If this morning is any indication, 2007 is going to be a weird year. I woke up at 6-something to let the dog out since he was chewing on my hair, an obvious indication of bladder distress. Did I mention I had a dog? Well, we do now. His name is Stephen Tyler aka "Steve" and he is named after my brother Stephen Tyler aka "The Skipper." Anyway, I got up and put on the clothes nearest to me for warmth, so I ended up going downstairs in some giant non-Stepho sized sweatpants under a purple satin nightie with a cropped Browns sweatshirt sort of half pulled over the top, and in some fancy dress shoes since they were the first I found. As soon as I got downstairs I noticed a tall emo style figure hovering near the outside door. He had the classic long bangs over one eye haircut and was wearing a half open pink button down shirt with a white tie loosened to somewhere around the vicinity of his belly button. I wished him a Happy New Year and let him in. I realized there was no way he could have been hiding a weapon in those tight ladies slacks he was wearing. My question is: what was an emo guy doing hovering in front of the intercoms when he could have been more effective hovering outside the correct apartment's balcony? That's MUCH more emo, right?

Update: Bryan says this emo guy was knocking on our door at 2 a.m. looking for "Tiffany's" apartment, and he wanted to know who lived in OUR apartment, and who lived on either side. I don't know how he ended up outside again, but I do know that now he totally fits into my emo theory, and perhaps if I see him again I WILL instruct him about the balconies.

Anyway, so my point is today has been weird already, and I'm not sure if that's an indication of things to come, or of things past.

Here are some things I've learned from 2006:

1. Margarita Night should take place AFTER the Church Choir Night part of the evening, not the other way around.
2. You can take knitting needles on an airplane, but not hair gel.
3. If your shirt says "pre shrunk," it will still shrink anyway.
4. Screaming "I should have just eloped" at your dad first thing in the morning on the day of your wedding will just make him laugh and say "I told you so" instead of offering up any real sympathy.
5. Shots with the word "bomb" in them are to be consumed with extreme caution.
6. It can be extremely difficult to obtain rental property if you own pets.
7. It's possible to change pants sizes in one day, especially if you've been on an airplane.
8. Even when gas is at $2.79, it's not a big deal if you drive an economy car.
9. People who always talk on speakerphone should be whacked upside the head with a large blunt object. It's really annoying. Same with those push-to-talk phones.
10. Ohio is weird without snow. Where's the snow already?

Right. I'm sure there are dozens more actual lessons that I've learned, but I'm sort of more focused on getting coffee right now than about waxing retrospective, so, I don't know, go get a hobby or something.

Happy New Year!

So, I don't really recommend getting a disability. Just in case you were thinking about it, stop and think again. Not only will you be depressed because your vital organs do not work, you will be forced to fill out hours upon hours of intrusive paperwork that doesn't make any sense.

A while back, I complained that I couldn't get ahold of anyone to cancel my SSI. Since that bitter post I have managed to contact SSI and learn a little about the program they use to wean people off monthly benefits. SSI is a wonderful program, although it can be difficult to get into and even more difficult to get out off. When you are disabled you can receive monthly benefits. They're not nearly enough to cover all your expenses, so don't even imagine that they're going to do that for you, but they ARE enough to cover your medications, and I suppose if you want to be technical if you're disabled enough to be on SSI you're probably living with someone else anyway, someone who is helping with the rent. When you don't need SSI anymore they don't just stop paying you, because most people with disabilities such as renal disease end up unable to work off and on for months due to complications arising from their disease itself, transplant, infection, etc. So you do this work program where they pay you through a certain month, than they put you on hold so that while you don't receive anything, you can begin benefits immediately with a simple phone call should you find yourself unable to work.

This sounds wonderful, except that 1)the website makes this sound like it's a voluntary program for people who have never-ending disabilities. This isn't the case. You can't just CANCEL your benefits. You HAVE to do this work program thing.

I can see the point of them wanting to wean you off of the benefits. Should you need to start them again, it beats going through all the paperwork from square 1. It also allows them to keep an eye on your earnings and KNOW that you're going to be OK on your own if they stop giving you money.

I figured I was in the clear when I called the Social Security office and spoke with a nice young woman about this program, and she made it sound fabulous. I was feeling very positive about it until I received their paperwork in the mail.

