Intended Consequences

No, I didn't mislabel my column for this week.  I truly believe that what I am about to reveal was fully intended as the federal method of dealing with healthcare reform to limit government cost while fully controlling the populace.

My wife and I each received a disturbing letter this week from our long term insurer, State Farm Insurance.  It concerned a premium increase that will take effect on the policy anniversary date in June.

We purchased long-term care policies in June of  2000.  Of course we hope never to use them, but we took the precautions all the same.  The coverage is very basic and did not include any inflation factor, so it pays $100-per-day after a 90-day waiting period. I think you'll agree that $3,000-per month is not sufficient to cover the full cost of care, but it is a supplement to our own out-of-pocket expenses, should we need long-term care.

Our premiums over the past 13 years have never before increased.  They have remained constant at $834 and $558 respectively, for a total of $1392.  It is a payment that I don't regret making.

The letters we received this week informed us of the increase in premium to $1000 for me, and $670 for Judy.  That is a 20% increase, and benefits will remain the same as they are. We have options that we can exercise to lower the premiums, but that will also lower the benefits and we do not want to do that, so we will pay the increase.

I have to ask myself why this increase came about.  The insurance company says that the costs of long-term  care and the frequency of LTCI claims are increasing, and I can accept that as a partial reason.  But the increase also coincides with the implementation of the new "Affordable Health Care Act" commonly referred to as Obamacare.  I must conclude that at least some of that premium increase is tied to that event even though State Farm does not specifically say so.

It is becoming increasingly clear to me that a lot of health care premiums are going up while health care is being curtailed.  This trend will likely continue and be even more pronounced in the coming months and years as Obamacare comes into being.

It remains to be seen whether the number of doctors who have threatened to retire, leave their practice, or refuse to accept any new Medicare patients will actually do so.  If only a fraction of them take action, it will further limit our choices of doctors and treatments while increasing premiums still further.

In short, the new healthcare is shaping up to be a total disaster for everyone.  It doesn't appear that congress will be able to alter or repeal it, so be prepared for a huge change. That is what we were promised and what we voted for, after all, wasn't it?

Blue Tooth Forsooth

There is a new and disturbing phenomenon taking place in this country... It is actually two phenomena. I’m certain that you’ve experienced both of them.

We always tell our kids--well, now it's the grandkids--to turn the volume down on their radios, usually when they are playing music.  Then, when they don’t listen to us and keep the volume cranked up, we tell them that they’ll lose their hearing if they continue to listen to loud music.

We already have a lot of people who have lost their hearing, and they aren’t all kids.  Have you noticed, as I have, that there are a lot of people walking around with hearing aids?

I thought modern technology was miniaturizing everything except TVs, which seem to keep getting larger and larger.  But the hearing aids I see are pretty visible, with strange pointers sticking out of them.  Some even have little blue lights on them.

 

 Not only do people have those hearing aids, but they also have apparently gone crazy, too, because many of them walk around talking to themselves.  I hear these one-sided conversations all the time.

I've come to the conclusion that the loud noises must cause both hearing loss and mental disorders. Maybe it's the stuff those people listen to that also makes them crazy.

I sure am blessed with good fortune, because my hearing is almost perfect.  Of course, I do a little of the talking-to-myself stuff, but there is a difference... I usually have the answers to the questions I ask!

           

I know, it's meaningless in this context, but I like the picture.

What A Way To Go

Now that I'm a septuagenarian, I am bombarded by health advocates who want to practice "preventive medicine" on me.  Not a week goes by that I don't get mailers advertising hearing aids and other devices and aids for the elderly.

But the real kick came last week, when I received a health alert from University Hospital here in Augusta in my email Inbox.  In it was a list of preventive care screenings that I am eligible for through Medicare and that are overdue.  They included colonoscopy, td/tdap, hemmocult, prostate cancer screening, digital rectal exam and flu shot.

The first action I had to take was a search of the Internet to learn what some of those ominous-sounding screenings were.  (Isn't the Internet grand, that we can learn just about anything in short order on it?)  Then I had to think about whether or not I really wanted to subject myself to some of those procedures.

I won't bore you with my medical history here, other than to state that some of those tests and shots are already accomplished.  However, I have a real aversion to volunteering for some of them.  I also have a theory that some things are better left undone.

I am convinced that some health problems--cancer, for one--are aggravated and/or initiated by the very tests to detect them.   I don't have any factual proof to back that up, but I do believe that when cancer cells are exposed to air, they seem to take off and start multiplying.

There are a lot of people who have had cancer that went into remission, but there are many more whom, once the disease was detected and treatment was started, died in a very short time.  One has to question the timing from onset to terminal.

