Is it really free?

This whole "free" health care insurance thing Obama has going has had me confused from day one. First of all, it's not free. The money has to come from somewhere. And guess what - it'll come from those who bust their butts everyday trying to make ends meet. Those who have sat on their butts spittin' out babies for years will get a free ride on our broken welfare system.

The thing that scares me the most though isn't the money part. Yea.. that'll suck. But, it's the quality of care. The ease of getting an appointment and actually seeing a doctor. It's knowing that I will only have to wait a few days for a non-emergency but can get in the same day for an emergency. I currently can get a 2nd opinion within days, sometime the next day, even as a new patient.

It saddens me that people can not see the reality of throwing everyone into this mandatory system. Things won't get better... they'll get worse. Shortage of doctors. Shortage of nurses. Long waits for appointments. Long waits to get into the appointment once you are sitting in the waiting room. And then, a 2 minute appointment revolving door meeting where the doctor doesn't have time to really evaluate your situation. They won't have time to get to know you - build a relationship. All because they have 100 people sitting in their waiting room desperate to see them for whatever reason.

There must be another solution to the problem of people not being able to get health insurance. I wish I knew what that was. But for now, I want to be selfish and say I'm sorry.. it's not my problem. It never has been. I've always made getting and keeping insurance a priority. Even with pre-existing conditions. I've taken care of myself with exercising and eating right.

And the count down begins....

10 sleeps -- ok, maybe not sleeps... more like "10 more nights of staring at the ceiling"

Either way, I'm glad it's within reach.

Preparing for a Possible Evacuation

So, I guess I spoke too soon. Last week continued to get worse and now it's seeping into this week. There's been death, there's been birth (at least I'm assuming by now Adrianne has had her little girl.. it's been 23 hours since her last post saying she was going to the hospital)... there's been insomnia and snake bites and wildfires galore. The only good thing is the baby! Brian is finally home from his trip and I couldn't have been more excited to see him if I weren't so exhausted from not sleeping for the past few weeks.


Click Here for a Map

Thankfully, 3 of the fires from yesterday in my area were extinguished fairly quickly. Our firefighters are stretched so thin, they were asking for anyone with fire experience to come help... retired, off-duty, etc..

Today, I decided with our neighborhood surrounded by fields - dry fields next to roads where irresponsible people throw their cigarette butts next to - it's probably time to make a list and start putting things in a pile to quickly load into the car. So, here it is:

* insurance papers and birth certificates/passports
* valuable coins/currency in my collection
* both cameras and memory cards/chargers
* laptop and external harddrive
* scrapbooks
** bag of dog food
** diapers and sippy cup as well as some clothes for Kaylee
** an overnight bag for Brian and I with clothes
*** Mac, toys

* is priority
** is 2nd priority if I have room/time... these are things I can buy if I can't take them.
*** is if I'm able to make a second trip to the house... sorry, girl.. I can always replace you but know that if I have room/time, I'll pack ya up.

Other things I need to do now is document everything we have just in case the house burns and we lose everything.

As of right now, there are not any wildfires near us. But, 1 of the 3 yesterday was only about 3 miles away and that has me on edge.

So the question remains - are YOU prepared if a wildfire breaks out near you? What would you grab if you haven't had time to prepare?

Native Texan is Frying....

I was born and raised here, so I've gotten used to us only having two seasons. However, this year has been brutal. I've never seen so many 110-113F degree days. I also have never experienced more 100+ days in my lifetime. We're on 79 days. We'll easily hit 80 today. This smashes the record from 1925 of 68 days of 100F+.

Our nights have been pretty warm as well. It was not uncommon for it to be 100 at 10pm. We just started to drift into the high 70s as a low. And as of today, we're drifting into the 60s! That's jacket weather, ya'll! I don't know what I'm going to do with myself. It's been so bloody hot that I really thought it would never end. I fear our new trees did not survive the drought and all of those hot days even though they have had a constant drip. Only time will tell there. Our yard has barely survived. And that swing set I wanted so badly? Yea.. it hasn't been used much because of the heat. I just couldn't take her out there... but this week it's on! We're going to get back to swimming and back to swinging. Can't wait!

31 years old is too young to die...

But, that's exactly what has happened to a good friend. I think I'm all cried out this week so I'm having a hard time figuring out how to react to all of this.. having your friends call crying also puts you into the "stay strong for them" mode... I'm thankful for all the years I knew Clay. He was a sweet, sweet person that had a lot of bad circumstances fall into his lap. And this morning, the worst of all circumstances... a sudden heart attack.

Thank you for coming to dinner with us a few Fridays ago. I'm glad I got to hug you and tell you bye. But, I'm sorry we weren't closer over the last few years. 16 years of friendship - it won't be forgotten.

So many things are up in the air

Nothing much has changed in the ways of worry. There's still a bunch of unanswered questions... and I *still* can't really talk about it, which is frustrating. So, instead, I bottle everything up until I explode, which may or may not have happened this week. It sucks. I hope the next few months fly by... I'm over it all and trying to lay low for a bit.

So... hypothetically speaking...

If you send out an invitation to someone and they don't receive it... and that person asks for another one but you don't have one - you would give them all the information from the invitation and not have them track it down themselves, right? Would it really stress you out to the point of making a fool of yourself on a social network site?

Coming from someone who had half of her wedding invitations lost or dismantled by the USPS, I understand the frustration, but giving people a few addresses wasn't a big deal. It was the least of my problems. Then again, I always had it in my head that the wedding is just one day... and while I wanted it to be nice, I didn't want to be completely and utterly stressed out because of it.

I'm kind of over the whole "zilla" phase that the world is going through. There's bridezillas, groomzillas, babymommazillas, snarky-know-it-all-zilla.... it's obnoxious.

Keep it simple, ladies... you have no idea what real stress is if THIS gets your panties in a wad.