Phoenix Landing

I've kinda let the website fade away but I still like the name, so I gave it to my hat. I bought this white hat at Target about a year ago, thinking it would be a good canvas for something and you don't often see hat blanks like this.
Anyway, got tired of seeing it there not getting colored or worn, so I took it out and started doodling. After realizing sketching was a waste of time I just started drawing and let it go where it would.

This is in progress:
















And this is the "finished" piece. Quotes cuz I'll probably still futz with it for a while.

Pre-Op Visit

It's about a week out I guess and the scheduler, Sarah, called to set up a pre-op appt (this happened a couple of days ago), so here I am again, in the doctor's office and of course there's a problem with AHCCCS and my other insurance and the bills and I think I'm going to die of stress related brain embolisms before I can be cured of cancer. Apparently since I don't have a Primary Care Physician I can't use this doctor with AHCCCS because I didn't get a referral from my Primary Care Physician that I don't have. That would be fraud, ya know, to go to a Specialist without getting a referral from a Primary Care Physician. I guess Tank forgot to port-load that program for me cuz I didn't get that training. All I know is I've been coming here for two months and now they tell me that the thing I told them day one (no primary physician) is now going to keep me from getting the surgery. Oh but wait, I have other insurance. Yes, yes I have Pizza Hut's meek little tic-tac of a health plan that seems poised to save my life, literally, simply by the fact that they can be considered my Primary Health Insurance Plan and the ADCCCS becomes my Secondary Insurance Plan, thus solving the dilemma of who referred me to Dr. Rothman. I think. No, as Kevin would say, "everyone's God willing". We figure it out by saying, "here, call this number tomorrow."

So it's not long of a wait and Marsha sits me in the scary dental chair in room 4. Rothman shows up maybe 5 minutes later, smiles and shakes my hand warmly, which is so not like his previous meetings with me.

So he pretty much starts out by saying that this should go about as smoothly as my biopsy, as far as I was concerned. I'd meet him for a few minutes about a half hour before surgery. I'd meet the anesthesiologist. The nurses would give me an IV and ask me a bunch of questions, then they'd wheel me out and down the hall and the next thing I'll know is I'm waking up in ICU. I won't have any tubes or hoses in my nose or mouth. I will have a breathing tube installed, along with a feeding tube, as I won't be able to swallow. I imagine the breathing tube is for the swelling in my throat from the surgery which probably wouldn't allow me to breathe normally.

This all takes place on my right side, left if it's your point of view. He explained again how normally he would go in through the mouth with robotic surgical tools, but my kind of tumor prevents that. So he has to take apart my jaw on that side, which will be repaired with titanium. He indicated the chin area when speaking so I would think that's where the bone is broken so that half of my jaw can just be kinda moved out of the way. This also includes slitting me from collarbone to above my ear and probably up my chin to, and maybe including, my lower lip. It's called Radical Neck Dissection. Do not google that.



Once he can get at the tumor from all sides he'll remove it, the idea of course is he'll remove all of it. This will leave a tumor shaped hole in my face which must be filled. Tissue and muscle will be taken from my chest, which I described before, but what I learned today makes it cooler. The tissue and muscle will be moved under my skin. They kinda snake it up under my skin, past my shoulder and up into my neck and jaw area, with all the original attendant nerves and blood vessels still intact, so that it is my own live tissue being used to rebuild my neck. If they had gone with the other procedure, the one I really wanted, they would have had to painstakingly rebuild the circulatory network, I guess by matching veins with veins and arteries with arteries and nerves with nerves and so on. If he'd explained that the first time I totally would have gone with the chest method.

Then it's sewed back up and into ICU. Day 2 they'll get me out of bed and walking around. I told him all I cared about was being able to pee standing up. None of those bedpans. He said I'll spend 7 days in the hospital. Day 3 they'll probably start me on physical therapy for my chest, shoulder and neck.

