I dunno about the rest of you, but I sure could go for some PEARL pictures.
Open Thread
by John Cole| 78 Comments
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Come for the politics, stay for the snark.
Good lord, these people are nuts.
Their shamelessness is their super power.
“When somebody takes the time to draw up a playbook, they’re gonna use it.”
We can’t confuse what’s necessary to win elections with the policies that we want to implement when we do.
Let me eat cake. The rest of you could stand to lose some weight, frankly.
Too often we hand the biggest microphones to the cynics and the critics who delight in declaring failure.
They think we are photo bombing their nice little lives.
Not all heroes wear capes.
President Musk and Trump are both poorly raised, coddled 8 year old boys.
Every decision we make has lots of baggage with it, known or unknown.
He really is that stupid.
Text STOP to opt out of updates on war plans.
Stamping your little feets and demanding that they see how important you are? Not working anymore.
“I was told there would be no fact checking.”
Whatever happens next week, the fight doesn’t end.
If senate republicans had any shame, they’d die of it.
Hi god, it’s us. Thanks a heap, you’re having a great week and it’s only Thursday!
Republicans seem to think life begins at the candlelight dinner the night before.
Also, are you sure you want people to rate your comments?
I would try pessimism, but it probably wouldn’t work.
This has so much WTF written all over it that it is hard to comprehend.
We cannot abandon the truth and remain a free nation.
Republicans are radicals, not conservatives.
“The difference between stupidity and genius is that genius has its limits.”
CaseyL
TaMara promised a video of Pearl-nelope demonstrating her vocal range. And loudness. I could sure use that video.
Patricia Kayden
Cut taxes for the rich.
https://twitter.com/SenDuckworth/status/1154191381230956549
Cut food stamps for the poor.
Jim, Foolish Literalist
here’s one for ya
what?
dmsilev
Weep a tear in the rain in memory of Rutger Hauer.
Major Major Major Major
Yes! Duck pics please!!!
different-church-lady
So, after the Franken article dropped, I wandered over to LGM to see what they had to say. In the comments they were dropping shade on us, saying things along the likes of “It’s going to be insane over at Balloon-Juice.”
Number of front page posts about the Franken article at LGM: 3
Number of front page posts at BJ: zero
I’m beginning to wonder why I bother with LGM. Their shtick is getting rather thin and extremely repetitive.
Mnemosyne
Oh, good, an open thread where I can bitch about my sleep doctor’s office pissing me off today.
I’ve been trying to get my fucking HMO to take my sleep apnea seriously for a year and a half now. First they sent me for a home test where I came back with moderate-to-high sleep apnea, and then somehow gave the company that did it a “home phone number” for me that has been disconnected for FOUR YEARS. And they would never bother to leave a message on my mobile number because, hey, why should we leave a message at the number that has her voice and name on it when we can keep calling a number that is disconnected instead?
Anyway.
My doctor was finally able to get a new referral for me to a neurologist who also does sleep medicine. It’s so difficult to get an appointment with them (Western Neurological in Burbank AVOID AT ALL COSTS) that my primary doctor basically had to call them and yell at the staff because they wouldn’t return my calls or emails trying to make an appointment. Finally got an appointment, got the sleep study approved and scheduled, turns out I have sleep apnea (no shit, Sherlock!) so they did the CPAP titration during the sleep study.
I was supposed to have my follow-up appointment this Monday so I could get the actual fucking machine I’ve been waiting for since JANUARY OF 2018. The doctor’s office called yesterday and said that he won’t be in on the day of my appointment so I have to reschedule, but they have more times available next week.
I called this morning and the earliest time they could offer me was FOUR WEEKS FROM NOW. For an appointment that THEY canceled, not me.
When I complained, the receptionist said, “Well, that’s what happens when you reschedule. The doctor is very busy.”
BITCH, YOUR OFFICE IS THE ONE THAT FUCKING RESCHEDULED. DON’T BLAME YOUR FUCKING DISORGANIZATION ON ME, ASSHOLE.
She did say that they’ll put me on the “waiting list” to see if I can get in earlier for an appointment that THEY FUCKING CANCELED ON ME.