Apparently SSI wants to call and bug all my employers since 2005 about my disability and my earnings---one of which is none of my employer's business, and the second of which is something they know about since the Social Security Administration has access to my taxes. My paperwork was half filled out for me with my employers from the date I applied for SSI, including salary information. So what the hell did they need me to fill it in for? Keep in mind that this is for paperwork to get them to STOP sending me money, not for paperwork I'm trying to fill out to GET money.

I got to the part where they wanted me to authorize their agents to call and bug my boss and I put a big "x" over it, along with a note saying that my condition was none of my employer's business and that since they had access to my tax records they could pretty much shove it, along with the phrase "stop giving me money." I hope that works, because I'll be pretty pissed if they call my supervisor.

It was a lot easier to get them to send me money every month than it's been to get them to STOP. I'm still afraid that they'll keep giving me more and more money and then try to sue me for benefits fraud, since that certainly gets them a lot of media attention.

I'm starting to think I should have just kept my trap shut. This is the thanks I get for trying to be an honest, socially responsible citizen.

Friday night after work we flew out to Florida to visit family for Christmas. Mr. & Mrs. G live on farmland in central Florida, in a little town called Webster which is about an hour away from anything "civilized." We had a pretty good time from Friday night all the way up until Monday morning, when it started to drizzle. Drizzle turned into heavier rain, but we assumed that it wouldn't get any worse and decided to start cooking Christmas lunch. Just at the point where everyone was getting really hungry, the power flickered and went off, along with the oven which contained a partially cooked turkey. No problem, right? We waited about an hour and when the power didn't come back on we decided just to pack everything into the trunk and take it to the grandparents' house to finish cooking.

It took almost half an hour but we finally got everything packed away: veggies, potatoes, turkey, pie, and two puppies which were being potty trained and couldn't be left inside for the afternoon. We loaded up into the car and started the half hour trek to the retirement community.

Along the way we noticed various points of interest, such as places where carports were no longer technically covering cars so much as they were covering parts of trees and the street, as well as some manufactured homes that had been partially trashed by the wind and rain. "Huh" we all remarked. "The storm didn't seem THAT bad!" We continued driving, rubbernecking and even taking pictures, and at one point having to stop for emergency crews where an entire tree had fallen across the road. "Isn't this an adventure?! Look at that tree and all those county people with chainsaws! Ha ha! Oh no, look at that poor guy's boat, I hope he had insurance!"

No one seemed hurt and there didn't seem to be THAT much property damage, after all, I guess now if you want to build a permanent style structure in Florida now it needs to be built to hurricane-proof specifications, so perhaps that's why we didn't really get the grasp of how bad the damage to central Florida actually was.

After an exciting and eventful drive we finally arrived at the retirement community, which is a cluster of nice semi-permanant mobile homes which had been decorated sassily for Christmas, or I guess at least it had been decorated sassily BEFORE the storm. When we got there it was really sort of sad looking with decorations all over the place and broken reindeer laying about making obstacles in the road. It was there we found out that his grandparents and their dog had spent the last half hour hiding in their tiny trailer bathroom because apparently that storm we'd been riding through turned out to be a path of destruction left by tornados. Yes! We'd been riding around in the tornado warning zone in a little plastic Suzuki Forenza.

So that's how I ended up spending Christmas day crammed into a tiny mobile home with ten people and three dogs during a tornado outbreak, playing Uno while the local news played endlessly in the background.

According to CNN only one person in Florida was "seriously" hurt, but his or her condition is not "critical," whatever the hell that means. I wish the newscasters would just say that someone suffered from a broken pelvis or something rather than using vague terms which really mean nothing. Shelters were constructed, Christmas dinner was served to the people whose homes were flooded, and repairs are already underway.

I noticed that after the storm, my in-laws DID stop making broad hints about how nice central Florida is, and there were no more questions about how we enjoyed the long car trips, or comments about how easy it would be to work from home as a web designer or in a local law office as a legal secretary. At least they're more subtle than my dad, who likes to talk about how easy it would be to add a suite to the back of his house and how the nice middle eastern men where he works think multi-generational households are the only way to live. I think we're going to have to put both sides of the family into a giant bidding war, where we'll eventually go with the people who agree to do our ironing and buy us groceries and booze.

At least, that's how I imagine it.