Here's another reason I don't care to undergo uncomfortable screenings and procedures: Since I am already on the cusp of the hereafter, do I really care how I go?  Everybody's got to die of something, and, for me, I suspect my "something" is well established as coronary artery disease.  To learn that I also have another deadly disease would just be adding insult to injury.

With such a morbid topic, I can't leave you in a funk over it, so here is a little "kicker."

My barbershop quartet has a song we sing called, "Everybody Wants To Go To Heaven" that has a great ending.  The last line is, "Everybody wants to go to heaven, but nobody wants to die!"  Isn't that the truth? 

If I have to go anyway, I’d just as soon go out quickly and painlessly.  But if that is not to be, and I have to linger on awhile, I prefer to go out like this guy-note what’s in the IV bag.

The Whole Nine Yards

Note: I originally published this column in January of 2007,but it still has relevance today, so I'm going to edit it only slightly and repeat it.

While I was watching one of the bowl games, I heard an announcer use the term “the whole nine yards.”  That phrase has always held a certain mystique for me.  It sounded incongruous in the context of a football game, since ten yards is the distance required to gain a first down.  “The whole nine yards”’ is a yard short of the marker. 

Since I first heard that discordant expression, I have heard and seen it used several more times, including in the title of a movie starring Bruce Willis and Matthew Perry.  I even ran across it in a book I was reading.  I’m fascinated by etymology anyway, so I decided to do a search for the term online to see where it originated.  Boy, was I surprised!

I’m convinced that everybody thinks they know what “the whole nine yards” means, but there are a whole host of differing opinions as to where the term originated.  To save you the time and effort, I’m going to summarize them for you.

                       

1. It refers to the amount of cloth needed to tailor a three-piece suit of the finest quality.  A gentleman who wanted to get “dressed to the nines” would order “the whole nine yards” from the tailor.
2. Nine cubic yards is the capacity of a ready-mix cement truck.  A big job would require “the whole nine yards.”
3. Coal trucks in England supposedly had three sections, each containing three cubic yards of coal.  If an especially cold winter were forecast, the customer would order “the whole nine yards.”
4. Three-masted sailing ships had nine yardarms, the horizontal poles that held up the sails.  When the captain wanted to get full advantage of the wind, he would call for “the whole nine yards.”
5. The amount of material in a bride’s wedding train could be any amount, but if she were to have the finest wedding she would require “the whole nine yards” in a bolt of material.
6. The amount of dirt removed to dig a proper grave is said to be nine cubic yards. If a person goes “the whole nine yards” he has expired.  (Interesting, that one)
7. As long as we’re on the subject, a funeral shroud is also supposed to be “a whole nine yards” of material. (Hmmm!)
8. Material used to come in bolts of nine yards at the general store.  Embedded in the counter were brass nails spaced three feet apart to measure the material.  When someone needed only a few yards, then they “got down to brass tacks,” but otherwise they requested “the whole nine yards.”
9. The term supposedly refers to a football team that didn’t play their best game.  They went “the whole nine yards” and lost.
10. It refers to the length of a belt of bullets used in fighter planes (or bombers turrets, depending on who’s version you read) during the Second World War.  If the enemy plane was really hard to shoot down, the gunner was said to have used “the whole nine yards.”  Alternately, if the mission was going to be a long and difficult one, the gunners requested “the whole nine yards.”

Of all these definitions, the first and the last seem to be the most popular, although none of them, including those two, is entirely accurate.  And surprisingly, the term, “the whole nine yards” only came into being sometime in the late 1960’s; the first printed reference was in 1967.  Surely there would have been some reference to it in all the films, books and articles written during and after WW II if it had been a common term used by aviators.

I’m afraid the term, “the whole nine yards” will remain shrouded—Oh Gosh, another pun—in mystery.  In short, there is no definitive answer as to where the term came from or who originated it.  It’s no wonder it covers a multitude of situations, and usually means “went the distance.”

If anyone out there knows the true origination of the term, please feel free to write back to me and clear it up.  I’ll be happy to publish an addendum.

Fisherman's Paradise

I read a column earlier this week about the childhood joys of fishing.  That column brought back a memory of the best, if most unproductive, fishing adventure I ever took.  You see, I am not a fisherman and never was very good at the sport, though I did spend many a day casting and waiting. I guess I just didn't have the patience for it.

So, how, you ask, did an uninspired angler have an unforgettable experience on the water?  Well, it wasn't your average fishing spot for one thing. It was a fisherman's paradise.

Let me set the scene for you, because this story has world-wide roots...

In 1968, on my first overseas trip to Europe, I visited Athens.  While there, I met a man from New Zealand.  We were both in the lobby of our hotel and both asking the concierge about good places to have dinner.  The concierge pointed us toward a nice restaurant near the Plaka and we decided that we would share a table and a meal.

