Health Care

Firstly I have to apologize to my readers... I just have not had the time to sit down and blog or post my drafts. You can expect a few entries in the next few days that said a few thoughts on health care in America and secondly in DC.

A few days ago I had some Thai food and later that evening some good old pub food. Nothing out of the ordinary same routine every single Thursday. I woke up early Friday feeling sick to my stomach, it was not because I had over indulged but rather because I had eaten something that did not settle well with me. This has happened once or twice so I thought what the hell, take a day on Friday and just stick it out over the weekend. Usually I am only nauseous for a day or two and it passes and that is assuming I am feeling sick in the first place.

Well come Sunday, I am starving and feeling like holy hell. My boss desperately needed me in the office Monday so I did what I could to make it in. Through out the morning on Monday I spent time calling all the physicians listed by Carefirst my provider. I did not realize that my health care was limited to so few doctors and all the doctors I called were not taking new patients until mid February. I was told to go to the ER and deal with triage like every other sick person with an HMO plan. The catch with my plan is I was told I could see any Doctor I wanted to... This is true to a point, firstly any doctor within the limited scope of HMO providers and secondly one that wants to take on new patients.

Feeling like I was making no progress my next step was to contact my HR person and ask to see if there was anyway I could change my medical aid to PPO right away or effective next pay period. The answer was no, not until next quarter which is not until March. Fortunately for me I am one of those individuals who opted for a health savings plan and a flexible spending account, so I started calling all the private practices in the area telling them I was willing to pay cash for the entire visit, no need for insurance. I found a place, spent an hour with an IV in my arm for dehydration and got two scripts to cure my ailment.

I was really appauled at the way the health system works in DC and especially with regards to Carefirst and their HMO nonsense. When I lived in New Jersey my health insurance was a combination of two providers, Consolidate Health and Bupa international. We will only talk about the first one as the second is really beyond anything America could offer and is based in the United Kingdom.
Consolidated health had no co-pays, no out of pocket expenses, access to any and all doctors in the NJ, NY, CT tristate area and paid for my prescriptions. I did not even have to get generic drugs. This was ideal for me, if I had a problem I went to the doctor knowing that even if I had no cash it was ok. The only time I paid was for my premium and my first visit with my Doctor of choice. The reason I paid my doctor is because there was a preffered patients club, which allows you to come in any day of the week without an appointment, helpful when you have a busy schedule and can not wait.

Given the fact that I pay a little more here than I did in New Jersey for my insurance, what the hell is going on? I mean really.. what kind of a doctor does not take new patients based on your insurance? All of a sudden I understand the meaning of the "Hippocratic Oath" and its similarity to the word hypocrite.

A little word of advice if you do not have a primary care physician and you have a HMO, get one now before you get sick.

Personally even though I do not get sick too often, I am getting a PPO plan as soon as possible... I like the ability to pick and choose who gets to treat me for my illnesses.
Look at it this way, when you buy your dinner no one tells you what to get, when you get your beers no one tells you what to drink, so why then should the company I pay to take care of me, choose who can give me open heart surgery if I need it?

Congratulations are in order

Just wanted to say congratulations to my ex co worker who is going to be working with the senate...

Its good to see that life is not a dead end and with enough effort you will get where you want to be.

So here is a little shout out to my fellow blogger "My Thoughts"
Good luck and do not for the love of " " become a stranger. I wish you all the best in your new career and I am sure our paths will cross from time to time. You managed to climb from the ranks of generic user to person I can ask for favors to person I can rely on. One of the best things is you showed me to a certain extent how to deal with mental terrorists..

So good luck, thanks and well see you saturday.... at you know the lucky place

"May your life be like a good scotch, clean clear and smooth, improving with each passing year..."

of men and mice...

A little softer than usual... but what the hell right?


Not everyone is healthy enough to have a front row seat in our lives.
There are some people in your life that need to be loved from a distance.

It's amazing what you can accomplish when you let go of, or at least minimize, your time with draining, negative, incompatible, not-going-anywhere relationships/friendships.