So to those of you who like to bitch about Cleveland weather, at least you didn't have tornados. Kind of makes forty degree sleet seem kind of nice, doesn't it? Don't get me wrong, we had a great time in Florida, but it's good to be home, in our nice intact apartment building where the roof is still attached.

Today after work I am migrating south to Florida for Christmas. Not personally, of course. I'll be on an airplane, which probably won't be any less stressful.
I'm sure it'll be ungodly hot beautiful and I will return so sunburned I won't be able to blink feeling refreshed.

Also of note, tomorrow is my first kidney-versary, and Skipper and I are celebrating by trying to get on the show Miami Ink. If I end up with a United Federation of Planets tattoo on my ass, well, I think we'll all be a little merrier.

Merry Christmas!

Today I thought I'd do something different. Usually I blog about something that has happened to me during my day, or about knitting, or my cats, and it's usually pretty whiny and bitter. Today I decided that I would blog on some pre-approved topics. Unfortunately, I'm sick of politics and my local reviews are best suited for my other blog. I went to The Write Source to find a topic, and I selected "Grade 2" as my current level of competency. This may seem overgenerous, but hey, everyone likes a challenge.

Today's topic is "Words I Think Are Funny."

You know what word I think is really funny? Milk. I am from the Cleveland area, and I pronounce it "melk." No one even bothered to correct me until a few years ago, and then it was done with such a mean spirit that now I pronounce it incorrectly just for spite. To me, "milk" pronounced with "ill" in the middle sounds bizarre. It sounds like someone is trying to put on airs, which really annoys me. I know there's a way to pronounce it somewhere between "melk" and "m-ill-k," but I'm incapable of making that noise. It comes out sounding long and drawn-out as I try to do a sort of dipthong effect in the middle. I think I'll stick with "melk" (not that I can even drink the stuff) and those who don't like it can kiss my freckled ass.

I remember the grade when everyone learned the purported longest word in the English language. I believe it was "antidisestablishmentarianism," and it means exactly what it says. Pretty straightforward, I think. Still, I know people who will try to impress other people by actually working this into conversation. "Gee, Bob, I know what you mean. It really has an air of antidisestablishmentarianism!" I mean, come on. It SOUNDS like you got it off a cereal box in fourth grade, which I think is where I learned it. You want to be vague? Try talking about love, or discipline, or "honor."

There are two words I'm really fond of: temerity and strident. I love strident. To me it sounds very proper and British, and I can imagine applying it to all sorts of thing, such as my cat Jerome, who was rather strident in the manner in which she suggested I let her watch me shower. "Temerity" also applies to the cats, as in "I can't believe they have the temerity to demand I feed them at six in the morning, and then dart under my feet so I fall on my face three inches from their bowl." Hrm. Typing the above paragraph actually kind of made me mad. Why DO they wake me up at six? It's not like they're starving or anything. In fact, I'm not the ONLY one who lives here who can get my ass out of bed and feed the cats. Hrm.

In conclusion, I'd like to say that they should not name bad things pretty names, such as Chlamydia, and that good things like beef should have names that properly denote their gloriousness.

Take THAT, Grade 2 writing topic!

I work for a large corporation, and for the most part I like my job. However, corporations sometimes do things that they think are "feasible solutions" and the rest of us think are "really stupid."

The corporation I work for decided to go with a new computer system. This is a big deal, because everything I do all day long depends on this computer system. It's drastically different than what we're on now. They decided to switch everyone over to this system at the same time. Well, it's very complex, but instead of giving us a few hours a day for a week, which would be the best way to help us learn and retain and allow us to still get some work done, they decided we'd allll go over to one location today and learn it for eight hours, non-overtime. Furthermore, we HAVE to learn it today, because starting on Monday we're only using the NEW system. Meaning on Monday nothing will get done and the whole thing is going to crash, at least, this is how I see it. Furthermore, this office we're all going to barely has enough parking for its current employees, and since it's not downtown there really isn't any available street parking. How will this work? Who can say?!

The company decided that since making us come in all day on Saturday (non-overtime) was harsh, they decided to give us all a comp day. Here's the catch: EVERYONE has to take their comp day next week. Next week when we're all going to desperately be trying to use the new computer system. I don't know what we're going to do when all the trainers take THEIR comp day, but I suspect it's going to suck.