Yeah. I am not a happy camper right now.
different-church-lady
@Major Major Major Major: You wrong that read.
joel hanes
Why a duck? Why no a chicken?
different-church-lady
@Mnemosyne: I keep asking Anderson why incompetence is baked into medical administration. He never seems to have a good answer other than, “They have no incentive to be competent.”
Chetan Murthy
@different-church-lady: In all honesty, they don’t have any -real- incentive to be competent at -medicine- other than malpractice insurance premiums. It’s not like there’s a risk of being struck off for incompetent doctorin’.
[And I’m the son of a doctor: I heard a shit-ton of amazingly ridic incompetence related over the dinner table. A shit-ton.]
Mnemosyne
@different-church-lady:
I’m at the point with this fucking HMO that I’ve decided that they ARE going to give me what they’re fucking supposed to if I have to pry it out of them centimeter by centimeter. I don’t care who I piss off, because they’re just the administrators for my company’s plan.
They’re a bureaucracy on top of a bureaucracy (they contract with the insurance company that contracts with my employer which is actually self-funded) so I may be filing another complaint against them with the insurance company and my employer since that seemed to get their asses in gear last time.
joel hanes
@different-church-lady:
LGM … shtick is getting rather thin and extremely repetitive.
Loomis’s “This Day In Labor History” and “Erik Visits An American Grave” series are unique and invaluable (and no one forces me to read his other posts. And Charli Carpenter’s return to posting with her accounts of spending her summer witnessing at ICE facilities along the border is IMHO superb and affecting and important. And I usually like Campos and Lemieux’s stuff too.
But the comments section … sometimes really fun, and sometimes I just bail after reading the first couple comments, and sometimes I don’t read the comments at all. Attention conservation, as Cosma Shalizi calls it.
(I bail on reading comments threads here, too, when the backbiting surges)
Chetan Murthy
It’s an open thread, so I’ll dare to ask a question, even though we’re only in the teens, comment-number-wise:
Is it anybody’s impression here, that when somebody they’re talking with claims that they don’t pay any attention to politics, they try to ignore it all, that it’s a way of saying “I have some pretty horrendous political opinions, and I’d rather not discuss b/c you’ll get all outraged”?
I ask b/c …. well, that happened to me yesterday. And in a token of respect to the open thread, I’ll not describe any more of it.
Just curious.
ETA: So outrageous, that all I could do (b/c really, don’t wanna engage with that shit) is block his email (and never speak to him again, obvs.)
P.S. I -did- send him an email with some gentle suggestions to read a few of TNC’s posts (which I helpfully provided links to), but he rebuffed that, too. So, yanno, “done and done”.
The Dangerman
@Mnemosyne:
Have you considered the dental appliance solution? Bad news is it’s expensive (but your insurance might cover) and the worse news is it might not work (per my GP).
My GP swears by CPAP’s (I think he uses one; we are both stocky, although I’m taller). My experience with CPAP’s … had me running to the dentist (see above) but my insurance won’t cover as my latest sleep study (I’ve had 3 over the years) suggested I don’t qualify for CPAP (my episodes don’t last long enough or whatever). It’s all kind of a big Do Loop.
Ohio Mom
@Mnemosyne: something similar happened to me with the bone health doctor.
After the old one left town (no loss, really, didn’t like her much), and I finally got around to looking for a new one, I had to wait for the better part of a year for a new patient visit. That office called me up a couple of weeks before the appointment and moved me another four months out.
When I finally met the new doctor, she scolded me for missing over a year of osteopenia monitoring.
As Ohio Son says, Rolling my
eyes.
lamh36
Alright…anyone seen any news about this?
“suicide attempt or assault”
hmmm sounds to me like they are not gonna let Epstein see the light of day outside of prison.
wonder if TPTB think it’ll stop the investigation
Chetan Murthy
@joel hanes:
It requires a stalwart block-list. It’s a pity that Disqus doesn’t have a “just block everything that X, Y, and Z block” option. Ah, well.
joel hanes
@Mnemosyne:
I once had a recurring problem with company-provided insurance, and manged it by getting an email correspondence with the insurance company going about my complaints, with the history of each earlier problem and the insurance company’s responses retained as quoted material in subsequent communications, and copying my company benefits contact and HR representative on every single email. Worked, eventually, AND that insurance company lost the contract to administer our claims within two years. I’d like to think I helped make that happen.
jl
Yeah, some cute duck pix around now would be nice.