I ask him if I should start looking for an oncologist and he says no, he's an oncologist. This is all he does. When the time comes, if we need to add a little radiation or chemo to the plan, he can take care of all of that. Arranging for a Radiologist or a Chemotherapist(?) He's said it like that a number of times; "If we need" radiation or chemo after surgery. It's encouraging. He tells me to call him if I have any questions, that he will call me back if he's not able to talk at the time and I believe him. Very reassuring. In fact, the whole visit was more encouraging than any previous one. More than all rolled together. And I still could barely keep from falling apart when I left. I think it's the holding it all in while we're calmly talking about breaking my jaw and swinging it out of the way like a gate on a fractured hinge, right after my neck has been cut open like a frog tied down with pins, so they can scoop out a golf ball sized piece of my neck and then pull some chest meat up under my skin to fill in the hole.

Sat in the parking garage and called dad to tell him about the meeting. Find out that my kid is now employed. Woot!

I forgot to ask about the blood stuff - my mom and dad want to try to donate blood if it's needed, and Kaia's friend Alix did too, but I forgot to even ask if it's even an option, if it's needed.

Overall I feel much better emotionally than I have for the last few days. Sorry if I've been grumpier than usual.

Oh yeah, sorry Kevin, I shoulda told you that I was going to get some awesome food. It was kinda spontaneous. I couldn't really help myself, Mikado was on the way home and well, tuna tataki! I'm not going to get my hopes up too high, but if I don't have to have radiation, then my fear of losing my sense of taste might not even happen.

PS

People have been known to call me Grumpy

Fast Five Bucks Wasted. Plus Four.

No epic meal today, just a seriously opposite of epic movie with Kev and Cody. Fast Five, or whatever its called.

I don't think I could list the ways in which this movie sucked. It would take up far more time than I'm willing to put into it, considering the time I already wasted watching it in the first place. For all those "Who cares? It was fun" types out there, yes, I can see what you'd find fun in it. There were nice cars driving fast (though really, 2 races and 2 mediocre car chases are kinda disappointing in a car street racing movie), there were hot girls, good looking guys and some not too terrible jokes here and there. There were some beauty shots of Rio, if you count soft-focus, magic-hour shots of some of the crappiest slums in the world, as beauty shots. There was some drama too I guess.

I'd also like to point out how lazy and terrible movie posters have become.



Let's see...
-Terrible writing with equally terrible jokes delivered with equally terrible timing.
-Dumb guys standing around with hot girls feeding us the idea that street racing is sexy and cool and ballsy, despite it being dull, stupid and often dangerous with bystanders being killed a percentage of the time.
-Product placement gone mad. Seriously, two Dodge Chargers couldn't pull a full bank vault through the shitty streets of Brazil, much less one. They sound awesome when you're revving it, but once you actually need some power, sounding awesome isn't what you need. Real awesome is what you need. And besides, it's Brazil. Why the hell would every third car be a second-rate Dodge or Chrysler?
-Predictable. So predictable that it's impossible to ruin the film with spoilers as 1. There isn't really a plot, and 2. no one was surprised by any of the 'surprises'. Gee, you didn't know Dwayne would switch sides? I guess you're the 3% this movie was shooting for. Oh and the girl from all the other "movies" who's now hooked up with Buster the Great White Hope? She's now preggers with his spawn, gawd help us. And oh yeah, she can't drink alcohol, but she CAN drive fast cars and jump out of trains and shoot guns and be shot at by guns - those are all cool with expectant mothers.
-Ego strokefest. So much time is spent re-racing the old re-races from the other "movies" that I almost forgot about the other races that were inherent to the plot. Oh, yeah. There weren't any.
-Pandering. How many female cops have you guys met? I'm not saying they're ugly or a little muscular for my tastes or 'butch', as they say. I've actually met a few women cops that were both good cops and fairly pretty, some downright beautiful. Most were plain and butt-ugly though, just like their male counterparts. What I haven't ever seen, like ever never not ever ever never seen never never is a cop ever like Elsa Patakay or Gal Gadot (hmm, I found my long lost sister, Gal!). To say these girls are too beautiful to be cops (much less street cops in Brazil or elite manhunter navy seal-esque super cops) is like saying Steve Buscemi is too ugly to play the story of Brad Pitt's life. Ha! Iss funny becuss iss true.
-Contrived. It's too stupid and ridiculous to explain how contrived the end scene, errr, scenes (because it never damn ends) are, other than to say; with the number of times they had to improvise and change plans on the fly and add new peeps and new allies and still end it all like Ocean's Eleven, like it was all part of the "plan", you know, the "plan" that was abandoned and reworked ya know, in light of all this new evidence, man, cuz you're not ya know, like we know you're not privy to all the new shit and all. All we needed was a little faith I guess. Or peyote
-Acting. The lack thereof. I'm certain the Japanese guy is the Lawrence Olivier of his generation, in fact I'm fairly positive he must be some J-pop star because the man had range, son! I swear his mouth moved once and the words were totally synced up right. He didn't cower, hand to mouth and scream "Gojirra!!!!!" once! In fact, he did nothing. Nothing at all. No! Wait! That's unfair! He did smile at the Givenchy runway model as she bested all the men in driving in a circle really really fast. Without even spraining her Pocky sized ankles doing all that shifting. Especially since shifting 8 times in 12 feet is pretty impressive, especially while drifting around hallways in a warehouse, especially considering she was driving a 4-speed.

