river vignette 10 - the Rio Grande

An unexpected and unplanned trip into the city today to help my daughter. She's been fighting off a migraine for two days, husband is out of town and twin daughters have a major portion of their science fair projects due tomorrow.

We had heard thunder rumbling way off during the afternoon and after we made camp we could see the storm coming our way. We had about 30 minutes of a hard sprinkle and then it moved off. As the storm moved away, we saw a rainbow and had a clear sky for stargazing in the east and an incredible lightning show on the horizon in the west that went on for hours. It was a beautiful night and hard to decide what to watch...the lightning show behind us or the star field in front of us. The Milky Way blazed across the sky and we saw the most incredible shooting star. The longest, biggest, brightest any of us had ever seen. It went on and on all the way across the sky almost to the horizon.

eye candy

I've climbed off my soap box she says amid heavy sighs of relief. For now anyway.

The sky yesterday evening was just awesome. There was a giant pink cloud above us...

and to the north west was this so I decided to try a composite a la Reya over at According To The Cosmology Of Reya.

Tonight was pretty amazing as well. Click on the images for a better view (or not, I thought they would be bigger).

first, do no harm

Why do people want to be doctors, or rather, what is the primary motivation for someone who wants to be a doctor? I've been wondering about this for a while now. It seems to me that originally, people wanted to be doctors because they wanted to help people. It was their avocation or their talent. Then, to be a healer or dentist or doctor was just another calling, like being a farmer or blacksmith or storekeeper, and they lived modestly like the rest of the population. Doctors were not originally revered as demi-gods. Somewhere along the line, some shift in attitude took place.

In the 50s and 60s and even 70s, doctors were revered and never ever questioned. Their standard of living started to rise above the general population and being a doctor became one of the triumvirate of American professions...doctor, lawyer, engineer. In the 80s and 90s this trend continued. Of course, being one of the highest paid professionals means that you charge a lot for your services.

I understand that part of what drives the cost of medical care is the cost of an education especially with the specialization that is rampant today, malpractice insurance because even doctors make mistakes and modern medical equipment. However, I also think greed has become a major part of what the bottom line is. Doctors are no longer regular people. They have managed to convince themselves and the nation that they are deserving of special treatment, that they should be at the top of the highest paid income list because they 'save lives'. Well, so does a welder who just does his unsung job to the best of his ability. What makes doctors so special? When did being a doctor become the path to riches?

Explain to me why this is justified...

A little girl falls and bonks her chin and gets a 1/2” cut and is sent to the emergency room by the authorities at the church summer day camp where she was when she fell. She is there for about an hour. The hospital emergency room charges $1200 and the plastic surgeon on call charges $800 for the less than 5 minutes it takes him to squeeze the cut closed and apply super glue.

A man wakes up in the middle of the night in such pain in his lower back and abdomen he can hardly move. He is taken to the emergency room where x-rays are taken. He is seriously constipated. The doctor comes in spends less than 10 minutes, asks one or two questions about the pain, does not so much as lay a finger on him much less do any doctoring. Because of the insistence of his wife, he is finally given something for the pain. They decide to leave when the pain subsides somewhat and no further help is forthcoming and as they are being discharged, one of the nurses sees that the doctor (who left at shift change) did not proscribe anything for his seriously clogged up bowels and she went and got him the stuff they give you when you are preparing for a colonoscopy. The hospital charged $775 for 2 hours and the doctor charged $530.

A man, who does not have health insurance, has his hand ripped open by a hidden rusty fishhook on a wilderness canoe camping trip and by the time the trip is over and he returns home his hand is swollen and infected with red streaks creeping up his arm. He goes to the emergency room and every one who looks at it agrees that it needs to be lanced. They give him a prescription for antibiotics, some pain medication, a tetanus shot and discharge him. The next day he goes to a doctor who agrees it needs to be lanced and refers him to another doctor. This second doctor agrees it needs to be lanced but because the man has no insurance, the doctor refuses to treat him even though he has enough money in a savings account to pay for the procedure. He is referred to the county hospital for indigents. After spending nearly 12 hours at the county hospital emergency room where the intern agreed that it needed to be lanced and several times called the on-call doctor who never showed up, the man was finally given two prescriptions for the strongest antibiotics available and discharged. Total bill was about $7000.

A doctor who is content with the negotiated fees from an insurance company is not content with charging the same fee to a self pay patient. They get charged double or triple.