Cole could make a symbolic offering of a Rosie or Steve pic.
Would be an auspicious prompt for some sympathetic magic, that would summon duck pix from the vasty deep of duck pic karma.
Not saying anything, just saying.
But if some people want to just sit around and just grump and complain about everything, rather than pitch in to make the world a better place, it’s a free country.
Major Major Major Major
@different-church-lady: I was actually surprised there wasn’t a little dustup here.
joel hanes
@Chetan Murthy:
it’s a way of saying “I have some pretty horrendous political opinions, and I’d rather not discuss b/c you’ll get all outraged”?
Yeah, sometimes.
But with the low-information voters I know best, I think it’s a way of saying “I refuse to take any responsibility whatsoever for trying to change things, or for making responsible choices, or for outcomes.”
Major Major Major Major
@Mnemosyne: yikes!
different-church-lady
@joel hanes: Yeah, I agree, and I was REALLY impressed by Carpenter’s latest. But once they get a chew-toy goin’, chewing is all that is going to happen.
chris
@Mnemosyne: But… but I keep hearing that Americans LIKE their health insurance!//
Sorry for your troubles and hope you resolve them soon.
dr. bloor
@lamh36: That didn’t take long. If TPTB wanted to bump him off, this is the way to do it. He’s a textbook suicide risk.
Mnemosyne
@The Dangerman:
I asked my dentist, but he’s very skeptical of dental appliances. They can apparently cause more issues than they solve, especially if you have pre-existing jaw pain.
I was kind of okay with the CPAP when they put it on me, though it took me an hour to fall asleep with it on, or so the tech told me. I was able to use the “nasal pillow” mask, which is the most minimal one.
My insurance is actually really good for durable medical equipment — something like a $300 deductible and then they pay 90 percent. That’s why my HMO is dragging their feet — I will be unprofitable for them. Assholes.
@Ohio Mom:
My retired psychiatrist called me today to make sure I found a new prescribing psychiatrist. I, um, need to do that. I seem to only be able to really focus on one medical thing at a time, and the fight that ate up most of 2018 was my ACL repair, which took 10 MONTHS to get. When I first injured it on a worker’s comp claim in 2006, my surgery was scheduled barely 4 months after the injury. California Worker’s Comp is a very efficient bureaucracy when you have a straightforward claim.
jl
@Chetan Murthy: @joel hanes: Sometimes it means they don’t like to talk about it. Sometimes it means that they have views that are non-horrendous but that are in the minority in their circles and they have caught a lot of unjustified shit about their beliefs in the past. They may be pessimistic, cynical, or just very conventionally minded and afraid of voicing any potentially controversial opinions.
Or they could have horrendous beliefs and don’t want to voice them. If you can’t get them open up about it, you don’t know.
Edit: or oblivious, or non-too-bright in the head. Or lazy minded.
different-church-lady
@Mnemosyne: Got to their office in person. Wait as long as you have to. A live human being in their face was what finally jarred some answers loose the last time I had a… uh… “failure to communicate” with my insurer.
Jay
Mnemosyne
@lamh36:
Definitely sounds like someone is trying to shut him up before he can go on trial. It makes me wonder if Epstein is more implicated in the whole Russia thing than we currently know. The Russian mob is nothing to mess with … unless you’re Adam Schiff, who took them on here in California and won.
Ohio Mom
@dr. bloor: And yet, Epstein could really be trying to kill himself. We’ll probably never know when the inevitable happens who did it. We already know why of course.
Mnemosyne
@different-church-lady:
I’m leaving for Chicago at the end of next week, so it may have to wait until I get back. Stupid assholes.
Quinerly
@lamh36: just read the NBC piece. Could be self inflicted to get a transfer.
