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Thursday, November 26, 2009

Thanksgiving Adeventure

At work. Thursdays are not one of my days off, so I had to work.

But all is not so bad. Sort of. It was not a very busy day. It was actually quiet. So it was a chill out day.

I brought rum cake. So at least there was rum cake. It was a pretty big hit.

There is a rumor that there will be holiday pay - but I am not really holding my breath over that. Whatever.

Lets see what else......well nothing really. It was a workday, but a very low key workday.

After work I had my dinner.

And that, so far, is it. Well there is the beer I am about to open. Maybe watch some TV. And so on.

Hope everyone had a good day!

Wednesday, November 18, 2009

1/2 day off

Today is my 1/2 day off. I do not have to be at work till 1300 (1 PM). Now normally I would be tempted to sleep till at least 11:00, but not today! I have two missions to accomplish!

1. Get my teeth cleaned

AND

2. Refuel the boat.

The dentist office called the other day and reminded me that according to their records, I have not been there in a while. This is true. I had an appointment in January that I just bailed out on - on account of limited funds and whatnot. Well I decided that teeth are important so I scheduled another cleaning for today.

As for the boat, I actually got to use it for a couple of hours Sunday. It needs to be topped off. Nothing major, probably 6 gallons or less per tank. So Ill get that done.

Then after that Ill put the boat away, lock it up, and go to work.

I should have enough time to get it all done and still not be late! Work days that start at 1300 rule.

Tuesday, November 17, 2009

Insurance And Stuff

One of the things I have done (so far) with my days off is kick on the TV. It seems I have not missed much when it comes to the great health care fiasco.

Now I have one of these full time jobs that the right likes to talk so much about. You know, the kind that comes with benefits and options and all that other happy horse shit. So therefore, I must be set!

Well not exactly. You see, my employer is somewhat cheap. The plan offered is really not a plan. It is a supplemental plan. The way it works is that I get paid directly if I need care, then I use that money to pay bills. So I can go anywhere and see any doctor. It does not matter.

Well here is the problem with the plan. Without real insurance to back it up it is WORTHLESS. Lets just take emergency care for example. If I were to end up in intensive care the "plan" offered would pay a whole whopping $750 per day. The problem is that intensive care costs somewhat more than $750 per day.

They will pay $25,000 if I need an organ transplant. Hey great - better than nothing but I would still be in the hole by a couple of hundred grand.

So I opted to not sign up for the plan. I did my cost benefit analysis and determined that the plan was not worth the cost.

So what about routine care? Well it turns out I can do things like see the dentist or eye doctor and they will also pay me directly. Problem is the amount they will pay me is less than what I would have to pay anyway. They will give me $80 for a routine eye exam for example - but for me a routine exam is closer to $125 - $150.

Now why the hell do I want to pay someone about $7 per pay period so that they can give me back $80 later? Keep in mind the premiums I would pay would total more than what I would get back in routine care reimbursement. Here is $100 - you can give me back $75 later! What a great deal that is.

The "plan" was also fragmented. There was the emergency plan that only covers emergency care, the routine plan, the dental plan, the eye plan, the cancer plan, and so on.

To get them all would equal the premiums for a real plan.

So what good is the plan offered? Well lets say that a real plan was also offered (which it is not). I could buy into the supplemental plan and it would more than cover the deductibles for the real plan.

But offering only the supplemental plan is just a joke. People who buy into it think they are covered - but guess what? If you need anything beyond routine care (which you will have to pay roughly 1/2 the cost for anyway - on top of the premiums paid to get back less than what you paid in - which in effect just makes your routine care MORE expensive) you will end up bankrupt.

Well to hell with that. If I am going to end up bankrupt, I am going to keep the $7 every 2 weeks premium payment. That will at least pay for a six pack. I will get more benefit out of the beer than the plan anyway.

So there you go. More reason why we NEED more options. There are those of us out there working 40 hour weeks, in what appears to be a real company with some 400 employees (with plans to hire another 600 upon planned expansion) - but we have no real insurance.

And I am not really being paid enough to buy my own private plan. As it is now a decent place to live (as in not an apartment in Crack City) will cost me more than 1/2 of my income. At the very best, with the move in specials because the economy sucks I might be able to find a decent place to live for 1/2 of my income. This leaves me another 1/2 for everything else.

