epic endtimes fail
subtitle: “What are the odds?”
I was just reading BigIsTheNewSmall’s post on the latest socially network engineered wave of account compromise, and how to deal with it. People often make the mistake of thinking that this is about penetrating a particular operating system, network, or targeted group using a brand spanking new method. In all actuality, it’s the oldest game in the book. Taking advantage of human nature in the fallen state.
Scott lists several methods of avoiding being taken advantage of again, and of course, misses the only one that works.(grin)
It’s not his fault. Human nature tells us we must fight to win. We must resist the dark side of the force. We must be perfect. It works if you work it.
Let’s just focus on innocence and sloth, and how this particular wave works on human nature. Innocence allows us to indulge curiosity’s desire to learn, to posses, to acknowledge or to share. We click because Eve bit the apple. In the fallen state, sin is the default condition, not the temptation itself. Our tendency is to blame Eve, but the reality is that both humans in a perfect, created, state of mind, chose to yield.
What makes you think we’re any better? Sin, of course. So we click and we get “owned” and we feel shame and anger and confusion. Which simply conditions us for the next reaction; sloth.
How many of you have been compromised? By some innocent action of your own, or the action of a relative or friend with access to your access device. It happens. So what do we do? We obey the list of cures! Until we stop. It’s human nature in the fallen state. Just like sinners fall into one of three camps; wolf, sheep or both, we also fall into one of three states of human nature; con, mark or both.
Works tells us that if we just put the effort into it, we can educate ourselves out of danger. That’s about as realistic in the long run as Paul’s statement in Romans about wanting to do the good things he wants to do, and instead doing those things that he knows will deaden the soul.
So what hope is there in this epic endtimes failure? Will we be able to keep our Smartphone’s and Twitter and Facebook accounts firewalled against the forces of evil? Is the answer the same for both? In a world where sinful man lives in a fallen state, what possible hope is there?
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So, are you following step 5?
Change your password every couple of months and immediately after opening any of the above-mentioned links.
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And it needs to be at least 15 characters long, composed of a mix of upper and lower case letters, numbers and symbols, with no relation to any information related to you that’s easy for you to remember like birthdays, anniversaries pet names, etc. Oh, and you can never change it back to one you’ve had before.
What? Too much work?
(grin)
the gay agenda
“subtitle: YOU NEVER BREAK UP A GIRL FIGHT! EVER!
another subsubtitle: GET BACK DOWN YOU FATTY FATTY!
Did you see Neil Patrick Harris on Conan the other night? Yes, we’re already calling the Tonight Show “Conan”. I’m sorry but he owned it. Anyway, I didn’t know Neil was gay before I watched it. I mean, he’s a hilariously funny womanizing character, who just this last season started a longer than one night stand relationship with one of the other gang of five, on How I Met Your Mother.
If you haven’t seen this sitcom, and you’re one of the aliens who’s OK with watching TV, check it out. I laughed until I cried! Literally! I’d mention his role on Doogie Howser, M.D., but that would REALLY date me. (grin)
So now there are two openly gay actors, AKA “Hollywood Elitists” who MUST be promoting the feared “Gay Agenda”, right? Right? Buford? Hello? Have we so quickly put the “Gay Agenda” behind us? Are we not still worried about the Gays corrupting Heterosexual Marriage and molesting our straight children straight into Hell?
In case you were wondering, the other openly gay actress is NOT Ellen DeGeneres. Ellen has acted in her career, but right now she is a well known, and well liked, even by some of you aliens, comedienne, talk show host AND soon to be American Idol judge!
It’s her wife; Portia De Rossi. She’s presently acting in another very funny sitcom called Better Off Ted. I mean come on! With all these openly gay people creeping into our beloved television characters, when they are really just ““Hollywood Elitists” with a “Gay Agenda”, there’s gotta be something suitably creepy and evil to rant about!
So sorry Neil, I know your star is rising in both the straight and gay communities, and an Awesome High Five for representing, but Portia was there first! What? I’m afraid I’m a bit clueless when it comes to the whole Gay Agenda movement. Are there other more prominent Gays out there evilly forcing our children to become gay?
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It’s easy to distance yourself from any group of sinners by dehumanizing them. So let me try to bring it into your comfort zone. If an openly lesbian couple came to your church and wanted to be “saved”, would you tell them they had to get divorced first? Or eventually?
Now imagine it’s Ellen and Portia, only with kids. No not their pets. I know that offends pet mommas and poppas everywhere. Even my cat just gave me a dirty look from his throne. The other computer chair.
I actually have a serious reason for posting this. A lesbian couple is helping us financially. They don’t actually talk about being gay, at least they haven’t mentioned it to me. The only reason I know is because my wife told me. She knows them from the online world. My wife is so much better at making friends than I am. (grin) Still, I’m sure they MUST be part of the Gay Agenda. I mean, after all, they are gays.