Half the time I felt like that Directv commercial where the kid is taunting the "cowboys" in the movie he wants to watch tonight, and later, on the sofa, watching the cowboys having a bar fight and the kid asks, "They know they have guns. right?" A lot like that. Not only did every single bad guy take the obligatory double-tap center mass, but not one good guy was even grazed, except for Goose, of course, because there has to be some heartwarming shit among all the carnage. Ya know, to go along with the baby announcement, brother/sister reunions, bro hugs, and "Seems like old times?I'm too old for this shit" stares. Goose had to die so Maverick can be the solo pilot he always wanted to be and Iceman could go on to become fat and gay and do a tv show.

So yes, I highly recommend Fast Five.

Hodor

Aside from watching Game of Thrones and all the excellent character building (though I will say that King's Landing looks a little bit like the old Rome sets. Not impressive enough), I was kinda slack today and didn't do my other job; waiting for other people to kill my cancer. I didn't call the Mayo Clinic and I didn't find an oncologist and I haven't yet got a family practitioner yet even still as of now yet.

I did, however, get a lot of phone calls starting around 7:00am. I had a difficult time getting sleep last night. I think it was around 5 when I finally managed. So I figure 2 hours before the calls started. It used to be that I could just turn off my ringer and not worry about it at all. Now I can't miss any calls, ever. Sarah from Dr. Rothman's office called to say I had a 3:15 pre-op appointment on Wednesday, May 4th. My mom called around 9:30. I talked to her and I remember most of what she said. Wrote down some. Donna called around 1:30pm. Didn't answer.

As for my 10th meal before I can't anymore, I had Gang Ped Yarng, basically Thai yellow curry with duck, lychee, green peppers and tomatoes. Never had curry with duck or lychee. The lychee were good but the duck was a bit tough. Still awesome. I had ordered spring rolls, but they gave me steamed dumplings instead. Hard to complain.

Almost finished

I suppose I could work on it for a week or two longer, but sometimes ya gotta just pick up the marker and say "no more". I did want to add a little more color to the yellow brick road.

I wasn't up for drawing, as my meds have been making my hand less than steady, and my brain less than focused, but I still wanted to do something for Colleen and all of the awesome scrapbookers who've stood up and sent me their cards and drawing and more importantly, their hearts. For you guys:
























Click the image for a larger version

Missed one

Well, I didn't get to have my 11th epic meal. I guess I'll have to get 2 tomorrow. Still got my heart set on Panang Curry. Anyway, I had to improvise and made some killer omelets. Sauteed onions, chopped spiral ham, a little cheese. I put some chunky salsa in mine. Cilantro and a pinch of basil over the top. Close enough for bucket list food.

