All clear

I got the letter that I have been waiting two weeks for - that the mammogram that I had two weeks ago is clear of any signs of cancer. Even though on some level I knew this, it still came as a huge relief to me to know that I am OK, because I am about ten years late in getting my first mammogram. I know that I should have started around age 40, but I just never thought it a necessity to do this particular exam because I assumed, up until recently, that there was no family history of breast cancer. Now that I know better, you can bet your bottom dollar that I am going to be sure to get a regular yearly exam, because I've had far too many female friends who've been through breast cancer treatments and I know that early detection is the best protection. I feel a little guilty that I waited for so long to do this, but at least I have the peace of mind to know that I show no visible signs of breast cancer. For this, I am greatly relieved. Knowing that my medical insurance will cover this procedure 100% is also a relief, given how little my insurance seems to be covering lately. That also gives me peace of mind. Now the only thing looming in the not so distant future is my first visit to a gynecologist. Admittedly, I am extremely nervous about this, but it's something I really have to do, given my age and risk factors and all that. This is another thing I should have done decades ago, but fear is largely what has kept me from doing a lot of these things. Well, the peace of mind knowing that you're healthy, I am finding, is far better than not knowing.

GLUCOSAMINE AND CHONDROITIN SULFATE

For quite a few years now, I have been hearing of the benefits of glucosamine and chondroitin sulfate in dealing with arthritis issues. Naturally, I've been skeptical, but on the advice of both my primary care and orthopaedic doctors, I have decided to take the plunge. I bought a brand that seems to have good research behind it and has been clinically tested, so I figure that any brand that has actual proof of its effectiveness must be the one I should try, so I bought a bottle of it and I am on my third day of taking it. At the outset, you are supposed to take three tablets a day, either all at a time or spaced out through the day. I take one every eight hours right now and I won't know anything about its effectiveness for a month or two. So right now, I can't tell whether it was worth the investment to plunk down the bucks on this stuff or not, but I'm going to give it a try and see. I could have tried fish oil, which I have heard is effective in reducing arthritis pain as well as lowering cholesterol, and if glucosamine doesn't work, I may try this next, since I also have high cholesterol (which is apparently hereditary). It's gotten to the point where I am sick to death of being in pain, particularly with my left knee, but my right knee has lately begun to hurt as well, and this could well be the result of living for nearly 40 years with a leg length discrepancy of one and a half inches (the left one is the short leg due to a long ago car-bicycle accident). This is no doubt the source of my osteoarthritis, combined with the fact that I am also physically active and it's probably a bit hard on my knees. Add to that a pretty physically demanding job and it's no wonder I have arthritic knees. So I'll give it until about Memorial Day to see whether taking glucosamine and chondroitin sulfate works to reduce my arthritis pain. If so, I will know that I am doing the right thing and that my doctors were spot on. If not, time to resort to Plan B, whatever that will entail. Time will tell.

AIG bonus controversy

So let me get this straight: a bunch of people gambled untold tons of money on some shaky scheme that I can't really understand, except for that when it all fell in, it nearly destroyed the world economy, and they get multi-million dollar bonuses that were written into their contracts before it all happened. Therefore, they are contractually obligated to receive that money and have to fullfill the obligations of said contract. Well, I don't know about you, but none of this makes any sense to me except to see that it has spurred a massive populist uprising against Wall Street greed. Rarely have people been this angry before and it's grown into a full throated roar. Couple that with the recent Madoff scandal and you can see why people are absolutely fed up to the teeth with these rich traders, bankers and others who have reaped huge financial rewards at our expense. They've caused this recession and now they need to be made to pay for it. Throw 'em in the clink and toss away the key. Their property ought to be confiscated and the value of it ought to be distributed to everyone who lost their life savings in these scandals. Or something. I don't know. It just galls me to no end, knowing that I won't receive much of a pay raise this year and whatever I do receive will disappear in higher health care premiums, as has happened every year for quite a long time now. It seems like the longer I stay at work, the less pay I make because of skyrocketing health care costs, and when I step in the elevator at work en route to the staff room for breaks and lunch, and I see massively obese co-workers who don't seem to be doing anything about their health and what it's costing the rest of us, it really ticks me off when I consider that I have been working out and trying my level best to eat right and do the right thing. So between that and what's going on around the country and around the world.....I just find myself despairing that anything's going to change anytime soon, because I know how bad things are now and how deep of a mess the previous administration left for Obama's administration to clean up. Well, the first thing I'd do is to put into place stiff banking regulations so that nothing like these Ponzi schemes and credit default swaps (whatever those are...some complicated form of legalized gambling, from what it sounds like) ever happens again. Ever. Overhaul the SEC, throw out the bums who allowed this to happen. Whatever it takes. Put new regulatory rules and agencies into place to police our financial system. No more Madoffs, no more AIG's, none of that. Time to enact real change, and the sooner, the better.

