Why I'm sick today

Today represents the culmination of a series of events that started over a month ago! I feel absolutely terrible. I have a headache that won't go away. Stiffness in the neck and shoulders. Occasional bouts of vertigo and a general feeling of being ill at ease. In short, I am unwell.

I met with my physician at the end of May. At that time, he approved another 3 month prescription of my medication that I've been taking for anxiety and depression for the past 5 years. I know I've written about it before, but it really has been a major factor in improving my overall quality of life.

That prescription was submitted to the insurance company we switched to at the beginning of the year; Aetna. Within a week, I checked on the status and found that it had been cancelled. Since this wasn't the first change in insurance carriers in the past few years, I figured this was the typical, "we need a pre-authorization" routine.

I contacted my doctor's office and had them resubmit the prescription again.

One week later, I looked online at the status and found it was cancelled again! A bit later, I got a voicemail message saying that I needed to call to find out what was going on. I reached out to the insurance company and was told that the dosage was too high and that they wouldn't approve it.

I was extremely displeased. Why was I being told there was an issue, if there was nothing on my part that I could do to resolve it? Why were they calling me instead of reaching out to my doctor directly? I was then told that there was an appeal process, but that it would have to come from my doctor.

So I contacted my physician once again and asked them for help.

That was two weeks ago. Not only did they submit the appeal, but they asked for a rush processing on it because I was quickly running out of my medication.

Flash forward to today. I have tried to stretch the remaining pills from my last prescription for as long as possible and would very likely be alright if not for the added stressors of this weekend.

By stretching out the time between taking my pills a bit, I can usually keep the withdrawal symptoms to a minimum. Mostly my dreams become very vivid and bizarre. I've had to do this before because it was much better and easier than going into full on withdrawal which is a situation I found myself in a couple years back.

So Friday night, I found a bat in my home after my nap. Between the cat and I, it's a very real possibility that we've come into contact with the animal as it was found on the floor near enough to where I was sleeping. Because my system is in this semi withdrawal stage, you could injure me while I was asleep and it may or may not wake me. If it did, it's very possible, that I would chalk the experience up to part of a dream and return to slumbering.

So here's the situation, I've now got possible rabies exposure and a live bat. I'm able to capture it into a container and I start trying to find out what my next steps are.

Since the three year old cat I adopted in April is very energetic, it's possible he too has been exposed. I need to find out when his rabies vaccination took place. I dig into the paperwork that my ex brought from her friend in May. Uh oh, there's an unused voucher for a rabies vaccination and a note in the adoption agreement that the adopter will take him within 10 days to a vet for a vaccination. This isn't good.

Saturday morning, I take him and the bat to the vet. There, I'm told during the $50 visit that the office won't send the bat off to be tested, I need to contact the department of health. The also tell me that there's no way for them to give the cat a vaccination if he's been exposed. So I've basically gone in, spent money and been given a printout of the same information I've already looked at online.

The remainder of my morning is spent calling around to various places trying to find out what I'm supposed to do. Finally I call the local animal shelter and get animal control to come out and take the bat. They're not sure what the process is for me or my cat, but they will at least take care of the bat.

I've left a message with the department of health because they don't have any sort of emergency service line except to say to call 911 or go to the emergency room. Digging further on their website, I find that if I go to the doctor, they'll have to report to the department of health the next business day as well.

So it looks like my health and that of my cat is now in the hands of whoever is responsible at the department of health. I'm going to save myself the expensive ER copay and wait until Monday. Someone should be contacting me at that time, but nobody seems really sure what's going to happen.

I spend the next several hours digging into what all this means. Here's the conclusions I've been able to make.

• The bat has to be tested. This involves euthanizing the animal and sending it to the state to be examined. There's a specific process for this. The tissue has to be fresh enough that it can be tested. Here's hoping the bat survives the rest of the weekend.
• I probably have to start a rabies post exposure regimen of shots
• My cat will have to be placed into quarantine
• I then have to wait on the results of the rabies test for the bat
• A positive test will mean that my cat will remain in quarantine for the next 180 days with no human or other animal contact. (This is the most stressful part of the whole thing for me as it will have to be at my expense and should he start to show symptoms, I'll have to have him euthanized)
• I have no idea what happens if the test is negative on the bat, likely I'll have to have him vaccinated and risk being fined for not having done so sooner. 
• There's nobody beyond the department of health that knows what the process really looks like

My plans for this weekend were to get my oldest two children's final pieces of clothing in order for the trek this coming weekend. I have one stocking, 2 skirts, an apron, a bonnet, a dozen or so buttons and 2 pairs of pants in need of hemming.