Surgery

Who knows, maybe I'll come out like Robert Downey Jr. A little wiry-er or sumpin. Either way, the cuttin starts on Thursday, May 12th, according to the messages the scheduler and I passed between our phones. I guess I shouldn't complain. Before cel phones I would have had to rely on a land line call from a real person who can get answers to their questions. To be fair, I missed the call. So yeah, it appears, so far, that my surgery is scheduled.

Banks Suck

Ever since the government, in response to the immense number of complaints against banks for over-zealous application of overdraft fee rules, which often result in not one $35 overdraft fee, but 4 or 5 more when the first one causes a cascade effect, passed a law saying banks have to treat debit cards just like credit cards. What this means is the new law says 'if you do not have enough funds in your account, your debit card is declined rather than overdrawn. Previously an overdraft cost you a $35 fee because the bank had to get funds to cover your mistake, except you didn't know it was a mistake until it was too late, because the charge went through, right? Now you are $35 MORE in the red and any other checks or charges that might come through, like that auto-payment to the utility company and now you've got $75 more in fees and $75 more in the red.

SO, the government passed a law to help this by making it illegal to let a charge go through if there are no funds, as the banks were using this as a revenue stream. In response, the banks immediately (before the law even went into effect) began a new campaign to "Save you the embarrassment of your card being declined", which meant if you sign up for this "program", you're basically telling the banks you liked it better the old way and you've just opened yourself up to the old overdraft fees again. All under the guise of protecting you from the horrors of being told your card was declined.

It was exactly at this time that my bank (and yours, I'm guessing) started charging me $10 a month in service fees for my "Totally Free Checking". Remember those lies? Totally free? So when I asked about the fee, I was told that I need to keep at least $1500 in my account at all times to avoid that fee.

So today I got tired of it and closed my account. Of course I had to sit through about 20 minutes while the bank wonk explained how I can avoid the fees and how other banks are charging more and how we could figure out some way to solve my problem. Nope. Too late. I've tried to solve this problem 5 times already and have been just too complacent to do what needed doing.

So I went to Chase, which keeps mailing me cards about getting a $100 gift card for opening an account. They pay for this by charging $12 a month. Buh bye.

Then I went to M&I Bank. I managed to pick up a brochure before every teller in the store starting chanting, "I can help you here, sir!" I said that I wanted to talk to an account exec to open a new account, and was directed to, yes, a teller, who described the types of accounts before bringing me over to see - yes, and account manager.
Before she did, however, I asked her some questions about the checking account charges, which were $10 a month too. The difference being that the brochure said all I had to do to waive this fee is to complete 3 transactions a month. She said, "No, it's 10 transactions. I told her about the brochure saying 3, not 10 and of course she asked to see it. "Oh, no, this is wrong. Someone must have left the old ones."

So I walked over the the brochure display and took the handful of brochures, about 30 of them and handed them to her. "I guess someone forgot all these too. Now can you understand why people hate banks?"

So back to the account manager. Very nice, pretty routine. Opened an account. I told her as long as what they've told me remains true - no fees as long as I make 10 transactions a month, whether they are withdrawals, deposits, charges or whatever. Then she asked me about the brochure question I had. I briefly explained it to her and then walked out of her little cubicloffice and went to a different brochure stand and pulled out another 30 or so brochures and pointed out exactly what I meant and told her also "this is why people hate banks." This is plain old bait and switch false advertising. I don't believe it was a mistake at all, but their fees are less shitty than everyone elses, so what else can I do? She smiled meekly and I left.
*edit - I wasn't mean to her. I was just illustrating my frustration because we had just had a discussion about why I left Wells Fargo - for changing policy every 3 days or so, how frustrating it is to sign a contract that is completely one way. whatever