WHERE'S MY BAILOUT, HUH?
Imagine if, instead of bailing out big megabanks and billionaires, the government instead decided to give each and every man, woman and child $10,000 in stimulus money. Wouldn't that do a lot to perk up our sagging economy? And wouldn't it, in the end, be far cheaper than spending untold billions bailing out banks that failed us in the first place and screwed up the world economy? It would give a real shot in the arm to our sagging economy. Think of it - people could spend it on, say, a badly needed new car, a down payment on their first home, one year of a college education for those who are already enrolled in a college or university, those nearing retirement could bank it and use it for their retirement savings, people with young children could use it to put away for their children's college education, some of us could use it to pay our debts and therefore free up discretionary spending that we could use to spend on things that would stimulate the economy, some folks could use it to start a small business that would create jobs....think of it, wouldn't that do a lot more to inject money into the economy than trying to shore up sagging banks that made bad business decisions and likely will in the future? Giving us a tiny tax break isn't going to do a whole lot to stimulate the economy. By my reckoning, my $400 annual tax break is going to equal about $30 extra per month, enough maybe for a night out to dinner and a movie, which is what the government is figuring we'll do with that extra cash. As if that's really going to do anything to help the economy! I'm hardly going to use that extra money to go out on the town once a month to dinner and a movie. That money will more than likely end up getting eaten up in higher health care premiums anyway, leaving me solidly in the negative territory for any financial gains to be had this year. For a family, a $1000 annual tax break is going to equal about $83 extra per month for them, but whether you have a larger or a smaller family, that money will hardly amount to a big stimulus for them. It feels as if we're being thrown a bone while billionaires are being given the big megabucks bonuses that they don't need in the first place. It would make more sense to me to give us all $10,000 and let us do with it as we please. It sure would be a cheaper way to jump start the economy and would make a lot more sense than giving people who already have enough money they don't need. So the Obama administration wants to level the playing field? Start by giving those of us who supposedly inhabit the once mighty "middle class" a bailout, and not just some tiny pittance that won't help, either. If Obama is serious about fixing the economy, help the middle class by giving us a real bailout. I guarantee that would turn things around very quickly, and if people are wise, they wouldn't blow the whole wad in one fell swoop. Hopefully, most people would combine spending some of it with saving some of it, thus helping the banks to stay afloat with an infusion of cash. It's a simple solution, and I urge every reader who comes here to write to the President and to your legislators to urge them to do this. We start with one voice at a time, and as the chorus grows, we cannot be ignored. Give us our bailout. And we'll do our part to save the economy.

Signs that spring is nigh

The weather has been warming, the days are growing longer and my timid little crocuses are popping their little lavender heads out of the cool earth in my front yard. Daffodils are beginning to send shoots up out of the gradually warming earth as well. Song bird mating calls can be heard in the early morning hours and the cheerful songs of dawn can be heard as I tiptoe down the stairs in the mornings to fetch my newspapers. Some trees and bushes are budding as well. People are out in shirt sleeves, flying kites, walking dogs, biking, jogging and doing more outdoor things again. Yes, spring is nigh at last. It smells like it, it sounds like it and it feels like it. Oh, I'm sure we'll still have some chilly days and nights yet - after all, tomorrow is St. Patrick's Day, so we're barely midway through March, but still, after a long, cold and harsh winter, it feels good to see sunshine, to hear bird calls, to see early spring flowers peeping up through the earth and to smell that familiar scent of spring in the air, a kind of heady, fresh earthy smell that indicates life returning after the long cold dark of winter. I always feel so alive again this time of year after practically wanting to hibernate all through the long cold dark nights of winter. I love getting out into the fresh air and sunshine and feeling the sense of renewal with a good hearty infusion of Vitamin D3 that sun helps our bodies to produce. I've never been fond of winter except for the beauty of a freshly fallen snowfall at night or early in the morning, sparkling like diamonds in the sun, but give me spring any day of the week. Maybe it's that I was born in the spring (late April), but I prefer the scent of newly blossomed flowers and the warmth of sun to cold air biting my cheek and chilling my bones. I await the blooming of my sturdy and hardy little lilac bush and next to it, the spindly old pear tree, whose pear blossoms only last a few short days but are a sight to behold each spring. And I await Blanket Hill on the KSU Campus turning into a sea of gold with over 58,000 daffodils planted there, one for each casualty of the VietNam War. It is a sight to behold and the scent of all those flowers in bloom is paradise! Ah, welcome spring! It can't come soon enough!