Fine. I’ll admit it. This entire post was just an excuse to link to my favorite tune by The Tubbies! (grin)
Which group do you think is the more worthy target? Fatties or gays?
trust me
subtitle: Really?
I get to go to my other job, computer tech support, today. I have to upgrade a laptop from Visa to Windows 7, and install MS Office. I’ve only allowed six hours for the job. What? It’s Windows. My stepchild asked me why she couldn’t play a certain movie DVD on the laptop when she could play all the others? Same answer. What? It’s Windows! OK that was Vista. This is Windows 7. It’s not gonna have any of the problems Vista had. Trust me. Oh come on! I know you’ve seen that commercial!
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I don’t actually get paid for this job. Except in love. And time, which I have in abundance these days. But let me just comment on my last post, which was just a comment on the post before that:
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Hah! Bet you thought I was gonna show you a Really segment with Seth and Amy from SNL? I wanted to. I really did. But this video had more impact. Impact, get it? Get it? Nobody can take a joke anymore. (grin)
Fine, take this:
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Hah! Bet you thought you had more time before the ridicule started amping up. (grin)
OK seriously, stop sending me emails offering me cash. I have my pride, my dignity, my self-esteem to think of. I also have a link and an email address; (jimmyparavane@gmail.com). Go to http://www.givinganon.org and give it to me there. No really! (grin)
Sorry. Couldn’t resist. What? I’m still the Paravane! It could have been worse. Trust me…(grin)
we don’t health care part 2
subtitle: Ask a simple question? You do know that I’m the paravane, right? (grin)
Hya Heidi. What do I think of Health Care reform? Long answer first:
I dread getting the mail out of the mailbox now. Right now we’re at $1532.00, in payments due this month to medical service providers, and were less than half-way through the month.
We’re closing in on our monthly fixed income from her Long Term Disability and SSD, you know, the money we use to pay all the other bills; mortgages, utils, gas, auto insurance, food and all the little things that you think you need to get by; razor blades, shaving cream, soap, cleaning supplies for kitchen and bathrooms, etc.
Oh, we also have to use that income to pay for all the so-called cheap generics. We’re at about $200.00 a month on those. And every once in awhile, can’t get free samples of the brand names, so we have to pay full price for one or two of those. Had to do it for her Prevacid this month; $175.00. PaP hasn’t been approved yet. Oh well.
We don’t eat out and her sisters buy us Angel Food boxes every month, so that’s our version of food stamps, which we don’t qualify for. I’m a lazy bum because all I do all day is stay home and take care of my wife who has Dementia and RF. I can’t afford to hire even an illegal alien to care of my wife while I get a job and work. We depend on the kindness of family and friends by gratefully accepting money from them. That’s always good for your self-esteem, but who can afford self-esteem these days?
I don’t go to a doctor or ER unless I’m dying. Actually dying. I just have to shrug off those chest pains and almost daily sinus headaches and migraines and feeling like I just want to slit my throat and get it over with because doctors and shrinks are not cheap. Have you ever actually seen what medications cost when you don’t have health insurance? I try not to. I can’t afford the heart attack or stress. Except for my Xanax, the dosage of which I’ve had to have increased twice now, and am closing in on feeling like I need it bumped up again real soon. Possibly because I often yield to the temptation to over medicate myself to sleep at night so I can get more than 2 or 3 hours. They say sleep is a good thing, and who am I to argue with “them”?
We don’t have the money for the only brand name high cholesterol medication my wife can take, but I’ve got a Patient Medical Assistance Program application in, and hopefully they will approve it. Soon. Before her arteries get too clogged up again. Good thing the two meds that actually keep her alive on a daily basis are generic.
We can’t afford all the Brand name meds and blood work and UA’s and sudden trips to the ER that having the stints in that make sure she doesn’t go into renal failure due to a sudden build up of toxins can lead to. So if she starts to feel really really sick and back spasms and murky urine, we’ll have to hope it’s not that, and wait it out. So when it came time to change the necessary stints out for new ones, we had to just have them taken out. She hasn’t died yet, so there’s that.
A lesbian couple that funds an FTD awareness Foundation insists on paying our monthly Broadband access service so that my wife can continue to participate in their FTD forum for victims of FTD and their caregivers and families. Otherwise, we would have had to turn it off. We’ve had to turn off Netflix, (and MY WoW account!), every unnecessary monthly payment, etc. Internet access was next when they heard about it and insisted on paying for it.