ps

To all my Florida friends who want me to come home, sorry, being a UNITED STATES citizen means you're part of something bigger than yourself. It means you're really an Arizonan. You can't move to another STATE in the UNITED STATES, because those people over in that state? They don't pay taxes to this state, and if I recall, Florida doesn't pay state taxes at all, so they're already socialists! I can't go home because I'm not going to be considered a resident of Florida, you know, another part of the United States? But thanks to things like State's Rights, and Insurance Companies and Free Capitalism, and oh yeah, greedy black holes of evil disguised as kindly old codgers in lab coats bound by an oath, a brotherly oath that says first "do no harm", unless that harm comes due to inaction. Because of course, the definition of the word "do" exempts them, since they didn't "do" anything and therefore their inaction is legal and not negligent like if you or I killed someone due to inaction. That would be negligent homicide. Florida won't cover another American because I didn't live in THEIR America. Because sometimes a State knows better what the people of the United States need more than the rest of the United States does. So even though our country is called the UNITED States, the only thing that's united is the fact that every state thinks they're the REAL United States.

So don't change states, otherwise you might end up in the WRONG United States where they lie about "taking care of their own" when the rest of the world says we're bad bad people. That is, unless "taking care of their own" has the same connotation as a Sicilian Mafia motto.

And may I say, PLEASE, oh please keep pushing for tort reform so those poor doctors should not have to worry about malpractice suits. Causing a cancer patient to wait an extra month for surgery because he's broke isn't malpractice anyway since there was no practicing to mal with. Even if you can feel the tumors getting larger and more painful every day. Nope, it's not malpractice at all to have all of my insurance information and still not realize that my insurance won't cover a hangnail operation, yet still offer the hope of full service and quick recovery when what you really meant was "Sorry, yer poor. Buh bye."

F U part 2

I've been told by Social Security that they don't take care of short term disability and have nothing to offer me. I would have to be considered 'disabled' for at least a year before they will. Either that or I need to be in end-stage renal failure - which doesn't sound like disability, it sounds like death. You know, that whole "End stage" thing.
Medicare or Medicaid, whichever, won't cover me unless I've been covered by SSDI for at least 6 months, which is impossible as I was only diagnosed this month.

Also, the dr's office just called me to tell me that the plastic surgeon does not accept AHCCCS and therefore won't be able to stick knives in my face anymore, so sorry.

So the moral is, exhaust every financial opportunity you have and then when you finally think the red tape is done, you've managed to save yourself, *poop* some new asshole shows up with another amazingly creative way to say "no cash? fuck you, go die"

So a doctor affiliated with a not-for-profit, faith based hospital refuses to treat people who are on AHCCCS. AHCCCS is for people who are unemployed or underemployed or under-insured. I'm not sure what the issue is, if AHCCCS doesn't pay 100% of his bills or something. Either way. I hope you get a serious illness while vacationing in Borneo or some remote place, and they refuse to operate on you because they don't take THAT kind of money and you have no Borneo dollars and you can't get Borneo state sponsored health care because you haven't been a resident of Borneo for a year. Maybe, I dunno, lose the use of your operating arm and your livelihood.

Or seagulls tear your eyeballs out.

So now, the three choices I was offered have been narrowed down to one choice. My God I'm proud to be an American, where we have the greatest health care system in the world. After Canada and Finland, and Australia, and Japan, and France, and Iceland, and the Netherlands, and Austria. I sure am glad we're better than say, Mexico or Haiti, because those guys put up a real fight, what with the free dysentery with every purchase and an uzi on every corner. I think they even stoop so low as to accept Travelers Checks for payment.

Crap story shittier: instead of repairing my arm after they take a giant chunk out to fill in the giant whole in my face, I'm now fortunate enough that I can have the as-is giant chunk whole in my chest added value package. Two horrific scars for the price of one.