Doctors are refusing new patients if their insurance is Medicare.

I know there are good doctors out there, ones who donate their time and services to give free medical care to those in need. I know there are good doctors out there who will adjust their fees lower for self pay patients. I know there are good doctors out there who do truly want to help those in need instead of using them to pay for their second vacation home or their yacht or their fancy sports car. I know they are out there but they are a vanishing breed.

So, addressing the first part of the Hippocratic Oath, first do no harm, isn't refusing to treat patients doing harm?

it's a shame and a sin

My sister's 63 yr old husband has two vertebra in his neck that are collapsing and he is in so much pain he can hardly move.  He has the complication of vascular disease (stents in his heart and femoral arteries) and he hasn't worked since he got laid off three years ago.  My sister, also 63, who had a heart attack at 50, works two part time jobs in this small town. Needless to say they have no health insurance.

This started up about 9 months ago with a pain in his shoulder and arm. In recent weeks the pain has spread down his back. The doctor thinks maybe the damage actually occurred 30 years ago when they were in a terrible car wreck, hit by a drunk driver, and my sister nearly died. What felt like whiplash then was actually damage to the vertebra. Right now, surgery is my bil's only option and if he doesn't get it soon his condition will be too far gone to repair and none of us want to contemplate what that will mean. They are having to go through all the hoops and the mountain of paperwork at UTMB (University of Texas Medical Branch and 100 miles away) and even though he has already been accepted as a patient they won't schedule his appointment until the finance department has given the go.

They both worked full time jobs, payed in insurance premiums month after month, year after year until he was laid off. My sister had quit her high pressure job after her heart attack and her husband supplied the health insurance for both of them. When he was laid off, they kept their insurance as long as they could, given their medical histories, because once uninsured, they would not be able to get coverage again due to pre-existing conditions. But, of course, eventually they had to give it up. Now they live on social security and her income. They have a mortgage. My sister does have a retirement account from when she had her high pressure job but two stock market crashes later it's not worth a whole lot now.

It's a sin that this is happening, that this happens every day all over this country. It is shameful that this is not a unique happenstance. It is shameful that people who played by the rules are reduced to this situation. It is shameful that every healthcare reform proposal offered has been met with vehement opposition and one was barely forced through congress. And it is shameful that the first thing government 'reformers' want to do is to deny people like my sister and her husband any kind of aid.

These government reformers with their undeserved salary, with their exclusive government retirement and health insurance plans, these reformers intent on undoing the health care reform bill who will be immune to what they wreak on the public, to these people I say...

Take care of your karma.

my little political post

image via http://www.old-picture.com

Now that the furor of and the aftermath of the recent elections has ceased and the small government party has the House again (though they had it for 8 years and only managed to produce an unprecedented deficit), I have a few thoughts.

I'll agree that the economy out there needs some fixing. And I'll agree that this country spends money on things that it needn't, although what those things are, we may disagree on. I'll even agree that I would like less government. I don't claim to have any kind of solution or even to really understand the problems. I do, though, find it simplistic to just say spend less, tax less, less government.

OK then, given that's the answer, what are you personally willing to give up? You, the one who voted for the politician that ran on the 'less government' platform, what are you willing to give up to make this happen? Your disability check? Your pension? Your social security? The grant you may have benefitted from directly or indirectly? No? What about funding for highways and infrastructure, for education or research to find cures for disease or technology to advance or just feed our civilization? What about the inspectors that keep our restaurants and food supply uncontaminated? No? So what then are you personally willing to give up in order to have a smaller government with a balanced budget and lower taxes?

It would be so much easier for me to take these people seriously, the ones who vote for less government, less spending, less taxes, if they would start with themselves. But they don't. They always want to start with the programs that help the most vulnerable among us, the demonized 'social' programs. Because these voters had the good luck to be born into a situation where they weren't faced with the kinds of debilitating social conditions that makes it nearly impossible to succeed, because they themselves never needed that kind of help, because they pulled themselves up by their boot straps they think that everyone can and should. But tell me, how deep was that hole really they were pulling themselves out of?

