It's always something . . . bad.

So, I went to the doc's office today--annual physical.  I was supposed to be fasting, and what did I do?  I popped a damned mint in my mouth while waiting in the examination room!  I spoke to the nurse about it, but, honestly, he seemed sort of . . . dull.  Nice, but only a thin hair shy of "box of rocks" territory.  His name?

Acquilleys.  That's pronounced "Achilles."

I kid you not.

Acquilleys said that the mint wouldn't affect anything, but, looking around online, I see it might.  So I called the office and asked them to make a note that I had screwed up.  That way, if the results are a mess, we'll maybe know why.

The doctor, who seems quite nice, agreed to a "once every six months" visit schedule.  I'm not thrilled about it, but I'm better with that then the "every three months" schedule Madame "There's No Mass/That's Why He's Your Husband and Not Your Gynecologist" tried to force me into.

It'll do.  I'll let you know how the blood work went.

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Next up (in about an hour) is the dentist appointment.  You know what I remember?  I remember the days of my dentist (Dr. Grover Hoopes, and the man ROCKED) looking to save his patients money.  I'd go in, he'd do the x-rays, have his assistant clean my teeth while waiting for the x-rays, and then fill right then if it was only one or two.  These days?  Holy cow, the money grubbing is breathtaking, it's astounding, how broken this system is.  What am I going in for?

I have no idea.  They say they want to see me twice a year.  Except that's for cleaning.  I have to make two more appointments each year for x-rays.  So that's four appointments per year, because they won't clean and do x-rays at the same appointment.  And if I need work?  That's more appointments, and they won't fill more than one cavity a day, so if you have two?  That's two more appointments.  So, for two cavities, they could conceivably have you in for a minimum of four appointments.  

Yes, I "get" what they're doing.  They're trying to maximize the insurance payout by spreading out the billable procedures.  

And it sucks.  It sucks for me, time-wise, nerves-wise, and money-wise, because each visit is a copay.

Universal health care, folks.  Like they do it out there in the civilized world.  And don't give me any of that dippy "I don't want to wait five months for an appointment!"  I had to wait four months for an appointment with the urogynecologist, and I had to wait six for my initial dental appointment here.  And my insurance?  The medical ROCKS (the dental is ehhhh).  Seriously, my husband's employer insures the hell out of us.  Well, there is that pesky 500 bucks a month we have to drop, but the point stands--here, in the U-S-of-A, with grade-A insurance, I had to wait MONTHS for treatment.  FOUR months just to have someone examine an unidentified, growing MASS.  

Yeah, universal health care, baby.  Now.

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So, today's the day I take a day off from the new way of eating.  Not totally losing it, no beef or pork or anything crazy like that.  But Chinese with Chicken (first non-fish meat in over a month) and cupcakes.  What's the bet I feel like utter hell tomorrow?

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So, we were at the Farmer's Market the other day, and found ourselves smack in the middle of a railroading festival.  The usual parking was full of additional booths, and so we hit the nearby parking terrace.  Now, there are very specific rules about parking here--Monday through Friday, the entire terrace is reserved for permit and city-worker parking.  However, on weekends, the top level (level 5) is for non-permit, non-city folks who are hitting the Farmer's Market.  

As we pulled in, we marveled at how crowded the first two levels were--every spot taken.  As we ascended, there were more and more open spots, until we reached level 5, which was almost empty--aside from us, there were, perhaps, a half dozen vehicles.  All bearing hippy-dippy stickers, Obama stickers, "COEXIST" stickers (I'll talk about my problem with those someday), and other nuevo-peacenik-type things.  Noting the stickers, I decided to keep an eye open on the way out, see if there was, perhaps, a trend there, politically-speaking.  We hopped on the ELEVATOR (yes, elevator--so parking illegally downstairs didn't really save any time or walking distance) and hit the market.  And when we got back, laden with our treasures?  Even fewer cars up top, even more on the lower levels.

And the stickers?

Of the ten cars parked closest to the entrance?  The "most illegally" parked, if you will?  One had a Romney-Ryan sticker.  THREE had Cuccinelli stickers.  There were two NRA stickers.  One strongly anti-Obama sticker, and one Tea Party sticker.  And some various sports team stickers.  

Certainly not a scientific sample, but it sure does make you think.  Makes you wonder about the mentality that can't be bothered to park where they're supposed to.  It's clearly marked, it's not like they missed it.  It's not like the free parking up top was full and they had nowhere else to be.  No, this is an oblivious sense of entitlement, a "don't you tell me what to do" kind of bent that I've commonly observed in the bagger/right crowd.  

Maybe there are some research dollars in that, huh?

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And finally, I did good.  First I did bad, but then good.

Friday night, the lice-kid from down the street, the one who pathologically lies?  Showed up after 9 p.m., wanting to do a sleepover.  This kid blew our boy off for months, and even before that, made it clear our kid was a "last resort."  This boy and his brother brought LICE into our home!  Most scarily, this boy has been hanging out with the frightening animal killing/kid beating group.  

Oh, and he's three years younger than our boy.

Anyway, he shows up and wants to overnight.  Wanting to save my boy the discomfort of having to beg off, I sent him upstairs--and it got ugly.  I had no idea why, so when the lice-kid had left, I asked.  And our boy said, "I wouldn't mind if he came over."

Understand, our boy can't stand this kid, which means he must be really desperate for companionship.  

Problem is, I'm not willing to have the kid over here.  When he comes, he's not here for our boy, he's here to walk through our house inventorying our possessions while he makes up stories about his rich grandpa and rich uncles who have stuff that's so much better than ours.  Instead of hanging with our boy, he hangs on the adults, telling whopping, incredibly stupid lies about things like "electroid soundproofing curtains."  The kid proudly proclaims that he's gone over a year without reading ANYTHING, and every time he's come over, it's been followed by a return visit claiming he's lost some expensive bit of electronic equipment over here.  

That's the bad.

What our boy didn't know is that I had scoped out an open house for a local Radio Control Flying club.  See, since we moved here he hasn't been able to fly because the laws are pretty nasty around here on flying in parks and the like.  He's missed it.  Terribly.  In fact, I was reading a writing assignment I gave him recently, and he was describing flying, and then how much he missed it.  So, when he was yelling at me on Friday night, he didn't realize that his Saturday was going to be RC Flying.  We've made arrangements now for him to fly most Saturdays.

That's the good.  I hope I redeemed myself.  Hubby said there were a lot of kids there, and I hope that brings him some joy, too.

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And that's that.  Oh, except we got an email from the landlord, a very vague "The HOA says there's a problem with the fence, fix it."  Yeah.  Some clarification, please.

Oh, and here's something ugly:

And finally, the bad news.  The small cavity in the lower left canine?  Not a problem, 27 bucks to fill.  The crack in the molar on the only side of my mouth I've been able to chew on since I was 13?

Over six hundred.  Over six hundred, and that's if the tooth doesn't break between now and the appointment I have no idea how we're going to afford.

Oh, and that's six hundred-plus AFTER insurance.

And that's my day.