My story can be summed up in one word: Freedom.

In 2015 my place of work switched to Evergreen Health, and I had to find a new primary care physician for the first time in more than 25 years.  I went to Evergreen's "very helpful" website, where I found a long list of general practitioners who, as far as Evergreen was concerned, accepted Evergreen Insurance at the present, or once upon a time, or maybe in the future.  In any case, I spent some hours over the course of some days failing to secure the services of a general practitioner.  For about a year.

During this time- the winter of 2016-2017- I was so constantly sick that I finally gave up and went to a CVS Minute Clinic for treatment.  First, I checked the CVS website to make sure the Minute Clinic accepted Evergreen Health.  They did.  Then I called Evergreen Health to make sure they would pay for the Minute Clinic.  The nice lady on the other end of the line said "yes, CVS takes the insurance," which isn't what I was asking but was as close as I was going to get to an actual answer.  So I went to the MinuteClinic and got a prescription for what was basically Claritin.  A month later, I got a bill for $140- $160 minus the $20 Evergreen paid for.  I wonder, if Evergreen had paid fifty cents of the $160 visit cost, would they have said "yes, CVS takes the insurance?"

Anyway, for two years I tried and failed to find a general practioner through Evergreen Health's not-at-all-helpful website, and every time I called to talk to a real person I was urged to use one of Evergreen Health's Primary Care Offices, conveniently located nowhere near any metrorail stations (and only one located on a bus line.)  This spring I gave in and made an appointment at the only clinic I could get to by bumming a ride with a friend and taking half a day off from school.

The visit went well- I got a complete physical and everyone was very nice.  Yay, contact with a doctor again!  Kind of the reason we have health insurance to begin with!

Last month, I got an email from Evergreen Health- the company "regrets to inform me" that it is closing down it's primary care offices- all of them- this summer.  I was given 60 days to pick up a copy of my health record (which I could obtain if I gave the office three days notice.)  I was also given the advice to use Evergreen Health's web site to find a new primary care physician.

I'm sure this is Obama's FaultTM, but whoever is to blame, I'm about to start my third year of paying premiums but not actually having a primary health physician except for that one day this spring.  Thanks, Evergreen Maryland, for playing your part in making the American Health Care System the very best in the whole world!  I'm sure that a good percentage of those Canadians fleeing their own awful Socialized Medicine to seek Good Medical Care use doctors who take your insurance.  I just wish they'd drop me a line and let me know who those doctors are.  I could return the favor by warning them not to try to use one of your Primary Care Offices, since they don't exist anymore.

Because 'merica, indeed

I haven't been on another planned summer vacation for the past several days, just stuck without electricty, and then with electricity but without internet, which to many people means without electricity because as one of my Facebook friends pointed out, what is the point of electricity if it isn't used to get one on the internet?

But tonight I have both internet and electricity, so I can update this blog by posting what isn't exactly a commercial but is more like a review which turns into a commercial by pulling a great big "this isn't as bad as you think because take a look at this much much worse thing over here" out of nowhere at the last second.  Burger King's deep-fried mac and cheese monstrosity "won't set you back as much as you think," we are told, because it has "only" 310 calories per five pieces (and we just KNOW that the lard-butt future heart disease patients who would consume this are going to limit themselves to five pieces- and not eat it as a side with a Double Whopper, oh no..)  But here's the kicker- we shouldn't be too critical of BK's fried macaroni and cheese dusted with more cheese because KFC's Double Down Bacon and Mayo between two fried chicken slabs has more calories!  I mean, check out this gigantic picture and everything!  As long as you aren't eating THIS, you are doing just fine- heck, you might as well get two of those 5-piece fried cheese things, you'll still be ahead of the game!

Never mind that this is exactly like telling someone to go ahead and drink that coffee laced with rat poison because at least you aren't putting a gun in your mouth and pulling the trigger- that would be REALLY destructive!  Yep, because 'merica.  No country is better at killing itself with food and being aggressively proud of its ability to rationalize it.  Ugh.

Sad, Lonely, Pathetic: This woman hits the Trifexis!

(The word "Life" in the video title used very loosely...)

Dear Crazy Dog Lady:

Just because you never met a fellow human being willing to tolerate you and your insanity doesn't mean you get to call your Sad Substitute for an Actual Family your "boys."  They are dogs.  Three big, clumsy, stupid dogs who look to you for food and shelter and pretty much nothing else.  They don't love you.  They'll never love you.  You can talk to them about your problems- and man, do you have problems- but they won't understand a word of it and they really don't give a damn anyway.   They'll never give you advice or a loan and they sure as hell aren't taking care of you when you're sick.  For all the "love" you provide them, including this tic medication or whatever the hell this commercial is pushing, the only thing you're getting in return is hair and dirt and noise and the opportunity to pick up and carry around feces when you take "your boys" for a walk.

A few more things- your "boys" don't give a damn that you serve them in different colored bowls.  They are color-blind and even if they weren't all they would see is the food.  They have no clue that you are protecting their health by adding medication to that food- and no matter how long they live, they'll never reach an age where they'll tell you how much they appreciated the care you put into "raising" them, because they don't appreciate it, they just expect it, maybe because from the moment they were puppies you gave them the idea that you exist for them and not the other way around (which is actually the case, if you could be honest with yourself for just a few moments.)

