Tag Archives: Health Care

Just Give Us Something To Talk About

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A friend who is slightly paranoid about being known as a friend of blogger (and ergo, SPOBFOB) and I were discussing (and, might I add, solving) the world’s ills over lunch.  It is so frustrating when two people make major breakthroughs in world peace, economic policy, and moderate reformist politics and no one will let us see the President.  We wouldn’t have made him take notes (he is the President); we know enough about protocol (we could write the book) to bring a short-form and long-form memoranda setting out the action points for achieving these huge global steps forward.

Not only did SPOBFOB and I have important problem solving breakthroughs, but we also took stock of the freak show that comprises the leaders of our nation.  Let’s face it:  Men like the game — thrust and parry, if you must — of negotiations.  Women want to get the damn thing accomplished in the least amount of time with the most impact. Sure there are women who are impossible to deal with in these situations (Michelle Bachmann, par exemple) but by and large, you don’t hear women say, “let’s say this and see what they come back with” when you know full well that “saying this” will only lead to vengeful behavior and reverse any constructive negotiations up to that point.  We rarely make grand pronouncements that make compromise impossible because our egos are in the way.  Just sayin’.

Maybe President Obama would not like to think that he is pretty much in the same camp as John Boehner and Mitch McConnell when it comes to purposeful and constructive negotiations.  Ok, so the answer is that the White House would slam the door on our advance team.

I was despondent because here we had answers and no one who would listen.  I mentioned having a cable talk show and SPOBFOB came up with the brilliant idea of naming it the “Alternate View” because we look at the world quizzically and with our heads tilted, as if we were trying to understand really edgy art.

[So, this is where I go off on one of my tangents and SPOBFOB has no responsibility for anything that follows:]

We can invite our friends and family to come on the show.  They represent a varied and seasoned cross-section of America.  Ok, the liberal, urban/suburban, well-heeled and over-educated America.  So, there would be wide national appeal.  (Ok, that would be in the sovereign nation of No-Where-istan, a state of my mind (see prior blogs).  But, I digress.)

Everything would be fair game, from:

  • did anyone really think Justin and Selena were anything but a media creation?
  • to: should you home school your children in places where the gay liberal communist agenda has not fully infiltrated main stream public school education?
  • to: should fertility treatments and surrogacy be tax deductible for same-sex couples in states where gay marriage is legal?
  • to: who is the sanest person in the Tea Party asylum? and is that like debating how many angels can dance on the head of a pin?
  • to: whether quinoa is subversive grain that could reduce America’s dependence on hamburgers?
  • to: how to keep skin from sagging without surgery?

And everything else anyone wants to cover.

 

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July 1

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July 1.  Day of doom.  Why, you ask?

Because, all over the country, newly-minted graduates from medical schools are in hospitals and each is called “doctor”.  Enough said.

SOB (sister of blogger) is an attending physician at a hospital and the head of the medical intensive care unit.  Each year I offer to have a talk with anyone she deems a “007” (licensed to kill) about other potential career paths.  It is my annual charitable event; I think of it as saving lives.  Every year, she demurs.  No one is quite the Austin Powers version of James Bond.

But the offer still stands.

When TLP (our son, the little prince) was born, it was July 11.  The interns were 10 days old.  POB (partner of blogger) had to have an emergency Caesarian.  In order to get to the baby in a Caesarian procedure, a lot of organs need to be taken out of the way.  So when TLP was born and I heard the OB-GYN say to the intern, “where would you put the uterus?”  I offered, “back where it belongs!!!!”

If it is July, don’t ask for just any doctor.  Ask for a REAL doctor.

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Dear Paul

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Dear Paul:

I am not a Ryan, but I know members of your extended family. 

I know you come from such a good family, with strong community values based in religious precepts, like the one about taking care of the poor and the stranger.  Or the other one about not putting a stone in the way of a blind person.  And even though Rabbi Hillel said, “do unto others as you would have them do unto you,” that is totally in sync with the Christian Bible.

Here’s the big problem with your budget:

No amount of spending cuts is going to get us out of the hole caused by waging war in Iraq, Afghanistan and, now, Libya. 

Paying for these requires tax increases.   (Remember when the GOP just put the Iraq and Afghanistan tabs on the credit card and, oops, forgot to put these line items in the budget??????) 

Cut all you want from social programs, etc.  Go on.  

But one year from now, when the deficit is still essentially as large as it now, there will need to be a tax increase on all Americans. 

All you will have done is gutted the social compact that each generation has with another:  we will not leave those vulnerable in our society — the young and the old — to fend for themselves.   The very social compact that makes America great.

What are you thinking?