Observe the relationships around you. Pay attention. Which ones lift and which ones lean? Which ones encourage and which ones discourage?

Which ones are on a path of growth uphill and which ones are going downhill? When you leave certain people do you feel better or feel worse?

Which ones always have drama or don't really understand, know or appreciate you?

The more you seek quality, respect, growth, peace of mind, love and truth around you, the easier it will become for you to decide who gets to sit in the front row and who should be moved to the
balcony of your life.

"If you cannot 'change' the people around you, change
the people you're around."

Talk to me people.

Mental Terrorists

So I have a few minutes to kill before I go and meet some friends I met this last week. I was talking to a friend today and we were both wondering why break ups take so long and how girls always seem to come out on top..


We came to a conclusion, at some point when a couple decides they do not want to be together any more, instead of doing the mature thing and saying lets call it quits and go our separate ways. The more difficult path is usually chosen and this is where all the petty arguments come in. You fight about why there is no more detergent and yet when you first started dating you went shopping together and did laundry together.
You argue about the thermostat, the amount of gas in your imaginary car.. the list is endless.

The way it plays out is most guys feel like they have won the argument when the girl concedes or she sheds a tear in which case the guy in question feels bad and says sorry. This cycle continues for a while but really you are prepping your girlfriend for her final assault. While men will fight battles out in the war fields... Girls are a little more cunning, they use terrorist tactics. I am going to touch on one such tactic now.

During the course of the argument, the girl slips some comment in. The comment is about something that was a somewhat sensitive issue and it took you all your heart to tell her. She abuses that week point and well in the heat of the argument you do not really think about it but later on you are like wow that hurt. You see girls seem to use the small ammo here and there, they plant seeds till eventually you fall apart. Pretty ingenious actually, as opposed to the full on frontal assault where you wind up feeling guilty and saying sorry.

The icing on this terrorist cake is when she tells you to stop calling because she is seeing someone else and he doesn't appreciate it or she puts all this pictures on facebook... Twitters about him all the time etc. It takes guys a while to heal from that kind of thing but that good part about it is... It does end... and when it does when you stop caring, they come back one last time to try see if you are still interested and if maybe they can take you for one more round in battle.

I was quite intrigued by this theory and I am wondering what everyone else is thinking.

Video of the Week...

The weekend :-)

goggles and bellies

Ever since I moved to DC life has been a ride for me. It started off slow but as time progressed I have found myself engaging in all sorts of activities making new friends, keeping in touch with old friends and basically orienting myself to the change in pace and lifestyle that one experiences when you move to a place like DC coming from the New York metro area.

One thing remains true however, I still like to party like a rockstar. It is tough because each time I do go out in DC I need to make the appropriate plans to get home in one way or another, I know the metro stops running at midnight for instance and there is no way I am willing to shell out the required 50 or 60dollars to take a cab home after that. So that leaves very few options.

Last night I attended a social networking event which was absolutely great. It was sponsored by a couple of big wigs and well there was food and booze and a lot of people to meet there. The event went well and I actually networked with some amazing people some of whom work for NASA and all sorts of other great places.

There were some ok looking girls at the begining of the night and later on after a few drinks they looked a lot cuter and quite palatable. I was wondering what if this was the chain of events..

We continue hanging out and have a great time, I happen to miss the metro and call a friend desperately trying to figure out how to find a place to sleep and how to get home. That falls through so i decide to go back and after a plethora of shots, I go home with the one girl, solving one issue I do not need to ride the metro anymore.
So I wake up the next morning at 5am, and take a peek at this girl and realize all of a sudden she is not a 9.95 but maybe a low 7? WTF. Beer goggles my friend thats what.

I always wondered what it is about alcohol induced encounters and if its a secret part of our lives coming out or if it is just lack of judgement and character. Alcohol can do many things to us, make us happy, sad, horny, tired... wired. If there is an emotion there is a type of alcohol that can bring it out in all of us.

What are your thoughts on this? How do you get when you drink and do you ever regret the encounters or shrug it off and call muligans?