What started as a chance encounter turned into an interesting evening of swapping travel stories.  At the end of it we exchanged business cards and Bob invited me to visit him at his ranch near Auckland if I ever got to New Zed, as the natives call it.

Fast forward ten years, and a drawing at our company Christmas party yielded me a trip on Air New Zealand.  (I worked for American Airlines, and back in those days all the airlines had very cordial relations and reciprocal pass privileges.)  Still having Bob's card in my wallet, I decided then and there that I would take him up on his offer of free lodging and a motor tour of the North Island.

The trip pass was for two, and since my wife wasn't amenable to international flying, I determined to take my 10-year-old son with me on a trip to both New Zealand and Australia.

Brad and I made the trip in April of 1977.  The day we arrived in Auckland, Bob met us at the airport and we visited his favorite pub.  While there, Bob talked me into playing the trifecta for the horse races that afternoon, and we each chipped in $2.50.  You know the rest was preordained... we won about $500 on 100-1 odds. 

With all that bounty, we set off early the next morning for the town of Whangarei near the northern tip of the North Island and its fishing port, Tutukaka.  We chartered a boat for the day and left at daybreak for the Poor Knights Islands and a day of deep sea fishing. 

I'm not going to make excuses, because the weather was picture perfect, and the seas were relatively calm, but the fish, mainly blue marlin, tuna and mako sharks just weren't biting.  We spent the entire day out on the water and never caught anything but bait fish.

Was I disappointed?  Yes, and no.  We might not have caught any big ones, but the scenery was absolutely gorgeous.  Add to that the fact that Mrs. Jones-Parry, Bob's wife, had packed a full picnic basket of food to be devoured on the trip, and we were in heaven.

The captain of the boat wove in and out of the islands and even took us into a grotto, or sea cave.  The water was crystal clear with thousands of fish swimming beneath us.

I took lots of pictures, but this was long before the digital age, so they were either 35mm slides or Kodak instamatic shots, and they have long since disappeared into boxes in the attic.  Rather than spend hours digging them out and trying to scan them, I invite you to view Images of the Poor Knights Islands, a compilation of photos from many fortunate visitors to the area.

Not too long after we visited the Poor Knights, the entire area was turned into a restricted marine preserve, so fishing of any kind is forbidden now. However, it is a scuba divers paradise as well, and probably one of the best in the world. 

Needless to add, my son and I have never forgotten our free trip Down Under.  And I often wonder if we really did win that horse race bet, or did Bob Jones-Parry have the whole thing planned out in advance to deflect any thought I might have had of sharing the cost.

A Brief History of Daylight Saving Time

This weekend marks the beginning of that controversial custom of setting our clocks ahead in the spring and back in the fall, known as Daylight Saving Time.  That's right, it isn't Daylight Savings time, as most of us have always referred to it; the 's' after Saving is non-existent.

Many people, myself included until recently, hold the notion that Daylight Saving Time came about as a means to allow farmers to have more time for their agricultural chores. It seemed to make sense, since farm activity during the growing season should be more labor intensive. However, farmers can arise and go to bed whenever they want to, so who needs to reset clocks?

In fact, a form of time adjustment goes all the way back to ancient Rome, but brevity demands that we skip ahead to the late 18th Century, when our estimable Ben Franklin was in Paris (1784) and wrote an essay titled, "An Economical Project for Diminishing the Cost of Light." Modeled after the French practice, it proposed a method for using fewer candles by using morning sunlight (a.k.a. rising earlier).

The Chandlers of America were furious with Benjy for suggesting such a scheme to take away their huge profits from the manufacture and sale of candles. But then, most of the worlds’ leading scientists, including Franklin, were of the opinion that the extra heat and pollution generated by burning candles was contributing to global warming—controversy that is still rampant to this day in one form or another.

At any rate, the flame was extinguished (the idea, not the candle flame). It never took hold anyway, and clocks remained undisturbed for another hundred years.  Franklin’s essay was intended as satire, by the way.

Skip ahead to 1895, when George Vernon Hudson, a New Zealand entomologist (studies bugs) proposed a two-hour time shift ahead in October and a two-hour shift back in March, a reverse of the modern trend.  Well, that didn't fly either, any more than most of his bugs did.

The "invention" of DST is credited to a Brit named William Willett who, in 1905, put forth a plan to move clocks forward in the summer to take advantage of increased light in the mornings and evenings. He wanted clocks set ahead 20 minutes each of four Sundays in April and back 20 minutes each of four Sundays in September.  Okay, that was really ridiculous!  The main opposition came from farmers...whom else?

The first recorded modern use of DST was during WWI, to save on fuel for the war effort. Germany started the practice, but Britain and other countries soon followed suit.  Nobody on the opposing side wanted Germany to ‘get ahead’ in the weapons race. After the war ended, the practice ended, as well it should have.