I suppose I should still be happy. I still have a surgeon who will remove my cancer from my head, though I'm starting to feel like he's going to fill in the hole in my chest with, "Hey! Look at that! This chunk here? The one from his face? Wouldn't that just fit perfect in the hole I just made in his chest? NURSE! Close please. I'm off to Scottsdale! There's a charity ball in my honor! For godlike figures who save the lives of the rich and insured. I'm getting an award! :D"

Red Tape part 2

I was having a bad day earlier today, so I lay down in bed for a bit. Of course, 'a bit' turned into 4 hours. My dad woke me up when he called to see what I'd accomplished today. It being Monday and no answer from Access (even though they said yes, I won't believe it till I have my ID card and #), I got up and drove to the hospital to ask the DES office there if they could help me.

The first time I spoke to the women in this office, the lady who helped me was very nice and also very helpful. The women there today were pretty much the exact opposite.

I tried to explain to one woman that I had already applied and been accepted, but since that happened on Friday, I didn't have my ID number yet and was hoping they might be able to help me, as my doctor was waiting for the number in order to schedule my life-saving surgery. I explained that I was in this office once before and the woman was very helpful and I was hoping they could help me again, as going to the Guadalupe office meant two hours in line just to ask a question. She looked at me like I was a dumb child so I tried to explain it again and got a similar response. She said she would have her supervisor, who was sitting 2 feet away and heard everything I had said.

Being only 2 feet away, I heard everything she said as well: "There's a guy here who is asking for help because he doesn't want to stand in line at the office."

f

So the "supervisor" walks the 16 inches over and asks me what I want....
I explained again, this time trying to be clearer than before since the two of them already have a pre-conceived notion of what I want regardless of the actual words I use. I explain that I was in this office earlier last week and a nice young lady was able to call up my account and tell me where it stands and what I need to do from this point on and I was hoping she would be able to help me as well. This person said that she wasn't from AHCCCS, even though the sign on both doors and the building entrance door said DES/AHCCCS, She said that this office was just DES and I said I was at DES to apply. She said that health insurance is AHCCCS, not DES and that the signs on the door were wrong, this was only DES.

Trying very hard to be polite, since this ...person...most likely holds my balls in her hand, I asked her why the other woman was able to help me. She didn't know why that was, but that I had to go to AHCCCS to get my ID #. She said I should call this number (which she wrote and handed to me) and ask them to give me my AHCCCS number. Feeling once again like I was getting the runaround, I asked again, "How is it that the other lady was able to call up my files from here and help me". She gave a bored shrug and said that I needed to call that number. Feeling again like I was falling for the same crap and leaving without answers again.

As I'm leaving her office, which is really a closet with 3 cubicles in it, I see a sign that says "Patient Advisory" (or similar), "Rescue for the uninsured"... The last time we were here we asked the information desk if there was a department we could talk to about financial issues, as in, we have no money or insurance, and they looked at us like she had never heard of such a thing, much less been asked a similar question before. I really can't imagine, with the amount of times I've been treated like a social outcast for not having decent insurance, I really can't imagine that no patient has been in the same situation as me.

So I go in the lobby and call the number. After being on hold for almost 20 minutes, a man, Ken, answers the phone and is very polite and gives me my AHCCCS ID # and ends the stupidity that is DES and mostly useless government employees. Ken repeats the number to make sure I have it and directs me to the AHCCCS website. I thank him profusely while mentally giving the finger to the door of the DES/AHCCCS office that's not a AHCCCS office, despite the signs on both doors and the building signage and the lobby directory. Again, the feeling is one of, "cripes, I'll lie to this guy to get him out of here, its almost closing time and I'm tired of answering boring questions related to my job. Now where are those Oreos? "

So I call Dr Rothman's scheduler, Sarah, since she's been waiting to schedule my life-saving surgery until I procure alternate means of payment. Did I mention the surgery that is on hold because of red tape and money is necessary to save my life? That without it I have about 6 months to a year to live? Because I did mention it to miss Saggy Everything. I think the Oreos were calling out for her because she didn't seem to register my desperation. Sometimes tears and desperation don't work. Maybe if I cried tears made of Skittles.

But I digress. Sarah, the scheduler who's become the life/death gatekeeper for Dr. Idontgetintothe Financialsideofthings, didn't answer the phone. I left a message with my AHCCCS ID #. Hopefully doing it over the phone doesn't somehow disqualify me.