Just to wrap up- you are going to outlive your "boys."  Probably by a lot.  People generally don't outlive their kids, and they certainly don't expect to.  That's just another way your "boys" are not your "boys," they are your pets.  They'll die and you'll replace them with other "boys," or maybe "girls," and then that generation of Animals Which Live With Me Which Are Just Like Family will also die and be replaced, and so on and so on, because that's our relationship with animals* unless we are Insane.  Just Sayin'.

*My parents lost one of the animals that lived in their house last night, the victim of a little guillotine which snapped it's neck when it wandered into the wrong part of the kitchen.  I opened the trap and tossed the nasty little thing into the weeds.  They'll get over it.

Education: It's for Elitist Snowflakes who don't know how to use technology

If I had the technology, the time, and the talent, I'd probably replace this blog with videos like this.  Except that they'd be even more clever.  I'd fulfill every lazy semi-talented slacker's dream of becoming an instant YouTube celebrity sitting at home watching the massive checks just keep showing up in my mailbox- err, I mean, being direct-deposited, of course.

Because I don't have any of those things, I'm stuck with this non-paying, Just Because I Need To Rant Sometimes blog.  Oh well, at least that means I can slack off now and then and just post awesome parodies created by people with far more talent.  This one snarking on Grammarly, for example, which does a great job hitting that Literacy is Overrated Man Those People Who Paid Attention in English Class Were Such Suckers Product.

Oh well, the people who made this still deserve a pat on the back for a job well done, so here it is.  I wonder if Saturday Night Live has done their own version, and if not, why not?

Karlie Kloss brings inane blather to a whole new level...

Whoever Karlie Kloss is- and Youtube tells me that she's a Supermodel and Entrepreneur, whatever- she isn't a web designer and at no point in this video does she show me how to design my own website.  She just shows me how to type Wix.com on my web browser's address line, which I'm pretty sure I could figure out all by myself and without one stupid video after another hosted by Karlie Kloss.

She also shows me how absolutely, unbelievably delighted she is with herself and her life of camera-mugging, jumping around, and generally acting like an idiot with a brain stuffed with straw and yogurt because she knows how to use Google to find chimp-friendly tools her assistant can use to create a website to let people know that she's not JUST that annoying woman on YouTube peddling Wix.com- she's a real, successful Supermodel and Entrepreneur!

Anyway, glad you're picking up a little money on the side, Ms I'm Supposed to Know Who You Are and Take your Advice on How to Build a Website even though it consists entirely of "use Wix.com."  I strongly suspect that if you posted a video "showing us" how to peel a banana, it would involve nothing more than "type 'Peel a Banana' and watch this other cool video, glad I could help, now if you'll excuse me, I have to get my picture taken grinning like a psychotic moron 'cause that's what I do!  Glad I could help all you non-Supermodel non-Entrepreneurs!"

Ready to be taken advantage of? JD Wentworth is here for you!

This ad for JD Wentworth's scummy "give us your structured settlement of lots of money in exchange for a lump sum nowhere near what's coming to you" is even worse than most because it literally tortures the viewer, and all because someone at JD Wentworth thinks that boy bands are still a thing.

As to the message itself- yes, JD Wentworth provides a perfectly legal service, legitimate in exactly the same way that "Rapid Refund" loans are legitimate- "oh, you have a large amount of money coming to you but you have to wait and you're willing to trade it for less money right now?  Sign right here, sucker."  Yes, perfectly legal.  And yes, perfectly scummy and nothing to be proud of, let alone loudly advertising.

I imagine that if television had existed during the Crash of 1929, Mr. Potter might have hired a band to sing the benefits of trading in your Bailey Building and Loan shares for ten cents on the dollar, and there'd be people defending the practice.  Ah, you were ahead of your time, Mr. Potter.

Meanwhile, this Hanes Commercial continues to stink

I guess it was just a matter of time before someone invented t-shirts which absorbed odor, finally solving the age-old problem of what to do when you simply don't want to follow basic rules of hygiene and do things like bathe regularly and use deodorants.  This commercial is a natural successor to those Lysol ads which feature people dumping entire cans of aerosol into couches because Oh No We Are Having Visitors Any Moment Now And We Are Disgusting Slobs Who Simply Will Not Do Any Actual Cleaning More than Once a Year.

And, guys?  We are already living in the Golden Age of Shabby, with untucked shirts, uncombed hair, and unshaven faces being the the height of fashion.  Never has it been easier to just roll out of bed and out the door (my battery-operated travel razor died two days before my overseas trip came to an end, and I have to admit I am grateful that I didn't feel the least bit obligated to spend five Euro on a couple of AA batteries, like I would have if it happened 20 years ago.)  Now another once-necessary but Oh So Tiresome chore- bathing- goes the way of the dodo.   Because being a slob in every other respect shouldn't include the stink, I guess.

I wouldn't invest in odor-absorbing clothing, however.  We're probably only a few years away from  smelling like a sweatband being all the rage and not announcing your presence with your body odor being something our way-too-uptight grandparents thought was important.  This is going to get worse before it gets better, people.