SOMETHING FISHY WITH CITIGROUP
So one week, Citigroup claims that without federal bailout money, it will go under, and the next week, it's claiming to be operating well into the black with a comfortable profit! Does anybody besides me see something fishy going on here? If they are doing that well, then why on earth would they need that bailout money, anyway? To wine and dine fat cats? So that the corporate bigwigs can keep their multi-million dollar mansions and penthouses and luxury cars and private planes? It's bad enough that it was just revealed that AIG used its bailout money to pay fat bonuses to its big shots, but now to find out that Citigroup has operated with a comfortable profit when they are standing in front of the government with their hats in their hands begging for money as if it was the difference between keeping their doors open and going under, why, it just begs the question: Who's minding the store these days? Where is the SEC in all of this? How is it that this kind of outrageous behavior is happening when the rest of our economy is sinking faster than the Titanic? And where is the outrage? Why aren't more people taking to the streets demanding justice? Millions are unemployed and all these Wall Street fat cats can do is to go to Washington, hat in hand, and beg for more money to maintain their lavish lifestyles while the rest of us struggle to pay our bills and keep the roof over our heads? I'm outraged just thinking about all of this and it seems like no one's doing a thing about it. I suppose it's just the cost of doing business on Wall Street but it's gone on like this unchanged for so long that no one seems to know how to change things to make things more fair, just and equitable. Maybe people are just so discouraged that they don't have the willpower anymore to fight Wall Street. Maybe everyone's just so down in the mouth about the economy and the general state of the world that they don't have the time to worry about a few Wall Street fat cats getting rich at our expense, but that's precisely what they should be worrying about, because that's why we're all in this predicament in the first place - runaway, unbridled and unregulated Wall Street greed. There should be marches in the street demanding justice for the ordinary Main Street working person. There should be marches on Washington demanding action. There's got to be something done about all this, before it continues unabated, because if things don't change soon, then we'll just continue being suckers whose hard earned tax money continues to make a few people very, very rich at our expense while we down here among the ordinary folk continue to scrape, struggle and fight just to get by day after day after day. We voted for change - now, let's see some.

My hero, Jon Stewart

I am fortunate enough to have access to high speed broadband Internet at work, which sadly, I lack at home. This means, of course, that I can only watch video streaming at work (while I am busy doing other things - I can listen to it and not necessarily have to watch it). Well, I have rapidly become a big fan of Stewart and his skewed sense of humor, but I am finding that he is also a very sharp and capable interviewer who can really put people on the spot when need be. He's a very smart, capable guy who is obviously very well read and quite informed on any number of issues, and of course, he's broadly partisan as well, but still, that doesn't in any way diminish his ability to interview someone from the opposition. He treats them fairly but also flings sharp questions at them when the occasion calls for it. For the past week, he and CNBC "Mad Money" host Jim Cramer have been engaged in a bit of a war of words (and rightly so, I might add!), so last night, the showdown of the week/century happened on "The Daily Show", where Cramer came on and was interviewed by Stewart, who hammered Cramer over the whole Wall Street mess of recent days and the kinds of things being said on CNBC. It was nothing short of a brilliant interview that showed Stewart at his sharpest and best. Truly, this man is amazing. You would never have known that he's a comedian when he's being such an able interviewer and questioner. He spares nothing and really lays it all on the line. There was nothing funny about this interview. It was dead serious, with a touch of anger on Stewart's part toward careless Wall Street types playing dangerous games with ordinary people's hard earned savings and investments, all in the name of maximizing profits over taking care of people's money. If you haven't seen this interview and you have access to a broadband connected computer, go to The Daily Show site and watch it. Nothing funny about it, folks. It's dead serious and really good. If only I had enough money to afford a new computer at home that I could connect to broadband - I'd doubtless watch this and many other shows online that I can't normally get because I don't have cable TV!