Jay
Stuck in moderation.
jl
@chris:” but I keep hearing that Americans LIKE their health insurance! ”
Most people don’t have extremely serious health problems until they are very old. Or they don’t know that they do have serious problems that won’t show up for decades (hypertension, high blood sugar, etc.)
Also in the US where the prevalence of very low information is high, there is evidence from focused polling on voter info, that many people confuse their insurance with their access to health care providers of their choice.
dr. bloor
@Ohio Mom: Oh, I’d put money on “doing it himself” over “nefarious plot” at this point. A 66 year old white male, rich (or at least, maintains the appearance), aging narcissist, no meaningful family/relationship ties looking at the rest of his life in jail checks all the boxes for suicide plus a few extra boxes you don’t normally take into consideration.
joel hanes
@Mnemosyne:
I have to use a full-mask CPAP. Got it in mid-December, and my life immediately changed for the better. I hate the mask, but I’ll never voluntarily sleep without the machine again.
jl
I was just thinking some Cole pet pix would sure make the wait for duck pix seem much shorter.
Adam L Silverman
@joel hanes: You will read ALL the Balloon Juice comments thread and you will like it!!!!!//
The Dangerman
@Mnemosyne:
Oh, major bummer; while I have no jaw pain, per se, I did have maxiofacial surgery a long time ago to correct a massive overbite (mouth wired shut for 8 or 12 weeks, I forget which; a hell of a good way to lose weight, but sucks if you don’t like liquid diets). I probably would get disqualifed for the dental. Sigh.
Major Major Major Major
@Adam L Silverman: oops.
Mnemosyne
@joel hanes:
The one thing that kind of freaked me out was that it was hard to exhale, but I was able to talk myself through that and eventually fall asleep. It turns out that it’s common for people with asthma to get freaked out by that because being unable to exhale fully is one of the things that happens in an asthma attack.
I have my eye on the Resmed Airsense 10 AutoSet for Her in part because it is apparently able to automatically adjust for exhales — not a full-on bipap, but it lets up the pressure a bit as you exhale. Yeah, it’s top of the line, and the more my HMO drags their feet, the more determined I am that they’ll shell out for it because it ain’t their decision. I can go over their heads more effectively than they want to admit.
The machine:
https://www.resmed.com/us/en/consumer/products/devices/airsense-10-autoset-for-her.html
jl
@Adam L Silverman: you do, and do, and do, for these damn kids, and what thanks do get, what thanks?
Mnemosyne
@The Dangerman:
I keep seeing Facebook ads for the goofy appliances that hold your tongue out of the way of your airway. Some people like them?
Jay
@dr. bloor:
He’s in “protective custody”, like solitary, but nicer.
So yeah, he faked a suicide attempt in the hopes of getting transferred to Club Fed.
eldorado
@joel hanes: thank you. labor history and american grave are two of the best series in what remains of the blogosphere. mayhew’s insurance posts are another.
rikyrah
Oh Pearl???
Adam L Silverman
@lamh36: @Jay: Just did a breaking news post on it.
Mnemosyne
@Jay:
He ain’t going to Club Fed. At best he’ll get put on suicide watch in a locked ward at a psychiatric hospital.
As dr. bloor said, a 66-year-old narcissist who’s facing the possibility of actually paying a penalty for his crime is a very high suicide risk. It’s not that uncommon for narcissists who have been publicly humiliated or unmasked to commit suicide. Psychologically, it seems to be a weird last-ditch attempt to convince people that they’re the real victim.
Adam L Silverman
@Jay: You know what you did!
The Dangerman
@Mnemosyne:
Never seen; I’ll watch for it.
I did see a thing on the news from Dignity Health (it’s kind of a news story and kind of an infomercial on the local news; the demographics of the area trend old and our local news needs the money apparently) about some funky surgery that eliminates apnea. I don’t recall details, but it almost looked like some device that’s put in place kinda like a pacemaker. I’ll have to look for it as my CPAP experience wasn’t cool (I’m extremely claustrophobic).
Oh, I see Adam is in the virtual house; if I can ask, good Sir, is your theory about Flynn still in play? You dropped a hint a couple to a few months ago. I have no idea what’s been going on with Flynn as I try to avoid the news as much as practical.