Until I have things in a better position with the cat, I don't really want him around the kids. He's very energetic and has a tendency to play a bit rough. Could he scratch or nip at the kids? Yes. Do I want them exposed as well? NO!

So here's all the stuff going on now:

• I can't fit the skirts or finalize the placement of the buttons until after Monday. I don't know when or how I'm going to get all the clothing done.
• I had to cancel all my meetings on Monday, so I can be available for the DoH.
• I'm terrified of what a 6 month quarantine will do to my cat.
• I'm not thrilled about the expenses I'm about to encounter in dealing with all this. As the typical cost of quarantining an animal at the shelter is $30 for day 1 and $10 each subsequent day. ($1820 for 180 days)
• I heard that mid-August I may have to take my kids for 2 full months while my ex does some out of state training.
• My fiance is supposed to be coming out for a visit mid-September
• I'm facing a series of shots that will likely leave me ineligible to finish the blood donor study I started in May and completely ineligible to donate for over a year.
• I face fines and penalties for the inaction of the cat's previous owner
• I don't want to euthanize another animal. It's been less than 6 months since I lost Mu.
• I feel so badly for the bat. Its done nothing but somehow get into my home, but is to be euthanized.
• My insurance company won't give me the full dosage of the medicine that helps me deal with anxiety and depression
• I am feeling overwhelmed and this is leading to physical manifestations in the form of general disease

I've dealt with more. I've dealt with much harder things. The problem is, that right now, I'm in an already emotionally disoriented state due to the medication.

There's only one party responsible for putting me in this place. That's Aetna.

Today, after 16 years, I had to put my buddy down. I was a complete mess at the vet and had 2 of my daughters with me. I suspected the worst because for days he hadn't been eating, staggering around and crying. All day long he was super lethargic and wouldn't even cuddle on my lap.

His story started when my ex and I were first married. We were just getting our first apartment set up when we found out that my dad was looking for people to take some kittens. My dad had been caring for one of the strays at his auto repair and the mama decided to have her litter in the back of one of the broken down cars.

After delivering her babies, she was rounded up and taken to be spayed, while the "old man who hates cats" proceeded to find homes for all the kits. We were smitten by the beautiful blue eyes shared by one boy and his sister and took them in, despite a no pet policy at our little studio apartment.

It was only a matter of months before we both felt badly about living there and rather than renew our initial lease, we sought a pet friendly home. We moved a bit further south and found a nice 2 bedroom where we could also have a room for our first daughter. There we had a pretty nice setup including a very large closet that served as a nice place to keep the litter out of sight. This whole time, neither of us could figure out what to call these two bundles of energy. It was just him and her.

We were a happy little family until we decided that we needed something a bit larger. We were soon moving onto baby number 3 and both wanted a house. Stupidly, we made the mistake of purchasing a doublewide in a trailer park with a no-cat policy. :(

We were very upset and wound up placing the cats with my sisters. They had a larger home and were able to take them in. It meant we still got to see them once in a while and we knew they were well cared for.

We went on with our lives thinking we were done with these two cats, only to find that when my sister and her husband wanted to find a place to live, they'd be doing so out of a motor home. Certainly not an ideal environment. They tried, but one night his sister got out and never came home.

We also decided to find someplace to settle down and purchased a home in Kentucky. Knowing we were going to be more stable, we decided to take him back. It would be good for us and better for him.

Unbeknownst to me, my sisters, had decided to give him a name. He had packed on the pounds and in homage to the Austin Powers movies, named him Fat Bastard. To the kids and everyone else, they said either Fat Boy or just FB.

This just wouldn't do and so we renamed him Mutah. A name that fit much better and was far cleaner. It also meant that we could just shorten it to Mu.

