Excuse me professor, you were saying something of societal distress? Just now."
"Ah yes, right you are McLaughlin. Nasty stuff, that. Societal distress I mean. Such rot. We do what we can, but, well." The professor proffers a tin of snuff, and when declined, puts a pinch on his lace cuff and sniffs it in. "And yes, there's always the them, now isn't there? Projection, we call it, but I shan't bore you with jargon."
He steps to the full length window and lightly pushes aside the brocade with the back of his hand. The sudden light glints from the brass buttons of his green plush waistcoat. He regards Foggy Bottom at some length. "Yes yes. Them. Deus nobis fiducia. Always the them." He turns to McLaughlin and speaks earnestly, as if to fellow conspirators,
Today, the Tea Party's "them" is a perceived "soft center in Washington who doesn't understand," Post said, and it helps to have "an external target to blame. It makes sense of the senseless in his life," Post said.
He slumps wearily into a chair. "At the end of the day I suppose all our lives are senseless, aye McLaughlin? We bugger about and then one day, poof! These Tea Party fellows. It's all rather tedious." And with that he dismisses McLaughlin with a tired flip of the hand.
By Imperial Decree: Frivolous Day
As Grand High Pu-Bah of this establishment, I have come to a policy decision, and am here to announce it to you all:
WHEREAS, the calendar of the Nation is festooned with "days" about this, that and the other thing; andWHEREAS, this "day" stuff appears to have, if not a clearly positive, at least a leavening influence upon an institution; and
WHEREAS, we here at Eternity Road are somewhat too serious for our own good (though, be it frankly admitted, lately there's a lot to be serious about);
BE IT THEREFORE RESOLVED THAT henceforward, the 18th of April shall be deemed Frivolous Day at Eternity Road, and shall be strictly observed by:
- Avoiding all talk of political subjects;
- Doing our best to be lighthearted;
- Doing our best to raise the spirits of those Gentle Readers who, inexplicably, continue to visit this dump by the hundreds each day.
ACCORDINGLY, there shall be no posts at Eternity Road on Frivolous Day which:
- Refer to any political subject, political figure, or disease contracted by association with politics or politicians;
- Cast a pall of gloom over this corner of the DextroSphere;
- Conduce to the imposition of anxiety, concern, doubt, boredom, or unwarranted sobriety upon any Gentle Reader of Eternity Road.
CO-CONSPIRATORS shall be duly encouraged:
- To tell jokes and funny stories;
- To laugh at themselves and one another;
- To post pictures of extremely attractive, scantily clothed women, albeit nothing that would cost Eternity Road its PG-13 rating.
The Curmudgeon Emeritus shall have power to enforce this edict by the insertion of one or more really bad puns into any offending post.
Let the town criers proclaim it to all the land! (Yes, yes, to all the people of the land, too. To be sure, the land can be a bit stodgy.)
Friday, April 16, 2010
That Moron Bush Dept.—VI.
~ Barack ObamaI traveled to Pakistan when I was in college—I knew what Sunni and Shia was [sic] before I joined the Senate Foreign Relations Committee.
Editor, Harvard Law Review.
”Political Punch.” By Jake Tapper, ABC.com, 4/8/08.
Moral clarity from the National Education Association.
This from the largest U.S. teachers’ union’s list of recommended reading:
NEA [National Education Association] recommends the following Saul Alinsky books to those members of our Association who are involved in grassroots organizing, especially Association Representatives (ARs) — also known as building reps or shop stewards — and leaders at local affiliates.
Saul Alinsky is widely recognized as the father of, and pre-imminent expert in, grassroots organizing, which is why we recommend that ARs and local leaders become familiar with his theories & materials.
Yes, this person is writing something about “improving public education.”
Why local NEA affiliates are engaging in grass roots organizing at the local level and how that will improve public education aren’t clear to me just now. No doubt it’s what the members of the NEA had in mind when they paid in their union dues.
On a more important substantive point: the unidentified NEA official who is the author of this entry states that
We hope that ARs [Association Representatives] and local leaders of all political stripes will discern from Alinsky’s books grassroots organizing strategies that will best help us bring our members together around the common goal of improving public education.
So far, so good. However, it appears Alinsky believed radicals “can and should” use means “to change things” that are unethical if circumstances warrant:
Alinsky spends a lot of time critiquing the idea that “The end does not justify the means.” What end? What means? He feels that there are circumstances where one can and should use means that in other circumstances would be unethical. I am not sure I agree, but Alinsky certainly speaks with the voice of experience.
So if Alinsky’s “experience” taught him the utility of unethical means that experience must validate those means and his voice should be heeded?
This official backtracks and says he or she is “not sure” that unethical means are proper but nowhere points to any portion of the recommended Alinsky books where there are ends or means that he or she is sure are unethical. In short, unethical means praised by faint damnation.
This U/I official does know, however, that it’s proper to recommend to NEA Association Representatives and shop stewards that they study morally questionable books that that, among other things, celebrate “Radicals” because they “are most adept at breaking the necks of Conservatives.” That seemed to be a memorable quote to this person.
And the one about using stink bombs if your organization is too tiny.
To further the goals of the NEA?
”Recommended Reading: Saul Alinsky, The American Organizer.” National Education Association, 2010 or earlier.
New Story Posted
“Farm Girl” has been added to the Short Fiction section.
“Comprehensive” self destruction.
H/t: ”Thomas Paine on Immigration Amnesty.” Trevor Loudon, New Zeal, 4/14/10.