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My sister-in-law, the keeper of the flame

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SILOB (sister-in-law of blogger) and I don’t have much in common.  I don’t know that much about her, mostly because BOB (brother of blogger) has banned potentially touchy topics, such as sex, drugs, rock ‘n roll, religion, politics and the first-coming-versus-second-coming discussion that can be VERY tricky among Jews and Christians.  So, there isn’t much of interest to talk about, except our kids (my nephews are FABULOUS in case anyone wants to know).  I may have failed to mention that I curse like a sailor which may or may not be offensive to her.  BOB insulates her so well from us that we assume that she really doesn’t like the New York family.

Except for my mother.  When my mother died, SILOB said simply and beautifully that she was the daughter-in-law that my mother never expected (not Jewish, GOP, Texan) and my mother nevertheless threw her arms around her and made her welcome.  POB (partner of blogger) could relate; my mother — having had two girls and one boy — never expected to have TWO daughters-in-law.

Families are complicated.  Love isn’t as complicated.  What is complicated is what you do about the things you don’t like — or don’t know — about the people you love.   My mother seemed to have bridged the divides with her daughters-in-law well before her death.  So much so, that SILOB walked 60 miles in San Diego for the Susan G. Komen organization in my mother’s memory.

So, EIGHT years after my — OUR — mother’s death, SILOB keeps the dream of a cure for breast cancer alive.  She literally walked the walk.  She keeps my mother’s memory alive in a positive way (SOB (sister of blogger) and I try to, but sometimes, we just wallow in self-pity.)

It is a testament to SILOB and my mother and their relationship that eight years on, she fights breast cancer “for Elsie” [our mom].

I haven’t tried very hard to get to know SILOB these past 13 years.  I have allowed every inadvertent or intentional rebuff (mostly from BOB) be an excuse not to try harder.  But there is something very basic we share — the memories of Mom.   And that is one of the strongest ties I have to most people in my life.

To SILOB, the keeper of the flame and the fight for a breast cancer-free world.

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Blogcation Year 2, Day Whatever – Too Much Information

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So, on vacation, one can lose track of days, especially when one has drowned one’s blackberry (accidentally).

Our G-d daughter and her life partner came over for a couple of days.  We gave them the downstairs bedroom (with two full baths – go figure) and POB (partner of blogger), our son and I took the two bedrooms upstairs (with one bathroom to share).

As is often the case on vacation, everyone’s toiletries bags are open and strewn around the bathroom.   I was downstairs with our G-d daughter and her partner talking, and POB and our son were upstairs so he could get ready for bed.

Our G-d daughter’s partner overhears our son’s question to POB, “Mommy, what are Tampax?”  She repeats the question to us.  I jump up and ask, “[POB], do you need help?” “Ye-e-es” she responds in a way that says I am too tired to deal with this.

So, I run upstairs, my mind blank about the “Tampax” issue.  I get to the bathroom and say (because my son is a bit of a bird nerd), “You know how birds make nests when they are ready to lay eggs?  Well, imagine that we have nests inside us.  If we don’t produce an egg, then the nest has to leave our body and we use Tampax and other products to avoid the messiness that ensues from the nest disintegrating.”

He’s 8 years old

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From Ben to Bust in 234 years

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Benjamin Franklin, a rock star of his generation, said, when signing the Declaration of Independence, “United we stand, divided we fall.”  Our founding fathers and the colonies, united, defeated a great and mighty empire.

Throughout our brief yet notable history, the cities of our nation were known for the dog-eat-dog way that fellow citizens treated their neighbors, eschewing the cornerstone of religious faith, all the while claiming to be part of the most upright of Christian nations.  But, outside the cities (or so I would like to think), neighbors helped each other and generations of families lived together, all working to keep everyone afloat.  Maybe it is the romantic myth of the heartland.  But, I am buying it, lock, stock and barrel.

Today, we live in a society where people are more worried about their morning lattes than they are about ending our two wars, reducing our crushing debt and the stopping all politicking, all of which threaten to bankrupt out nation.

There is no silver bullet cure for our woes.

I heard today that people say that the Congress should not have saved the 300,000 teacher and firefighter jobs because their unions are too strong and teachers earn too much for doing too little.  Ok, so, make the unions feel some pain, but does that justify keeping the Bush tax cuts for the wealthiest Americans?  The illogic is frightening and delusional.

So the great experiment started in 1776 is rounding the drain because of greed and me-first-middle-and-last mind think.

Well, I don’t know about anyone else, but I will forgo my Bush tax cut that I never wanted and didn’t need to pay for health care and to start reducing the deficit.

How about this:  we make giving up the tax cuts voluntary.  Just like the optional $1.00 gift to Wildlife Preservation (or is it public campaign finance?) on our tax forms.  Just put a line item on the 2010 tax return that says, “This is how much more you would pay if the Bush tax cuts lapsed.  Do you want to pay this amount (a) to reduce the deficit, (b) to pay for health care for the uninsured or (c) 50% to each?” and publish the list of people who contribute to these funds.