The car trip out East was a real adventure. We had purchased a harness to put him on as we traveled so that he could get out and walk a bit at the rest stops. He would ride with the kids in the old van, while I would drive the moving truck.

It was our first rest stop on the way to Spokane where we got out and tried the leash for the first time. Never having been really anywhere, the sensory overload was a bit much for Mu. He took into the deeper grass and started pulling at the leash.

I attempted to reign him in and he flipped in the air, twisting right out of the harness. I was able grab hold of him, but he lashed out with claws and teeth, leaving my right arm a mass of scratches and puncture wounds.

I was so upset that when he bolted into the fields around the rest area, I figured it was good riddance.

It was only a short while later that someone backed up the freeway entrance ramp to ask us if we had a cat. He had run through the fields and was waiting at the edge of the road.

The ex loaded up and went to retrieve him. To the great relief of the family.

We figured we couldn't risk another getaway so kept him in the car until we got to Spokane and could purchase a cat carrier.

While doing so, someone mentioned that children's benadryl had a sedative affect on cats. I'm ashamed to admit that we were so frustrated and afraid of how he was handling things, we tried it. He proceeded to drool and bubble red foam for hours all over the white carpets of my ex sister-in-law's home.

Spokane was our last stop inside a building for the rest of the move. We drove across the country stopping at camp areas and pitching a tent. Each night, we pulled him out of the van and loaded him into the tent with us. We constantly worried about anyone opening the tent door and having him run off.

Happily, we didn't have any more issues, he figured out a cozy spot in the van and survived the trip.

Settling into Kentucky proved a challenge for the old boy. Not only did he have more kids to deal with than ever before, that first Christmas, the wife and kids decided I needed a dog. The 18 month old black lab was more animal than he'd ever dealt with before. During that period, his home was our bedroom and his safe spot as far back as possible under our bed.

The dog proved incompatible with the ex and she returned him one day while I was at work. Much to Mu's relief, as he started to finally come out and explore.

Thinking that the home was still missing a pet, the family adopted another cat. She didn't adapt well and Mu, declawed as a baby, couldn't really defend himself. The two never formed any sort of bond and he continued to struggle.

One birthday, I came home to a pair of kittens in the home as well. These two would eventually stay with Mu and I for a while, but ultimately prove too much an emotional and financial strain on me.

It was during all this that I started missing the signs that my "happy home" wasn't so. Divorce soon followed and I took Mu with me for company.

We found a great apartment where he and I would spend his remaining years. For a few months, we tried to have the other two boys here, but it was too much of a toll on me. I was struggling emotionally and my financial resources were strained with my new living arrangement. I had to let them go, but couldn't put him out to pasture.

He grew to be my best bud. I know they don't see us the same, but I think in his eyes, I was just a bigger cat that was okay to be around. He'd greet me at the door each evening, snuggle on the back of my legs, follow me around as I did my chores and chat with me in the mornings as I got ready for work.

I don't know what I would have done had he not been a part of my life. I am so thankful for Mutah. To be honest, I'm a bit scared because tomorrow night will be the first time in a long time that my apartment is completely empty when I get home.

For the better part of 16 years he's been in my family. When his kidney's started to go he hid it so well that we didn't pick up on it until it was too late. Even now the tears haven't stopped. I'm going to miss him so much. I loved that cat.

Embarrassing My Kids

Monday night was another awards ceremony at the school. It's pretty bad when you have children in Elementary, Middle and High School. Seems like you're always at one event or another (or supposed to be at two at the same time).

This night was the promotion night for the 5th grade as they graduated up to Middle School. It was my daughters last night of Elementary school and there were all sorts of awards to be given out.

On a tangential note, I really want to know what's up with the school district being unable to run the HVAC system past 6:30. I would say that 80% of the programs handed out that night were being used for fanning hot faces beaded with sweat. It's getting into the humid season and it was pretty disappointing that, just as they were about to start, the AC that was blowing right over our seats shut off!