I stopped worrying about the cost to my self-esteem a long time ago. We’ll take money from family, friends, casual acquaintances, uhm hey! Anybody out there…dang ,I KNEW I should have finished that GodsPal button! You know, like a PayPal button except when you press it, not only do you get to make a “donation”, but you get to be God’s Pal too! (grin)
We only use the car for necessary trips, Doctor appointments, Groceries, Church, the occasional stay at her mothers for which she pays for the gas there and back. I could go on and on, but if you don’t get my point by now, you won’t.
Not having Health Care Insurance effects every aspect of our lives. We don’t pay medical service provider deductibles or co-pays. We pay cash. Upfront. Or we don’t get seen. Paid $65 for a doctor’s appt. today. Haven’t filled the 7 prescriptions from that single appointment, yet. Actually, we use our credit card with it’s rapidly increasing unpaid balance.
I could care less about Health Care Reform. I don’t have the time, patience or money to give a damn. It would be nice to not have to think more than twice about going to the doctor or the Emergency Room. But we don’t have that luxury. We have to spend money on things like food and mortgages and gas and utilities. You know, luxuries like that.
And as far as spending anything on the kids, you know, my stepdaughter and son-in-law and grandchild? I can’t talk about that at all without wanting to do harm to someone. No more happy meals, no more spare change, no more “oh don’t worry about that, I’ll pay for it.” I have to sit there and pretend I don’t notice when my grandchild looks at me when her mom says no to some silly small thing she wants at the store. Actual physical harm! If I could just figure out who did this to me.
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So I guess the short answer to how I feel about Health Care Reform is that I take it very personally. And I’m very pissed off. And feel very helpless. Dang it, this was long enough for a post, and I wasted it on a comment! Wait…no I didn’t. Thanks Heidi. (grin)
Editorial Update: There was too a part one!
family matters
subtitle: the dog ate my homework
I didn’t get the response to Heidi’s comment post about how I feel about Health Care in light of a previous post posted yesterday. Sorry about that. The stepchild needed me for chauffeur duties. Taking massive doses of steroids all your life, so that you can breathe and not die from severe asthma, catches up with you in your 30’s. On the plus side, I got to spend the day with my stepchild! So there’s that.
I’ll try to get the post out tonight. We have a doctor’s appointment today. Without Health Care Insurance. Your God’s sense of humor really bugs me sometimes. (grin)
tales of hope and temptation
subtitle: “nothing’s gonna change my world”
On the one hand, I have a hospital bill for $1032.35, we wait on the “this is your final notice!” statement before we call and arrange a monthly payment plan, might as well. On the other hand, I have a check for $150.00 that places me in a moral quandary.
The bill, I know we owe. I know exactly why we owe it, and I’m used to working the system to pay it off as we can, when we can, without letting it hit our credit record. So far so good.
But the check is from someone with a caregiver. And now for the rest of the story. What? I’ve already been compared to Andy Rooney! I might as well shoot for the big guns! (grin)
I keep going back to incidents that happened over 14 years ago, about the time I first moved to OKC. This particular time I was driving on a cold and rainy day, and before anyone leaps there, I wasn’t intoxicated or on any medication. I was just still arrogant enough to believe that I would never be the cause of an accident. Not by doing anything so foolish as to assume that no one would be driving in my blind spot when I decided to make a sudden un-signaled lane change. On the freeway, on an overpass, on a cold and rainy day, with patches of ice on the overpass.
The back, driver’s side corner of my car met the front passenger side bumper of a 3/4 ton truck. The driver of the truck said he didn’t have any time to react, and watched helplessly as my car suddenly swerved across all lanes of traffic to wind up against the railing of the overpass. I was lucky. I got to watch all of this from the passenger seat of my car. Oh, did I mention I wasn’t wearing a seatbelt? I didn’t get a scratch either. The truck got a small scratch in his bumper. My car was totaled. Nobody else was involved.
But as the adrenaline wore off, and I realized I was in the passenger seat with nobody at the wheel of the car, I began to question my judgment. What? You’ve never been there? (grin)
In a few hours, I have to risk offending my wife’s friend, the one who sent us the check. I have to call her caregiver and ask if she is aware that her charge sent us this check.
A few month’s ago, my wife was feeling much better. She was happy, aware, alert, doing our finances again, controlling her own medications, and she got her driver’s license renewed. Those last two happened against medical advice, but heck, she had made so much progress, and you can’t fight progress, right?
This culminated in the incident that occurred three days before we had to re-commit her to the Senior Diagnostic Unit for treatment of manic delirium. We call it the “muddin for God” story. Don’t ask. Let’s just say that I began to once again question my judgment in allowing her to drive. Again. What can I possibly say to excuse this decision? How about hope for a loved one is very addictive and persuasive? Never mind. I guess you have to have been there. Believe me, where I had to go next was worse.
As her caregiver, I had to ask her Psychiatrist to issue a written statement that she was incapable of driving. Ever again. I had to take away her driver’s license and her keys. Again and for the last time. No matter how much “improvement” she may show or experience in the future.
