Tuesday, November 27, 2012

THANKSGIVING 2012

I, the Pollyanna of the family, am having a little difficulty being cheery and thankful this year.  I am doing a thanksgiving post to try to get myself out of this blue funk.

I simply must stop reading the news and pseudo news, watching the news and pseudo news and last but not least listening to the news or pseudo news.  I had become unhappy with the media, when the President would speak, and right after, a distinguished gentleman from the media would come on and tell me what the President had just said.  Did that bother you at all?

This has now exploded to having distinguished ladies and gentleman coming on after the news to tell us what the news meant and we are extra lucky on Sunday mornings, there is a plethora of distinguished ladies and gentleman telling us what the previous weeks news was about and what it probably means in the coming weeks.  There is only one pleasant program, Sunday Morning, that does interviews, looks at art, history, music, oddities, the famous and infamous and the funny.  It even ends with a quiet moment in nature, that is so relaxing, I wish could go on for an hour.

I get overly informed about our diets, something is good for you till it is found to be bad for you.  Overly informed about finance, yes invest till investing leads you into the hands of the unscrupulous who depletes your investments.  Then you will have your social security till there is no more social security.  Medicare will care for you, till you get your letter saying you are entitled to a health assessment each year (not a check up).  You may be asked and answer the deep questions; do you have a smoke alarm, do you use your seat belt, how about a carbon monoxide detector?  How is your mental health, do you feel depressed?  The things you are not allowed to talk about is your health, neither your known health problems nor should you ask about something you notice that is new.  You may not even discuss your medication.  Now, I guess, asking if you are depressed is not such a silly question, since you aren't allowed to discuss your health with your physician, that is very depressing.

Have any of you gotten your degree in the math, needed to figure if you would be better off paying for your prescriptions out right or paying for a prescription insurance and then paying a co pay for same?   
 
                   Total cost out of pocket          vs.                  cost of premium plus co pay

Now if you are thinking you have the answer, please add, which type of insurance do you want to buy?  The little amount per month premium where you pay more out of pocket, the medium premium where you pay a little less out of pocket  or the really expensive premium where you pay a lesser amount out of pocket????????????
I missed that day at school, I am so sorry I did.

Then we must talk about teeth.  Yes, teeth!!  Have you noticed, many older folks with missing teeth?  And truth be told they all don't come from the back woods, where the nearest dentist is 100 miles away.  Let me tell you what the cost of dental, without insurance, could set you back.  I know the proper way to look at your dental health is to save as many of your own teeth as you possibly can, that is the very best scenario, correct?  Maybe not, lets look at this from the down hill side of your life.  You are now left with few real teeth (ones that have not been ground down to the nub to have a false tooth attached) the rest are a combo of crowns and partial plates, both removable and (supposed to be) non removable.  The non removable are really only as good as the cement that glues them in, and the plate is only as good as the fit when originally made for you.  My husband, bless his little tooth, broke a tooth that was on a pin.  Yes that means, go to a lab to have the pin removed, $270 then back to the dentist to have the pin and tooth replaced, $300.  Now I have seen an add on TV with this cute little old dentist offering removal and full dentures for half the cost of his silly pin tooth.

Now lets talk about autos.  You all will remember the post of our last visit with Flossie and Mr. Wonderful at The Villages.  You know, when we took the auto into the dealer for a small fee ;)  with instructions for them to go over the car from bumper to bumper.  A few adjustments later, we started off with a clean bill of health and by the time we were in Tennessee, the check engine light was on and the car was leaping forward on it's own, mile after mile.  All in all, after $1000 in repair cost and much prayer we made it home incident free.  Just a few weeks ago, looking for the best cost for brakes for my hubby's old truck, add after add, sale after sale and armed with several coupons starting at $69.00 upward to $250, he took off to get the work done.  Returning hours later with a bill in his hand for over $700 and a glaze over his eyes, I put him to bed and wanted to take him some warm soup.

Another problem, please hear me out!  I couldn't take my hubby a bowl of warm soup, cause I couldn't get the lid off the can.  A hand held opener is no longer something I can manage, and an electric can opener makes a wonderful burrrring sound, but will not hold on to and cut open the can.  He wouldn't have really liked it without crackers and all I had was a new box of crackers, with the sleeves hermetically sealed so even if I had any teeth left, could not even have chewed thru.  No, couldn't take him a glass of juice, it has the seal that needs to be pried open from a pull tab, that no matter how hard you pull, will not come off, the milk maybe? no, it has the tab to break to get it unscrewed and when you do there is a white seal that can't be removed.  I have no idea why I am as heavy as I am, not being about to get into any food stuffs in the kitchen????

Well, it took me till the week after Thanksgiving to unload all this on you.  The good news is that I feel much better just getting all that out. 

 So from our little part of the world to yours, lets get ready for Christmas, HoHoHo

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