....

On a much more pleasant note, I got home to find out my basic cable was disconnected. No, that's not the good news. I wasn't able to pay the whole bill, as I'm kinda broke, but I wanted to check and see how much I owed and how much was in my bank account. Imagine my shock to find over $5000.00 in my checking!
Apparently my ex-wife and living beer-based wax sculpture, Donna Gorodnick actually paid her back child support. So like a good denizen of the interwebs I posted it to my Facebook and realized, from a friend's comment, that they must have taken the cash out of her tax return. I can't imagine that Donna did it out of a sense of responsibility or a sweet, motherly act of kindness or even out of guilt for how she treated our daughter, because none of those things exist in the vacuum that is her soul and skull. No, it must have been her taxes, and I can't help being tickled bloody purple at the idea that it had to have come from her scumbag husband's taxes, hopefully ruining whatever plans they had for that much money. Probably to pay for that cruise they just took. Cue Nelson.

of course the guy who stole stuff from us when he took advantage of a kid, talked his way out of it

p.s.

Regarding the initial denial and subsequent approval, based on my income:
I don't care how much money I make, the costs of cancer surgery and treatment are impossible to pay for no matter how much my income is. One recent post from a FB friend with cancer stated that her Chemo treatments for her melanoma were 30K a pop.

The screaming catch-22 is that I couldn't get approved based on the potential costs because I would have no way of showing how much the costs would be without first being approved and getting a bill. Without getting approved, I would never receive a bill and therefore would never have proof to show that I can't afford the upcoming medical costs.

My head hurts.

Winter is Here

I got my answers to my applications for Food Stamps and State Health Insurance in the mail today.

I got turned down for health insurance based on my GROSS monthly income, which the mouth-breather entered incorrectly and supposedly why I got denied.

I got accepted for the Food Stamp program based on my NET monthly income. Not sure why one is taken from the gross and the other from the net, I can only imagine it's so that it's possible to turn people down for insurance more easily, since the costs are clearly larger than food costs.

Regardless, as I said in my previous post, I was approved today and these denials are invalid now. What adds to the whole wtf day I've had, the approval letter is almost more ridiculous than the denial.

Yep, according to the letter I am eligible for $16.00 a month in food stamps.

"Winter is coming! Here's a chunk of ice to suck on to get you through."

F U

Been trying to reach my Access person for 2 days. Still worried that I'm going to get denied because the lazy hole who took my information and shooed me out the door didn't take all the info the letter I received had requested. Left 3 messages, called every 10 minutes or so and never once got to a real person.

Dr. Rothman's scheduler, Sarah, called me this morning to ask me if I had any other insurance. I told her no, but I've applied for DES. She said to call her when I find out if I have Access.

Yes, my doctor's assistant in charge of scheduling my very important life-saving surgery didn't schedule my life-saving surgery because I don't have insurance.

So after calling DES all day with no luck, I grabbed all the info they had asked for but didn't take and drove all the way down there again.

And was told I was denied because I make too much money.

I made $100.00 last week. According to my paychecks, I make about $900.00 a month. My rent is $1000.00. This doesn't even count electric, gas, utilities, car payments. And still I make too much.

So I asked how it was possible since I only made around $300 a month. She said I had a right to a "fair hearing". I asked her "When?! Because I need to have life-saving major surgery in 2 weeks! So when am I going to get this fair hearing? After it's too late and I'm home writing my will?"

Apparently I've been wrong all my damn life, and yelling and crying ARE what you have to do to get people to give a damn, because the lady in the next booth said she'd give me my "fair hearing" this afternoon if I would just wait for her to call me.

I waited about a half hour till I was called. She told me again that I was denied because I made too much. That the cut off for GROSS pay is $907.00 a month. Which means they've set the poverty level at $10,800 a year. I dunno, I think I could survive on $209.00 a week. How about you?!