So I'm a little bitter. Also, since we didn't get a choice of training days I'm missing out on the church Christmas pageant dealey I have done every year for about six years, something I'd already agreed to do months ago, and I'm also supposed to go in for a blood test this morning which will make me just late enough to miss the part on how to log in, but not late enough that I'll feel justified going to get breakfast. Hurrah!

I'm sorry this is boring and whiny, but that's how I feel right now, so suck it up.
Vent, vent, vent.

Last year I became eligible for Medicare and SSI because I was diagnosed with end stage Renal disease. This is an expensive condition that causes most people to be unable to work for months, years or even decades, which in Ohio makes a person ineligible for health insurance because of their pre-existing condition. See, in Ohio, if you have a pre-existing condition you can't get commercial health insurance unless it's through an employer. That's where social services steps in.

Social Services is notoriously crazy to understand. I remember being pretty much forced to go sign up for Medicare by the dialysis people, since dialysis runs roughly $36,000 a month. I was on dialysis for eight months and worked the whole time, but because of my dual coverage I think my family paid a total of $200 for all of those treatments. When I signed up for Medicare the nice man at the office also talked me into SSI, which is supplemental income you "earn" by working a certain number of "quarters," although some people say that it doesn't really work that way, depending on your condition, and blah blah blah. Even the people who WORK there don't understand it. Anyway, I got all signed up for that and started receiving a small monthly allowance for the months I was unable to work due to my recovery after transplant.

Now, I am a freak. Most people can't work during dialysis, and most people are out of work for a very long time after transplant. I was very blesssed in that I was able to work up until I had my surgery. I was also going to school, in addition to doing thrice weekly three and a half hour treatments. I had my surgery December 23, 2005, and went back to work in April. .

According to the nice man at the Social Security office, I was technically able to receive benefits from SSI through 2007 since I was "paid up" through then. I guess SSI is different from Social Security Disabilty. The way he explained it was that with Disability, other people are footing your allowance with their taxes, but with SSI you have EARNED that money with the taxes you payed into Social Security from all those years you worked prior to illness. If you're under a certain age you use up your mom's social security taxes, and so on and so forth.

When I went back to work, I debated whether I should still receive benefits. One one hand, I wasn't sure if my health would turn. Also, I was starting to get medical bills. On the other, this SSI was MY money, and it was coming from the taxes I paid by working since I was 16, at one point even working three jobs at once. Still, what if I needed to use it again? Would it be fraud if I was getting SSI while still receiving a monthly income? (It isn't...you can still work and receive benefits, but I didn't know that a few months ago.)

Technically I think I'm earning too much now to be receiving SSI. I HAVE to be, because I earn enough for what I need all by myself. I've also been riding the Clinic's ass and my medical bills have dwindled to $1,000, thanks to my calling every billing cycle and complaining about the errors, coupled with a threat I made to the Financial Coordinator about parking my pasty white rear end on her desk until she personally fixed the problem.

I've been trying to call/write/fax SOMEONE to get my SSI cancelled. I don't need it, and I don't want there to be some sort of error in my amounts and find out I've accidentally defrauded someone. I sent in a form SAYING I was working and I had my own insurance and everything, but after I did that I got a letter saying the were giving me MORE money. I still haven't gotten a response from the Social Security office, and I don't have any days off left this year so I can't go there in person and fix it.

Basically, the benefits people are always bitching because people abuse the system, and here I am TRYING to find someone to tell me how to cancel my SSI and they're giving me MORE money. What the hell? The tricky part is I don't want to cancel Medicare...no matter what, after a kidney transplant a patient is eligible for Medicare for 36 months in case of various complications that might cause a lapse in employment.

So there you have it. There are people out there who NEED SSI and can't get it, despite having worked enough quarters, and here I am, a lucky son of a bitch trying to stop my benefits because I'm self-sufficient, and I can't even find the number or the form to do that.

I looked up "cancel SSI" on the internet, and all I got were pages where you could appeal THEIR decision to cancel your SSI. Apparently no one cancels their own SSI? But what if I need it in the future, you know? I'd like to put some eggs back in that basket.

Yes people, these are our tax dollars at work. I'm afraid when I call again tonight they'll try to bump up my benefits AGAIN. I don't know. Maybe this is part of their master plan to pay me out now so that when I'm old and bitter my social security is all used up and I'll have to sell my body to make soylent green. There's a cheerful thought.