Good old FDR instituted year-round DST in the United States on February 9, 1942, two months after Pearl Harbor, and it lasted until September 30, 1945.  From then until 1966, many states practiced a form of DST, but there was no uniformity and confusion was the norm.  Congress finally stepped in and passed the Uniform Time Act of 1966, which stated that DST would begin on the last Sunday of April and end on the last Sunday of October.  As usual, some of the states disagreed with the standard and still had the ability to arbitrarily exempt themselves, which they promptly did.

Over the years from 1966 to 2007, several changes were made to the dates on which DST started and ended for those states where it was practiced.  Then Congress stepped up once more and created the Energy Policy Act of 2005. It established the current dates as the second Sunday in March and the first Sunday in November, but it didn't take effect until 2007... Go figure!

Oh, one other fact... Two states, Hawaii and Arizona do not observe/practice DST.  That is, except for the Navajo Nation in northeastern Arizona, where they do adjust their clocks, or sundials, or whatever they use to tell time.  Those pesky Indians!

If reading this column confused you, as writing it confused (amused?) me, then I'll give you one good take-away from it: Here is how you remember which way to set your clocks tonight.  

Spring ahead - Fall back

And just how many of you are going to set your alarms for 2 AM so that you can reset the clocks at the correct time? Hah! Sure you will.

All of the above “facts” are true, except where I embellished a little to inject some humor.  On a more serious note, I do believe that God created the diurnal cycles just fine, and He doesn’t need any help from mankind to make them more perfect.  Of course there is more daylight in the summer than in the winter, because it is the growing season, and crops do need more sunlight.  In the winter there is less daylight, and that fact should prompt us to retire earlier and get more rest.  What could be simpler?

Maybe someday we’ll learn to leave God’s creation alone and quit trying to fine tune every last thing as though we really have any lasting influence on nature. We don’t.

Cycling Pleasures

(I am dedicating this column to my "baby sister," who was the only one not along on this trip.  That is only because she was still five-and-a-half years from being born at the time it took place.)

With gasoline prices rising and conservation on most peoples' minds, wouldn't it be fun to get around like much of the world's population does - on a bicycle?

Well, I know that you can't get very far on a bike unless you're willing to expend a lot of time and energy.  And with few exceptions, there are no bike lanes to allow for cycling over long distances.  Vehicular traffic is also hazardous to your health on a bicycle, as was demonstrated by the British couple, Peter Root and Mary Thompson, who were recently killed in Thailand after cycling through over 27 countries since 2011.

I'm harking back to a past time when bicycling was not so dangerous in this country. In fact, I'm going to take you back to another time when gasoline was pricey and scarce, WWII.

My father wasn't able to serve in the military during the war, but he did two jobs that were equally important: he served as an air-raid warden, and he worked at the Bell Aircraft plant near Niagara Falls, NY, where he helped build P-39 Airacobra fighter planes.

My grandmother lived in a little town about 50 miles from our home in Buffalo.  With rations on fuel, we had no way to drive to her house to visit her.  My father decided one summer day in 1944 to get out the bicycles and pedal our way to Grandma's home.

I was 5-years-old and had just recently learned to ride my little bicycle with its 20-inch wheels. My two brothers were 7 and 8, and they both had full-sized bikes.  My little sister was only 2, so dad had her in a special seat behind his handlebars on his bike, and mom had her own bike with a picnic basket.

So, five bikes and six people started out on an epic journey from Buffalo to Peoria, the town where Grandma lived. 

Being the littlest bike rider, and owing to the smaller diameter of my wheels, I had a hard time keeping up with the rest of the family, so my two brothers had a rope that they used to tow me when I got too tired of pedaling.  I don't recall how often that was, but suspect that I was towed more than I pedaled.

There were no motels in those days, so the trip was to be completed in one day come hell or high water.  50 miles on a bicycle in one day was monumental, especially since we're talking about the old balloon tire bikes with no gear shift - one speed, as fast as you can pedal.  We didn't have any safety equipment like helmets, either

The long and the short of it is, we didn't make it all the way to grandma's.  We did get as far as the city of Batavia, about 10 miles short of our goal.  We got a lift from an uncle from there in his farm truck.

Our family bike trip was written up in the Bell Corporation company newspaper, complete with a photo.  I, of course, have no memory of the trip, but it must have been quite a feat in those days.  I doubt that you could get kids to do that today, and maybe it would be as difficult to talk a parent into it.  Oh, for those days gone by when we used to be able and willing to perform activities like a 50-mile bike trip.

Here is the original picture with caption as it appeared in the August 12, 1944 edition of Bell Aircraft News.

That's me on the far left with my little 20-inch bicycle. It looks like my dad had the 
skinny tires on his bike as apposed to those fat tires on the rest.