Maybe neighbors will embarrass neighbors into paying the money (because if you’re not on the list, either you’re selfish or you don’t make enough) or we have a pledge drive and use positive peer pressure.

Either way, Mr. President, I am with you for letting lapse the tax cut I never wanted and our nation couldn’t afford.

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There is a new normal for everything these days

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I was sitting on the train and I heard this annoying clicking noise.  I thought someone was cracking chewing gum.  I looked to my immediate left and saw that the woman next to me was clipping her figure nails on top of her backpack so the clippings would fall into the front pocket.  Before I could think to shut my mouth, I gasped a disbelieving “noooooooo!!!”  She looked at me, put her clipper away and took out her file, all the while making sure that everything fell into the front pocket.

So if she cleans up after herself, does it make it ok?  Is this the new normal for behavior in the subway?

Hmmmmmmmm.

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Youth, Age and Beauty

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So, I am still fixated on the events at the gym yesterday.

I must have a magnet in the shape of an S (for schmuck) implanted in my forehead, just above my eyes.  Why else would I notice things better left unnoticed? 

Yesterday’s magnet caused me to see the following:

In the locker room at the gym, a mid-twenty-something woman is prancing around, checking herself out, all in preparation for her performance of the daily nude hair-drying ritual.  She had dyed hair, sported a tattoo and was bronzed (but not orange like House minority leader Rep. John Boehner).  These fly under the radar these days.  No one notices those things anymore. 

But what shocked me — maybe I am naive — is that she had breast implants.  At her age!! 

Didn’t people use to wait for a sag before a lift? 

Then I walked upstairs to a work-out floor and saw an older woman who had way too much work done and looked Joan Rivers-like only not as good.  Now, that is tragic.

Then I got on the bus and there was a 30-something woman who had had plastic surgery to restore her nose and mouth and part of her cheeks.  You know, that look when plastic surgery is necessary after something really bad happens. 

An unfortunate reality check on beauty and the medical reasons for plastic surgery.

I don’t think I’ll go to the gym today.

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Change of Venue

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SOB (sister of blogger) came back from visiting her in-laws and wanted us all to come over for Sunday night dinner at her house.  The usual complement of the family showed up.  POB (partner of blogger) was happy for the night off from cooking.

As I was helping my sister, I had occasion to open her refrigerator.  This is what I saw:

Nothing else on that shelf in the refrigerator.  Without these cans of non-nutritive and non-food particles, you could sleep in that refrigerator.  I was amazed and therefore, I had cause to investigate further and I found this in the freezer:

I was a little shocked to see all of this ice cream and sorbet especially when she said she went out especially to buy vanilla ice cream for my son.  Really?  Really? You mean you didn’t pick up vanilla by accident while you were buying in bulk??  Or maybe the neighborhood store threw a vanilla in your order because as part of a customer rewards program? In all that ice cream and sorbet, there wasn’t already vanilla?

Then SOB said something that completely blew my mind, as a 46 year-old listening to her 50 year-old sister:  “you can’t imagine how quickly we go through this.” Doesn’t HOSOB (husband of SOB) have a cholesterol issue?  Doesn’t SOB have high blood pressure?

AND, AND, to add insult to injury, SOB is the doctor in the family.  She is supposed to know better.  Because she is an M.D. and has mastered that air of authority, she can get away with saying crazy things.  I loved her comment, “eating fat-free whipped cream is like eating nothing”.

For the sake of family pride, I feel compelled to mention that she went to excellent schools and has incredible credentials.  Because even I, the juris doctor, know that what she was saying was just nuts (which, by the way, you could have had on your ice cream with whipped cream).

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My Gynecologist, Dr. Jew

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No joke.  My doctor’s last name is Jew.

If only his first initial were A., it would be “A. Jew, M.D.”  That would be the culmination of two generations of Jewish humor.

Except that Dr. Jew is Asian.

Actually, that makes it a satirical culmination of two generations of Jewish humor.

The whole point of the visit was to talk about hormone replacement therapy.  I am not loving some of the effects of aging and since, in this day and age where we think we can cherry-pick out the good from the bad and have it all, I think why not ask?   And besides I read about it in the New York Times Magazine.  The article says it is safer now.  Ahhhh, the Times.  The word from on High.  I know, I know, I know.  Think Valerie Plame scandal.  Think slanted reporting in the run-up to the Iraq War.  Ok, so the Times is almost as reliable as a comic book.

Dr. Jew was so very gentle and courteous when he suggested to me that doctors tend not to base their medical judgments on New York Times Magazine articles.  They like to rely on clinical tests and multi-year studies, like the kind you find in the New England Journal of Medicine.  “That rag mag?” I thought, but did not say aloud.

Look, I get my news from the Daily Show with Jon Stewart.  So, it isn’t a stretch for me to get my medical information from comic books.  Thank G-d I am not a doctor.

And Dr. Jew?  He is a good (Jew) doctor.

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