Yay, Government!

My boyfriend fiance husband (weird!) and I started a website to review locally owned franchises, small businesses and websites pertaining to Cleveland and its surrounding suburbs. Don't get too excited, the site isn't great right now. We were up to about a dozen reviews sometime in November when the database crashed and we lost all of our reviews and readers, so now we're starting to rebuild (and backup) our work slowly but surely. My first review each time was of the Avon Lake Conversation forums, which can be found on LorainCounty.com. It wasn't a flattering review, because every time I go to these forums with something pertinant and local I'm ignored by people going on about non-local politics, and there are a few members who like to post one line zingers at other members, making the board a giant bitch fest instead of something nice and postive for people who want real information about the area, not that I am bitter. Anyway, here's my first full post from ClevelandReviews.com. It's long and awkward, with thin content padded by pretentiousness, much like myself. Anyway, it's just a taste, so if you like the style and you're a local, you might want to go there from time to time, or email us with suggestions or even little reviews yourself.

X-Posted:
As a new resident of Avon Lake, Ohio, I was quite delighted when I learned there were conversation forums pertaining to the city itself. I like to consider myself a solid blend of lazy and cheap, so any time I can learn more about my surroundings without leaving the house or spending any money, I'm pretty much satisfied. I assumed that going to the Avon Lake Conversation Forums would be a grand way to learn about local happenings and to get some insight on things like local construction and benefits providing free food.

LorainCounty.com itself is a handy tool, and I'd like to say that the forums were a useful extension of that tool. Unfortunately, I'd be lying.

In an effort to be fair, I'm going to admit that in a conversation forum you are going to have a free exchange of ideas, whether or not everyone thinks certain ideas belong on a community discussion forum. That is the wonderful thing about the First Amendment, not to mention the Internet in general. However, I firmly believe you can exchange ideas without blasting one another to smithereens, and that just because you post a lot doesn't mean you are actually correct (you know who you are)! I also believe that it is possible to post on a forum without making too many grammatical mistakes regarding apostrophes and subject-verb agreement, although frankly to read many of the posts you'd think that such basic foundations of grammar are arbitrary on the Internet.

There are some places on this message board where people try to post legitimate local questions, but from what I have read many of them are passed over while people whine about political issues they 1)aren't really all that informed on and 2)have no power to change until the next election. I agree that politics are important locally, but there is only a certain extent to which you can expound upon them before your childish mewling becomes redundant and annoying. Look: just because your party won/lost, it doesn't mean you are always going to be correct in blaming the other party. Certainly whining about it endlessly in a forum better suited to raising civic pride than for changing the minds of people who have their minds made up isn't going to change the results.

I also find the forums a little annoying to navigate when you're trying to follow a thread, but I'm going to assume that's to keep the size of the forum program small and to allow it to fit in with the stylistic theme of LorainCounty.com. I'm sure if I weren't so lazy and if I actually had half an hour to blow trying to figure out why the "more" button takes you to an earlier post rather than a later one I'd figure it out eventually, but since I usually check the forums on my free, non-company time (shifty eyes) I am not afforded that luxury. I think it would be easier to read if the threads were organized by thread title and topic, since the topics that run for pages and pages are invariably the topics that cause me to roll my eyes and pass over (such as why people love/hate Bush and how certain posters think increasing commerce in Cleveland will have no affect whatsoever on the surrounding bedroom communities) and the ones I want to read (such as what the heck is up with that new RTA station, and the best location for fishing) are tragically buried amidst the multiple posts of certain people whose Internet handles imply that they are open minded and not bound by the constraints of intellectual prejudice but whose posts end up being laughably ironic. I love when people who are long-winded and pretentious whine about how other people are long-winded and pretentious without any sense of the comedy of the situation. Take this post, for example. Long winded and pretentious? Aye aye, Cap'n!

I'd like to say in conclusion that there are a few of you out there on the Avon Lake forums who would most certainly benefit from day jobs, or at least from a stronger form of medication, and there are several who need to be taught the location of the spell check.

Let's increase our community standing, not tear it down with the Internet, OK?

Avon Lake Conversation Forums, I give you half a beer and a stern talking to. Let's strive to do better in the future!