Bad News, Bears

Today was a visit to my primary care physician. He wants me to take a stress echo cardiogram immediately, because I have had acute angina in the past few months. I found out that it costs $2k. I delayed the stress echo cardiogram until a month from now, because I don't know how I will pay for it, and I don't feel right incurring a debt that I cannot pay.

Money v. living. That's a tough question.

How soon do the provisions of the healthcare reform kick in?

A Nice Week

This is a pretty nice week. Our day caregiver actually is showing up for work, which makes my life a lot nicer, in that I can get out during the day. In the past three weeks, she has been out about half of the time, and I had to cover the slack.

Monday I rode my bicycle around Seward Park twice. I have an Autobike, which is nice, since it takes care of all the shifting gears. The downside is that occasionally the chain just comes off of the front sprocket, and I don't know why. The weather cooperated, and it was lovely riding alongside the shore of Lake Washington for a few miles, with the sun shining, and the fresh morning air whooshing across my face.

Today I went to work on the rental house. I saw that the tenant weeded a lot of the flower bed, and I worked a bit more. I left out the spading fork by the back door for them to make things easier for them. Again, the weather was pleasant, and working in the yard was good to do on a day like this.

I hope the weather cooperates more this week, so I can go riding my bicycle more.

:-)

Things Mechanical

Today was a good day. My friend, Ricky-the-truck-driver, came over and he helped me so much when he and I replaced the defective rear brake caliper (I had never looked at the rear brakes, so I never knew I had disk brakes there, lol).

The most wonderful thing was that there was a mechanical problem, and we set out to fix it. It is so reassuring that there is a venue when I can effect positive change that is lasting. There are so many other areas when trying to effect positive change is a futile endeavor, especially with interpersonal relationships.

Cause for rejoicing today. :-)

Divorcing Siblings?

Today was one of those days when I wish that I could divorce my siblings. My sister was at her bitchy best, and I gotta say, I am pretty darned sick of her condescending pedantry.

We had another "family fucking dinner" out today with my favorite cousins for dim sum. It should have been a nice time, except my bitchy sister and her bratty daughter were there. I am sick to my teeth when they drop their not-so-subtle personal digs about me into the conversation.

If I had my druthers, I would be long gone. Being in South Africa would be nice.

I have discovered that the secret to my upcoming freedom is saving money. If I can save a few thousand dollars more, then I can get free.

O freedom, over me.

Taking a break

I am taking a break from all of the noise and bother of this world, and I am posting a piece that always gives me repose: Concierto de Aranjuez by Rodrigo. Enjoy.

Healthcare on Facebook

Yesterday I discovered that one of my former students has grown up to be a neo-con. She posted some urban folklore email thing about a welfare mom dripping in gold, and that she was pissed off about it.

I commented on it, saying that I was not allowed to get health insurance because I have a pre-existing condition. Thus the system wants me to die.

I was doing a Gandhi/MLK strategy trying to put a human face of the suffering in front of them. I was baiting them to agree that they think I should die. As far as I got was that they declared that they really didn't give a shit one way or the other.

I let it go. Bigots are highly reluctant to change their points of view, especially when they are speaking from a detached stance.

Buddha bless them and have mercy. They are putting bad vibes into the dharma. Karma will revisit them.

Dharma & Karma

Dharma/Karma does things in stages in my life. For a couple decades I was continually being beset by the Borderline and Narcissistic Personality Disordered. I learned that Karma does pay back in big ways.

Now that that's done (kainainhora), I am barraged by people who complain about their lives, and are in denial about the causes:

*The acquaintance who is continuing in a relationship with a guy, and then wondering why he mistreats her, and she won't leave him, and she wonders why she feels miserable

*Another acquaintance who has his blinders on, repeatedly complains about how his brother is jacking up the business, and then refuses to cut him loose

*This same acquaintance with blinders who is upset that his "girlfriend" is breaking up with him, even though she has an extremely inflated "resume" refuses to check up if she is telling the truth

This is just a short post, but my response is "Arrrrggghhhh!"

Perhaps the Dharma/Karma is trying to teach me how to better respond to their incessant complaining about problems they themselves are creating. Perhaps the Carl Rodgers approach would be best. However, after a while, I would probably feel guilty about pretending to actually care what they are saying. Maybe I need to learn how to set a boundary, telling them that I really don't want to hear it.

Now I am convinced that I would have made a shitty psychotherapist.