ETA: National news; I still watch local as gotta know the weather.
Adam L Silverman
@Mnemosyne: What you want is one with a ramp up feature. So if you’re normal setting is say level 8, for the first 20 minutes or so it runs on level 4, which makes it easier to exhale until you fall asleep. Then it ramps up to the full setting. After a month or so running the ramp up feature, you’ll have adjusted to being on you’re full setting and won’t need it.
Adam L Silverman
@jl: Having my spelling corrected.
frosty
Well, since this is an open thread I have a commenter to thank. I think it’s Mnemosyne but it might be Suzanne. Someone raved about using packing cubes for traveling. I’d always been skeptical about needing that much organization, but I got a set based on the recommendation.
Short answer: I LOVE THEM!! Long answer: most of our traveling is in a trailer with a couple of cubbies for clothes, no drawers or anything like that. I pull the cubes out of my duffel, toss them in the cubbies, I’m done. Can even take them to the laundromat and reload as stuff comes out of the dryer.
Ms. Frosty bought herself a set too.
So thanks M or S or other jackal!
Adam L Silverman
@The Dangerman: It is.
As too surgery for sleep apnea, they basically laser ablate the airway and the back of the pallet to remove the excess tissue and open up the airway. It is very dangerous, the risk of complications are exceedingly high, and the positive results are very low.
Mnemosyne
@The Dangerman:
It’s apparently called a Tongue Stabilizing Device (TSD). It doesn’t move your jaw forward like a mandibular device would, so it might work for you:
https://www.sleepassociation.org/sleep-treatments/tongue-stabilizing-devices-tsds/
There seem to be a bunch on the market, so I would definitely do a lot of research before shelling out the $100+ for one, and maybe talk to your dentist as well to see what s/he thinks.
joel hanes
@Mnemosyne:
I have the full-on ResMed FlowCurve BiPAP, because I require the adaptive BiPAP, and because my former employer allowed me to choose a gold-plated PPO plan that covered most of it.
The Dangerman
@The Dangerman:
On the apnea thing, I think I found it here.
ETA: Here’s a YouTube on it: https://tinyurl.com/y6ktuy7s
Mike in NC
@dmsilev: Tremendous actor. RIP.
Mnemosyne
@Adam L Silverman:
I am getting my pretty pretty Resmed For Her APAP machine and my HMO is going to fucking pay for it. They’ve pissed me off now and I will not settle for less.
But, yes, I’ve seen the thing about ramping up when you first start using the machine.
Adam L Silverman
@frosty: I bought a set for when I do short TDY where all I’m carrying is a 3 to 5 day pack and my roll up garment/suit bag. They work great.
Adam L Silverman
@Mnemosyne: That’s the one with the Hello Kitty on it, right?//
Mnemosyne
@frosty:
It probably was me, because I fucking LOVE my packing cubes. I have a set from Eagle Creek and a set from eBags and they’re each good for different things since they’re slightly different shapes (the eBags set has seams that keep things nicely stacked, but the Eagle Creek ones are better at compression).
It’s amazing how much more I can fit in my suitcase just by using packing cubes.
Mnemosyne
@Adam L Silverman:
I actually scoffed at it when I was first doing my research, because it has little flower silhouettes drawn on it. You know, because chicks won’t use it unless it has flowers on it. /eyeroll
But upon doing the research, it turns out that a lot of people of both genders prefer the For Her machine because it has more algorithms and is more adjustable than a lot of the other machines on the market. So the pretty machine it is!
ETA: My poor spouse is almost as upset about the appointment being postponed as I am. My snoring has gotten really bad, apparently, to the point that the poor guy has had to spend a few nights on the couch to get away from it.
frosty
@Mnemosyne: Sounds like it was you then. Thanks again!
Adam L Silverman
@Mnemosyne: Okay.
Steeplejack
@frosty:
Which cubes did you get?
frosty
@Steeplejack: Eagle Creek original, not compression. A set from REI (?) with 3 sizes (I think: 10×7, 4×7, 4×3) and then bought another long narrow one for socks.
I can stuff 10 tshirts into the 10×7.