In other words - nothing for health insurance.

I also do not see wages going up anytime soon. At least not till the economy recovers. Right now it is not like there are a lot of other jobs I can just take. And as long as there is a shortage of jobs, employers can offer lower wages and people will take them.

I know of people with many years of experience, and graduate degrees - working for $10 - $12 per hour. So that is the reality of today.

But as it stands now - we need more choices when it comes to health plans. I would like to be insured - but I can not afford to buy into a private non-group rate plan, and the garbage plan offered at work is not worth the premiums I would pay.

I suppose some radio clowns would just call me a cheap bastard who thinks everything should be free. Someone who probably supports labor unions, and who is just lazy and really hates capitalism. Why I might even be a communist! Or at least a socialist.

I just do not want to be horribly in debt should I get sick. I suppose that is too much to ask for.

Monday, November 16, 2009

Good News, Bad News

It seems I have been really extra super busy! And the updates here reflect this.

Which reminds me of the good news. There will be more updates. I get days off again! I was working twelve hour shifts 6 days a week. This works out to 72 hours a week. Now if you consider that there are only 168 hours in a week, I was spending 42.85% of my time at work. At least. A 12 hour shift is really longer than that. You have to count the time spent getting ready for work (which I have worked out to 20 minutes in the morning), time spent driving to work, and then the 10 - 15 minutes reserve time so you are never late. And after the shift I have been getting out anywhere from 15 - 30 minutes late.

Add in this reserve time and I was easily up to 44.64% of my time spent at work, on the clock.

Well all that is over for now. I always knew it would not last. The bean counters looked at operating expense and wondered why myself and others were getting so much time on the clock. I was easily at 35 hours a week overtime.

So the shoe dropped, overtime is discouraged, and I get three days off as a result.

The BAD NEWS is that I got used to the overtime income. I was pulling in some serious jack. Over a year, I was set to make anywhere from $52,000 - $58,000. Now for Miami this is a decent living, but you are not exactly rich or anything. If you want to live outside Crack City you need at least a grand a month for rent, plus electricity and water and all that other shit. So the money is spent rather quick.

But I was doing OK. Sure I was always at work, but work is not that hard. When work is not really that hard I do not mind it. I have an office job WITHOUT having an office job. There is no filing and schedule keeping and all that other shit - but I have a desk and a chair. At my job there are only two or three slots per shift that are sitting - the rest are all standing. So I have that going for me.

But my job is special. I have to keep track of EVERYTHING going on. I have a radio, and I handle all the radio traffic. If something is going on - I know about it first then direct the response team. There is a lot to keep track of.

I suppose it could be stressful - but to me it is not. I can deal with it.

But still - having more time is going to hurt. My income is going to go way down. WAY down. I was making more in OT than I was straight time. Now that I am back down to just straight time, checks are going to suck.

So there it is. The good and bad. I have time to have a life - but no money to afford that life.

Honestly, I would rather be at work. On the clock. Where I have something to do, and I am paid to do it.

Monday, November 02, 2009

The Week

It seems I finally got a week with more than one day off. For the past couple of weeks all I had off was Sunday. Every other day was a work day. Not so bad really - but having only Sunday off every week presents interesting problems.

Like the nasty gram I got from Florida. Something about my license being up for suspension on the 17th unless I do something. So this means going to another county, going to a court house, producing some documents proving the computer records the state already has are true, paying $60, and then going home.

All to prove some computer records are true. Amazing huh?

But that is not so bad. Ill have time to get it done tomorrow.

That is if this does not happen again.


So here I was, driving home minding my own business. And then I hit something. Maybe I kissed a concrete construction barrier, maybe there was something in the road. To be honest I am not sure. But the end result was a massive and sudden tire failure. The people at the Sears auto center said it could not be patched.

And the rim is apparently bent. So right now the spare tire rim is in use on the drivers side front side. There also seems to be damage to the drivers side rear rim, but the truck seems to be driving OK. No shakes. I still have to get to a tire place and have the other wheel put on a balance machine. Ill be able to get that done tomorrow too.

The good thing here is that there is no other damage to the vehicle. Or anything else.