So she takes a look at my pay stubs and, imagine that, the lazy waste of skin who took my info and denied me put my info in wrong. Even still, I only cleared the poverty level by $30.00

So yeah, $30 made the difference between me getting help and me driving my car through their window and... and they wonder why people lose their shit and kill themselves and everyone else around them. Now I understand that guy who showed up at that Florida school board with a gun. No, I have no intention of causing anyone harm, including myself, but I understand it better now.

So in case I wasn't clear - I got approved. But only because I cried and freaked out and wouldn't let them send me away without answering my questions.

...............

On another Fd up note and adding to my feeling like I need to really hurt someone: Kevin put a box of his kid's toys on Craig's List. $100.00 for a huge box of action figures. Kevin had to leave and I was already on my way to DES so he left it to his 16 year old son to finish the deal.

Turns out the scumbag gave his son $45.00 and took a second box of toys nearby as well. So Kevin calls him and he says he has to talk to his wife and he'll call back. No call so far. So yeah, I'm not a violent person at all, but I seriously want to take a metal pipe to this guy's kneecaps.

...

The Doctor's office called me to ask if I had any other insurance.

Random

A long time ago, I read a story about how an Apatosaurus, what we used to call Brontosaurus, had too long a neck for its heart to pump enough blood to its brain. The animal couldn't exist, yet there it was. Later I'd heard a narrator state that after a certain period, no animals larger than our modern elephant existed. Anything larger than an African Elephant had died off.

There's a layer of soot colored earth under the ground, sometimes exposed. Over the entire earth. That's the main evidence for the comet/meteor theory. This crater or that crater is the other.

My theory: Not one, but thousands, maybe millions of meteors hit the earth. But not single or even multiple catastrophic meteor like Shoemaker-Levy 9, the series of objects that hit Jupiter. I theorize that it was a shower of meteors that mostly burned out in the sky, raining iridium-laden ash and rock, smoking to the Earth. A meteor shower, rather than a bombardment, over a long period of time, maybe centuries. Perhaps a large impact or two to explain the craters. Enough to explain the vegetation dieing off. Enough to explain why there's this layer over the entire Earth. And also to explain why animals over a certain size died, but not because life got harder or size made them more tempting prey for desperate predators.

All those micro-meteors raining down added mass to the planet. They laid down a roughly 2 to 3 inch layer over the entire planet. I don't know the math at all, but I would imagine that that much mass added would increase the gravitational pull of the planet itself. This was all new material, not the same finite matter spewed up form volcanoes, as one theory posits. I think those animals were just too big to live after the added mass. Maybe they didn't die because of it, maybe they adapted and evolved because of it, but I can't see animals that size surviving now, even in a zoo. Their mass would kill them. Reverse that thinking and ask what would have to change to imagine the same creature living 65 million years ago.

Rawr

Long day today. My own fault I suppose. I went to work without taking my meds with me. Mistake. I had been feeling particularly bad in the mornings. I figured either the meds were wearing off in the night - which is logical, or something about sleeping (tossing and turning or stretching or being dehydrated) was making my throat more sore than usual. Last night I woke up at 4am or so to take a pill and still had pain when I woke up, which kinda reinforced my theory.

Nope. It's because the meds wear off in the night. I went without taking meds while I was working and by the time I got home it felt like someone had a dagger in my neck and was dragging it up to cut my ear off. Nothing like a pickaxe in your head to put you in a bad mood.

Red Tape

I got the last piece of info that the Department of Economic Security had requested to finish my application for AHCCCS, or Access. Basically state paid health insurance. Shades of my divorce. I had gathered about 12 folders worth of identification, bills, housing information, letters from churches, a lock of hair and chauffeured it all across town to sit in a crowded room filled with crying babies and dirty kids running, screaming through the room for two hours, on the same day they've installed a new computer system and intake procedure and the lady assigned to help at the door is here from Washington state and speaks no spanish and can really do nothing more than show you where the line is, for the lady to finally call me over and ask for my ID, a power bill, a paycheck stub and my medical bills and go into another room for an hour and come back and tell me to go home and wait