After a pomp and circumstance procession, the children were seated and the school administration made a few remarks. Maybe my daughter is just a bit advanced, but when they chose to read from a book, I was disappointed that it was a Curious George piece. Seemed a bit infantile for that age group, but again, maybe my kids are just so far ahead of everyone else...

Anyway, when it came time to hand out awards, I was quite pleased that she got awards for straight A's all year long in a number of subjects. It was even more exciting when they started to read off the children who qualified for the Presidents Academic Excellence Award.

This is no small achievement. It means that not only did she maintain an outstanding grade point average, she also did exceptionally well on the standardized testing. It comes with a certificate and letter from President Obama!

So when they announced her name, I couldn't help myself, I shouted out. The same overwhelming feeling overcame me when they read off her name and handed her the certificate of graduation.

I had my kids seated next to me all embarrassed, I had the people in the row behind me commenting, and even she gave me a kick to the shins later that night after things were over.

Let me explain something though. My personal feeling is that these are huge accomplishments. They represent years of hard work and effort on her part. Other than making sure her homework is finished, I haven't been one of those parents to make sure she got every answer right. This really was all her.

If this had been a baseball game and she hit a home run, no-one would have thought twice about me jumping for joy. If she had just won a tennis match, there wouldn't have been a single comment at my outburst. If she had just finished first at state in swimming, there would have been a crowd of people cheering with me.

If our culture celebrates sporting events with cheerful noise, shouldn't we do so much and more for academic excellence? Sporting victories are short lived, but the things she learns now impact her for the rest of her life. She's learning to succeed in areas that will be of greater benefit when she's in the workplace than any extra curricular activity I can think of.

I am very pleased with my children's performance in school. They're learning so much and working so hard. I'm going to celebrate their accomplishments as victories. Not everyone gets an award for a high GPA in high school, not everyone gets to play in the regional All-Star band and not everyone gets an award from the President. Like it or not, I'm going to continue to stand and shout. I think the shins can take it.

Thoughts on background checks

Let me share something with you. I'm on the email list for Organizing for Action. I'm there because unlike a lot of people I associate with, I voted for Barack Obama, not once, but twice. However, I got an email today that has me really thinking. They wanted me to lend my voice to efforts to require a universal background check.

The beauty of how our political system is supposed to work, is that we don't have to agree with everything. This is definitely a case where I think a background check system is a silly idea at best.

You see, the article they sent had the quote we've all seen so often claiming a majority of Americans and even NRA members support the idea. It struck a nerve.

Here's why, I've bought all sorts of stuff in private sales and not once has anyone inquired into my background other than the common back and forth typical to that sort of transaction. Nobody asked to see my driving record when I bought my cars or van. No-one told me that I couldn't purchase my bow and arrow without providing my name. I didn't have to have my psychological evaluation when I purchased a used set of golf clubs. The other day I bought a knife for my kitchen without anyone or anything checking a database. Yet all of these items have the same lethal potential as a firearm.

What about the silliness of 'every' transaction. Really? I have to do a background check on my kids if I decide to give one of them a gun for their birthday? What about if I decide to purchase one of the guns my dad has, you mean he has to conduct a background check on me? How about my friend and co-worker that has a concealed carry permit, do I need to check him out too? To what point? What is going to be accomplished by all this? If I was worried about any of these people getting guns, I wouldn't be giving or receiving one from them.

Does someone magically stop becoming a threat to society once they purchase a weapon and pass a background check? The newspapers seem to indicate otherwise. People snap; they go bonkers; they do bad things. A check on them at a moment in time really doesn't accurately assess what will happen in the future.

That aside, I'm not afraid of more guns being available and untracked by a lack of background check. Bad people are going to get their hands on guns. Fact of life. Background checks won't change it. The sooner we accept this, the easier we can sleep at night.

How many of us are up at night worried that the guy next door is driving on a suspended license? Do we panic that the car next to us might not be fully paid on his insurance? Have we seen the copy of our pharmacists license to dispense our medication? Did you personally check her out by calling the university listed on your doctor's diploma? Do you ask to see the food handling permit of the person making your fast food order? In school how did you know your teachers were accredited and licensed to teach?