AN APPROPRIATE NAME - MADOFF

In the past few days, Ponzi schemer Bernard Madoff (an appropriate name - Made Off, as in, made off with lots of people's hard earned life savings) finally got his day of justice in court. What astounds me is how long he got away with this and how much money he lost and who his investors were: everything from ordinary folk to celebrities to major foundations. Now, I grew up with the maxim that if it seems too good to be true, it probably is, so investing with this guy who never seemed to lose his investors any money and could promise amazing returns on their investments seems like something I would shy away from, given what little I know of such things. But people trusted him because they made a lot of money investing their money with him and now, a lot of folk stand to be wiped out completely, their entire life savings lost. On NPR's "All Things Considered" last night, an retired couple who live in Florida were interviewed and they lost everything - $1.66 million of their retirement savings. They'd invested with him for decades and trusted him implicitly, and now, all they can afford is to live in their RV and do what they can to survive with no money left for their retirement savings. And they're not alone. Unfortunately, it's not likely that any of these folks will receive any restitution, because like any smart money manager, Madoff probably hid the bulk of his wealth in some kind of off-shore bank where it will never be found, so he's probably got untold millions squirreled away somewhere. Like he's ever going to be able to use it, because he will likely spend the rest of his life behind bars, but he's probably thinking about his family's financial security without him there to support them. Still, if he's got enough money to where his wife made a $15 million withdrawal just days before this Ponzi scheme came crashing down, then he's got some serious dough that he could use to pay back some of his smaller investors who have been wiped out. The wealthier ones will survive, but the folks like that Florida couple won't, and they're the ones who deserve to get their money back. Sadly, though, it's not likely they will, so let this stand as a lesson to all: Remember, if it sounds too good to be true, it is. No ands, ifs or buts about it.

That was easy

Like any woman, I had heard horror stories of what it's like to have a mammogram. That being the case, I'd never bothered to have one, because....well......I was scared of the whole idea of having one. However, now that breast cancer has hit so close to home, I decided I was long overdue for this necessary procedure. Naturally, I had to find out whether such a thing would be paid for by insurance, since most imaging services can be extremely expensive. Fortunately, my insurance does encourage yearly gynecological health screenings and will pay for them completely, so this being the case, I decided it was high time that I took care of business and made an appointment to have my first annual mammogram. So I went to the Robinson Imaging Center in Kent last night and....I did it! It was so much easier than I could ever have hoped for, it was quick, and the radiologist was an old friend who I have known most of my life! They completely set me at ease and made it a quick, simple and painless procedure. And what was nice that since it was my first time, they gave me a small gift of a rose scented candle and a pink ribbon pin, which I thought was a really sweet gesture. It reminds us that we as women have got to take control of our health and make sure to get regular yearly screenings. And it reassures me as well that in spite of my often crummy health insurance (which is run by a consortium of doctors and hospitals - go figure!), they will gladly pay for such things.

MANAGED CARE - IT DIDN'T WORK
Back in the 1990's, the attempt at health care reform gave us managed care plans in an attempt to rein in runaway health care costs. The whole idea was to put a stop to what some insurers thought were needlessly expensive tests, surgeries and waste in the health care system. Well, I can say in all honesty that it didn't work. It usually results in denial of care when you really need it and insurance wonks making medical decisions instead of doctors and medical professionals. Basically, one can say that it's a failed experiment in health care cost containment. If anything, it's driven health care costs higher because people now wait longer to get medical issues taken care of because they have to jump through so many hoops to get taken care of. By the time they are able to get taken care of, they are so sick that the cost of helping them becomes even more expensive than if they had been able to get taken care of in the first place. Unfortunately, I don't see an end to managed health care systems going away anytime soon. There is so much bureacracy, paperwork and administrative overhead that if we went with a single payer health care system, a lot of folk would suddenly find themselves out of work. Still, I am a strong advocate of single payer health care. Managed correctly, it would significantly improve our rapidly tanking economy and might even give a significant boost to most companies who are currently struggling to pay skyrocketing premiums for their health care plans. Still, the insurance lobby is so powerful that it's going to be a tough battle to overcome their money, power and influence. I wish that it wasn't so, but I am a realist. I know how things work in Washington. Lots of legislators get big bucks from insurance companies, so they have a vested interest in keeping them in their back pockets. In the meantime, those of us stuck in managed care programs are being forced to pay more and more of our own health care costs out of our own pockets as our premiums increase and our coverage decreases. It doesn't make a whole lot of sense, given what managed care was supposed to do. Asking people to pay for their own health care when it's so expensive is not going to rein in runaway health care costs. If anything, it's going to add to the problem, and if things continue unabated, things will continue to get worse and worse until people just get so fed up that they demand action, and now. The ball's in our court now, so it's up to us to start demanding real change from our lawmakers and legislators, because goodness knows, if they have their way, nothing's going to change. They have too much at stake to change it and we have to be the agents of change. It always happens from the bottom up, not from the top down. History has proven that. Time for us to rise up and demand real change, not just half measures, which is all they are proposing right now. Half measures aren't good enough. Real change now! That's what we need to rise up in record numbers and demand!