Steeplejack
@frosty:
Thanks. I am a sloppy packer and have been trying to up my game. Thought cubes would help but couldn’t decide among Eagle Creek, eBags and Amazon Basics (or whatever they call theirs).
ThresherK
@Steeplejack: I have an Eagle Creek deely which has a plastic board inner and helps keep several shirts or a few pair of pants pretty wrinkle-free. Recommended for my style, which is throwing things into duffel bags.
Steeplejack
@ThresherK:
“Throwing things into duffel bags.” Yeah, that’s me.
StringOnAStick
@The Dangerman: The dentist I work for makes those anti-apnea appliances; they work by pulling your lowerjaw forward to keep your relaxed tongue from blocking your airway. They are most successful in mild to moderate sleep apnea.
Sleep apnea is not something to take casually: it can reduce brain function and usually gets worse if not treated I still regret not telling a neighbor when we lived in a condo that I could hear her snoring through the wall at night. Snoring that loud is often a sign of apnea but I didn’t know that then. She later had some transient ischemic attacks that she also ignored and died of a stroke not long after, far too young. I don’t know if my telling her about her snoring would have done anything other than piss her off, but maybe just a bit of a push would have got her to a doctor too. This was 12 years ago and medicine was definitely starting to at attention to apnea then.
StringOnAStick
@Mnemosyne: Packing cubes are a revelation. I got different colors and sizes; it’s so easy to grab the sock cube or the shirt cube.
We did a long trip to South America and Patagonia last year, and we needed stuff from cosmopolitan to backpacking. Using a large rolling duffle with packing cubes to keep it from becoming a jumbled mess worked perfectly; I never travel without them now.
Ruckus
@different-church-lady:
It’s like 7th grade. People are trying to find a place to fit in and if they don’t they either try to make a place where everyone else wants to be or they have no fucking clue.
I thought I fell into the last part, except that I saw that the cool kids really weren’t, the tough kids weren’t and almost all the rich kids were assholes.
And you know what? Nothing has really changed.
We did a go fund me that went over $12.000. Yes that’s Canadian, it’s still real money. We aren’t trying to be cool kids, or tough kids and I’d bet very few of us are rich kids. We range in age from at least early 20s, to at least the mid 70s. We have a couple of problem children. And a bakery to send them to. Sometimes the love is strained, sometimes it’s great. We are adults, we like being adults, we sometimes forget that we are but we wake up get over ourselves and move on. That’s what we like about this place, we can have real discussions and yes fights. We also come back and join back in, because we are adults.
Ruckus
@different-church-lady:
Incompetence is baked into humanity.
Ruckus
@Ohio Mom:
Some of my docs at the VA do not like me, because I don’t look at them as being better than me, which a lot of docs expect. They don’t respect me, they don’t get respect back. Yes they know far more than I do. But the one’s that won’t listen or get pissed because I can not tolerate a drug they prescribe, they can find themselves on the receiving end of a fuck you, delivered in a quiet and measured tone. If a doc doesn’t know the situation or understand the situation because they don’t ever have to live with it, they get an explanation the first time. That’s all the break they get with me. And you’d be surprised how well I get along with most of them. I just don’t suffer the assholes. After all they really do work for me.
SWMBO
@Mnemosyne: Check out online cpap suppliers. My son and I were both diagnosed with apnea in 2012. Then after 5 years we were supposed to get replacement cpap machines if our sleep study said we still needed them. Both of us needed it still (duh). The first time the pulmonary specialist got our machines through his DME in his office. They double billed for some equipment but you couldn’t read the numbers on the claims to determine what was actually being billed. They turned us over to bad credit and a collection agency for non-payment. Assholes. (We supposedly got 2 masks, 2 hoses, etc. Nope.) When it came time to get the replacements in 2017, the DME people didn’t double bill (I had complained bitterly about that) but they did jack the prices up. Since this was a new insurance, they said that we didn’t make our deductible, so we would have to cover that first. They charged us around $750 each for a machine that we could have bought online for $400+ or so. Our deductible at that time made the $750 machine cost over $500 out of pocket. The cost for replacement masks and other bits, made it cheaper to just order online and pay for it out of pocket.