Living with MCL

It’s been a busy week for me, and I’m pretty well toast.

It started with 3 dinners out this week, 2 relatively stressful days at work, a 5 hour tour of the beach cities with Alejandro and Marcela (friend/fellow MCL’er and his wife from Argentina), and the most miles I’ve ridden on the bike in any week since my hand surgery. Plus, there’s tomorrow’s ride, into Whittier, which will consist of the first significant hills I’ve ridden since my hand surgery as well.

But what really put me over the top, was the spirited conversation over coffee, after one of those bike rides this week. It was about US health care. [My favorite topic.]

I couldn’t believe it, when one of the participants stated he didn’t think health care was a right. I was surprised because, one, I obviously don’t feel that way, and two, I just can’t believe there really are people out there with so little compassion for their fellow man.

His reasoning was, he didn’t think he should have to pay for the health care of someone who was fat, didn’t exercise, smoked or whatever. Well, I can sort of understand that, but what about the person .. continue reading ..

Because I sure can’t say much about the rest of the week.

Even my beloved Steelers, defeating the Baltimore Ravens to start off the week, didn’t do much to stem the mostly negative tone to the week.

It started on Tuesday, when I put gas in my car at the neighborhood gas station, before going to work, and soon discovering the gas station 1 mile down the road was selling it for 6¢ less per gallon. That was followed by my realizing I had forgotten to brush my teeth before leaving the house (and I was too far from home to turn around).

Then the work week seemed overly burdened by some very annoying customers [thank goodness Becky was there to calm me down]. One customer even sent us a letter stating we weren’t working to the latest revision of a specification that was released barely a month ago.

The audacity! How can they .. continue reading ..

And what a year it was. So many things happened in 2008, it’s hard to know where to begin.

First and foremost was the free fall in stocks, the near collapse of the worlds financial markets, the rise and fall of oil and gasoline prices, and of course there was the election of Barack Obama as the next president of the United States. My faith in the American public was finally restored.

Everything else pales in comparison, even the fact Edie and I made it through 2008 not much worse for wear than we started the year, but there was at least one thing of note.

Edie did have an autologous transplant in October, but so far she seems to be recovering fine. She still suffers from persistent neuropathy, resulting from the Velcade she was taking for her Multiple Myeloma, but this month she was approved for Social Security Disability so that has helped. Edie no longer has to endure the unendurable anymore by trying to work.

But it seems there is always a downside to everything. Now .. continue reading ..

Edie received an unexpected large check today from the US Treasury, designated “SOC SEC FOR INS”.

The only explanation we can come up with is her application for Social Security Disability was approved, and this was just a retroactive amount since she became disabled. The strange part is there was no paperwork with the check, nor did we receive any notification her disability had been approved prior to today.

Seems strange, we wouldn’t have received an explanation prior to receiving a check, but maybe the government was just anxious to get some money into our hands so we could help the troubled retail sector.

Or maybe it’s just our share of the TARP funds, and everyone will be receiving a similar amount shortly