Better living through chemistry

Thursday I went to my primary care doctor's office for a routine check-up, but as mentioned in the previous blog entry, I have been suffering from agonizing and debilitating knee pain lately despite recent physical therapy. When an MRI was suggested, I had to inform my doctor that such a thing was unaffordable for me due to the fact that my insurance won't pay for such a thing. He asked about X-rays and I mentioned that I had recent ones done on the knee in December, so he's going to take a look at those to see what's going on. Because I am limited in what treatments I can have by my costly health insurance, my doctor decided that the most cost-effective measure would be to inject my knee with a steroid that he told me would give me months, even maybe a year free of pain. Despite some minor risks to this procedure, I agreed to have it done, but after three tries, the doctor could not even get the needle to go into the joint. This concerned him that I may be dealing with bone on bone (he'll know more after viewing my X-rays), so left with no other option to relieve the excruciating pain I'd been in, he wrote me a prescription for 800 mg. Motrin, a good high dose anti-inflammatory. Almost from the first dose the next day, I was amazed at the fact that as a result of this medication, I am able to pretty much resume a normal life not wracked by pain. It feels so good to be able to do everything I normally do without it feeling the awful pain that has hamstrung me for so long now. I know that I must be careful as the medication is merely masking the symptom, but still, it feels good to go about life like I have nothing wrong with that chronically bad knee, even though I know that I have osteoarthritis in it. The doctor also suggested that I might want to try glucosamine and chondroitin, so when this prescription is up, I will probably switch to that in hopes of remaining pain free permanently, or for as long as humanly possible.

HEALTH CARE REFORM

The main issue that I am following with the Obama administration is the attempt at health care reform. What frustrates me is that it seems as if they are taking an incremental approach instead of doing something that could slow our economic decline and save some jobs that are endangered by high health care costs being paid by employers. Health care should never have been tied to employment in the first place, but apparently, during the Truman administration, there was an attempt at universal health care, but apparently what happened was a need to attract people into jobs by offering health care as a benefit, so ever since, it's been tied to one's employment, meaning that if you lose your job, you lose your health care unless you are willing to go through the federal COBRA program and pay your entire premium yourself, unaffordable for most of us. So in the meantime, Obama is taking baby steps toward universal health care, but my fear is that it won't happen at all during his first term of office, meaning that I will still be paying more for my premiums and for less and less coverage. As it stands now, I can't really afford to take care of myself as well as I would like because of my high deductible plan, meaning I am limited as to what all I can do. Should my knee eventually need surgery, I will not be able to afford it and I will have to wait until there is the political will to offer real universal, single payer health care. Right now, Obama seems to be taking a downright centrist stand so as not to piss off Republicans who are embittered about losing the last two elections and to woo the centrist and conservative Blue Dog Democrats, who are more numerous than they have been in years past. In the meantime, we old Yellow Dog Dems and progressives wait impatiently for Obama to take bolder approaches to solving this nation's plethora of problems left by the previous incompetent administration. It remains to be seen whether health care can truly be reformed, or whether the powerful insurance and Big Pharma lobbies will shoot it down in flames as they did when the Clinton administration tried to reform health care in the 90's. Stay tuned, it's gonna be one hell of a big fight in Washington!