Just because we have a hot button topic, the loss of life due to firearms misuse, doesn't mean that we need to institute a bunch of policies that really aren't going to solve anything. If we're going to chase that rabbit, then let's make sure we go down every other hole of assumption that exists as well. For me, I'd rather assume that the guy asking to buy my gun is legally able to do so. It's a simple thing called trust. I'd much rather be trusted than mistrusted, so I try to treat everyone else the same. Does it backfire? You bet! Does it mean I should stop? NO WAY!

Let's keep private sales private. Let's let trust and good sense do their part. It's easier and doesn't require an act of Congress. Instead, let's focus on fixing our budget and economy.

Mac OS X Lion

I was asked tonight about upgrading to Lion among some other things. Since it might help someone avoid the same mistake, here is what I wrote:

I'll speak about Lion, DON'T

I was having some issues with my machine, so rather than do a complete re-install of Snow Leopard, I upgraded to Lion. It has been a nightmare.

I can't even restart my computer without having to boot into Recovery Mode to run the Disk Utility. I've had horrible memory management issues (meaning it gets really slow). I don't feel like the issues with my system were improved at all.

I have read that a clean install, ie, wipe the hard drive and start over eliminates these problems. Still, there are other things that make this a horrible operating system. Lion eliminates Rosetta, so if you have any older applications, those will no longer work. The toolbars have very poor contrast, it's hard to see what is a button and what is disabled. The scrollbars on the side of many applications auto-hide, meaning you have no idea at times how far down a page or document you are. Important folders, like the Library, are entirely hidden from the user (makes things like adding or removing fonts very hard).

In short, I am dreading having to support anyone running this system as it works right now. I am not a fan at all and will likely be formatting my hard drive and starting over with Snow Leopard this weekend.

UPDATE

I finally found another show stopping but in this pile of dreck known as Lion. The CIFS share from my NexentaStor system at home doesn't mount properly through Finder. I can authenticate and mount the share, but all the permissions are screwed up. I am shown the folder, but told through Finder that I don't have any permissions to view the content.

Now, you wanna know how retarded this system is? If I put it to sleep while connected to the drive, it suddenly allows me to open it and see the contents. But don't dare try to open a folder inside the share, I don't have permission to those apparently. Oh sure, I can get to those by opening the folder from the command line, I can even do everything I need to from there, it's just the Finder that's broken. GRRRRRR!

Frustration with Apple

So this morning I was asked to pull some images off an SD card using my MacBook Pro 15. Now in the past I've had issues using my microSD cards and an adaptor. I always thought that it was just an issue with the adaptor (it's a genuine yum-cha from who knows where). So I never thought too much about the trouble that it gave me.

Imagine my surprise when this name brand SD card gave me the same issues.

Here's what I have to go through to load the things.

• Pray that it's going to work
• Insert card
• Wait to see if the OS recognizes it
• Remove card
• Put it back in, shifting it slightly forward
• Wait again
• Pull it back out again
• Push it into the slot, now more to the back
• Jiggle the card in the slot
• Pray that the card's not hosed now
• Jiggle the card some more
• Repeat any of the above steps until:
• See it pop up in the OS
• Threaten everyone around you to not get close to the computer and literally kill anyone that brushes or touches the card until you're done with what you need to do.

As the contact pins are all in a line across the card, I never suspected that making one work would be such a challenge. Every cheap device I've thrown one at, it's just worked, until I got the Mac. Seriously, I know the motto used to be "Think Different" but why take something that works everyplace else and curse it?

So I've been patiently waiting a few weeks to post these. They were a gift for my fiance's cousin, so I couldn't risk leaking them to the Internet for fear that it would give away the surprise. They've now been received and gifted, so I can finally put them online.

The pattern and book they came from were quite terrible. I really didn't like the way that they were initially supposed to be done, so these have been heavily modified. The ears for example are completely from my head and much taller than the pattern called for.

I've now got requests for pairs for adults. I'm going to have to see how that goes. My initial thought is that I'm going to have to charge through the nose if people want me to come up with an original pattern for an adult foot. Somewhere in the neighborhood of a couple hundred bucks. I don't know, would you pay that much for a pair of slippers? They would be a very limited edition and I'd probably even let the person choose the colors.