This is what I would like to see. All those people who voted in representatives and governors intent on dismantling the government should start with themselves as should the politicians elected. My republican cousin should start by refusing his disability checks (he has a droopy eyelid) and his social security checks. The legislators should start by refusing more than a basic wage for their services. They should refuse the ridiculous retirement package that they have voted in for themselves and the privileged healthcare insurance they get for life. They should have to rely on the same retirement and healthcare options available to the rest of us. Then they should start with their constituencies by refusing any and all government money. Only then should they cast their eye afield.

I wonder, if we Americans could choose what programs to fund with our taxes, what would we choose. If our tax returns included a list of government programs and departments and we could select which and who we wanted to fund and how much went where, what would we select? I wonder which ones would get the big payoffs and which would not be funded.

If you could choose, what would you fund?

SOFA Chicago

The SOFA Chicago show opens tomorrow night. SOFA or Sculptural Objects and Functional Art does three venues every year but the Chicago show is the largest. When you make the SOFA show, conventional wisdom goes, you've hit the big time. This will be the second year after having our work shown there three years in a row that we will not be represented. Does that mean that we have unhit the big time?

Last year at this time, I was devastated. Yes, the gallery had fulfilled their promise of active promotion for three years when they took us on; yes although they have sold 5 good pieces, our work is not a fast seller; yes, I had done no new work in the previous year and a half; yes, the economy crashed in the month before my last appearance at the show; yes, the economy is still stagnant with galleries going out of business. All this I knew and understood, understand. It didn't really make me feel any better even though we were busy with commission work.

Now, this year, a year later, I think about it and am glad I'm not going, am glad I don't have to go. I still feel a twinge about not being represented at the 'big show' but I'm working in the studio again and I think I have some other options out there. The first thing is to keep it happy, keep it fun and enjoyable because I was not having fun at those shows. I was not having a good time standing by my work on display, a clearing in a forest of red dots. I was not enjoying all that traveling just to stand in that clearing.

It's an awesome feeling, being at SOFA. Row upon row of some of the most fabulous high, fine Craft. It is art and Making. It is humbling and intimidating to have your work there. Not only are the patrons looking you over, deciding what they want to add to their collections but other gallery owners are too. They will follow an artist's work (and sales) and try and entice them away if they can.  

I'm glad for the experience and I expect to have my work shown there again in the future but it may be with a different gallery. Right now though I'm just having fun with the making. I'll decide what I want to do with the pieces once they are done.

various works (wax models and some glass components) in progress (it's a terrible picture I know, but I'm feeling lazy)

short stories 6

Now that the shelling has begun I've started to lose my enthusiasm for the collecting. In fact I'm getting very selective. I've abandoned my methodical back and forth, up and down of the yard. The welcome storm that blew in last night amid much lightning and thunder was the first we have had in long enough that everything was suffering from lack of rain and it gave the branches a good shaking. Enough leaves have fallen from the trees to see that there appear to be still some hangers on, but I think most have fallen now.

The cotton was harvested last month. Two years ago he used a huge machine, a house sized machine. This year he did it all with this small tractor and collector. This past week he has been turning the earth, turning under all the cotton that still lay on the ground, getting the field ready to rest for the winter.

I was out taking some pictures of the moonflower vine for the next set of pieces (which I haven't found much time to be working on lately) and this yellow jacket flew up and was extracting nectar from the base of the unopened buds. It let me take a few pictures but when it looked right at me I figured it was about to lose patience with me.

Here's the wren cast in black glass. This is straight out of the mold and after a bath in vinegar. I still have plenty of finish work to do on it as well as a good 1/8 inch to grind off the bottom. It'll probably take me 45 minutes, maybe longer. I had to cast it thicker than I wanted it to insure that the glass would not draw up out of the narrow areas and as it is, the beak didn't cast all the way. I think if I had packed the glass in the mold a little differently it might have filled that area. I may need to adjust my mental picture for the blue heron inlay box to allow for a thicker inlay. Maybe save me some time at the grinder.

So, we were coming back from the city Saturday, the day before Halloween mind you, when we passed one of the many subdivision/suburbs on our way out. There in the green space between the highway and the wall of the subdivision was a christmas tree. A decorated christmas tree. Before Halloween. Is that really necessary? I know that christmas is a joy to believers and children but can we just please limit it to the few weeks preceding it? If the company responsible for erecting the holiday decorations for that subdivision has so much work lined up that they have to start this early, then they need to hire more people. There are plenty of unemployed out there who would love some seasonal work. So please, don't start cramming it down our throats before Halloween or even Thanksgiving for that matter.