Still, we don’t go out to eat anymore. Can’t afford it. We are allowing her sisters to buy us Angel Food Ministries boxes every month to stretch out our food budget. I’ve PAP’d every non-generic medication she has that I can, and still wince at the amount we have to pay every month for generics and medical service bills that can’t be avoided in serious or emergency health care situations. And the health insurance is gone.
At this point, even $150.00 out of the blue is a lot of spare change. Sometimes acting in a godly manner is a pain.
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This has become one of my favorite versions of this song. I love the emotional and visual contrast. The movie wasn’t that bad either. Gotta give mad props to the Rufus Wainwright cover as well.
Fifty years of personal experience have taught me that the reality I live in is a creation of God. Godly behavior always gets a better result in the long run. Hey, have any of you watched FlashForward? My wife says it’s really good, so I’m going to watch the first seven episodes today. I still trust her taste. It’s her judgment that I have no choice but to start to question. For her own safety, as well as that of others. I hate that. I’d rather nothing change my world.
Wouldn’t you?
tuna fish salad sandwiches rock
Subtitle: Jesus invented the 3 day rule
So what is the three day rule all about anyway? Who cares! Isn’t Neil Patrick Harris funny?
“Barney: Plus, it’s Sunday, so everyone’s in church already. They’re all in there, “Oh no, Jesus is dead”.Then, bam! He burst through the back door, runs up the aisle. Everyone ’s totally psyched. And, FYI, that’s when he invented the high-five.”
Can you tell I’m almost through Season 4? Have you watched all the episodes of every season of a good sitcom since you first heard of it this year? This is my 3rd one.
In case you were wondering, I just got back from a week at my mother-in-law’s house in Bella Vista. Nice foliage, hills, dales, etc. I stayed in the basement almost the entire time watching TV and reading Sci-Fi. Hard stuff too! Honor Harrington, dude. Just can’t get enough of that chick. Or is it dude? I mean, David Weber writes the Honor Universe stuff. With other people sometimes, but mainly other dudes.
Can you tell I’ve run out of things to talk about? Hey, that last post should’ve included the theme song from Smallville. I got like, zero responses to teh theme, dudez. Oh well. I did get comments! (grin)
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If only we could get Neil Patrick Harris to front for Shinedown in Save me:
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What? Too soon after the good, the bad, and the ugly? Have you seen the Remy Zero Live version of the Smallville theme song?
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Well now you have, sunshine. (grin)
Can you tell we’re in better spirits? We have absolutely no reason to be, but you can’t be depressed all the time. It’s just not healthy. Besides, the Dow is up today! So far… What? I can’t be happy for it even if I don’t own any?
Scuse me while I go eat the Tuna fish Salad Sandwiches my wife just made. With some lettuce, yeah baby, that’s the stuff. The secret to good Tuna fish is to make sure it’s half egg salad. Why not? And she made ice tea. Home made ice tea. Yeah, you heard me. Want some? (grin)
sinner for sale
subtitle here: you’ve got God. I only have me.
I saw this over on Candid Chatter and couldn’t resist stealing it. Heidi did all the heavy lifting. (grin)
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I’m going to add this to my About Page. It’s why I keep coming back every time I give up. Any takers? Bueller? Bueller? (grin)
the ugly
subtitle: why can’t the bitch just drop dead already?
I’m not above confessing. As long as we’re being all transparent. The truth is there are times when I wish she would just die already. I’m hating this descent into madness. “We” are ever so agonizingly spiraling deeper and deeper into it mentally, physically, spiritually every day. And because it’s a “relationship”, and I have to say those words; “she’d be there for me if our positions were reversed”, I have to stay. I can’t run. No matter how tempting that is. Just to give up and run.
As she loses more and more of the person I married, and I have to go through these exhausting, sleep-deprived, soul numbing, brain on fire nights and days of her ranting religious ideation that makes a mockery of her beliefs, there are times when I wish she was dead.
Yeah, I know. Pitiful and disgusting. There’s more. I hate the person I’m becoming almost as much as I hate the person she’s becoming. And since I already had low self-esteem issues before she had to go and get prematurely old and senile and unhealthy on me, it’s not a pretty picture I am painting for you.
I wake up from nightmares of what my life was like before her and what it’s most likely going to be like after she dies and I blame her, you, God, anybody but me. Right now my brain burns from lack of sleep and worry and this constant need to try and “fix” everything and take care of everybody and I’m not that guy. But I have to be. And it’s all her fault.
Get better or drop dead. I don’t know who you are anymore. I’m tired. I’m sick. And I’m sick and tired of being “there” for you when you can’t be there for you. Or for me. I want to scream and yell and pick you up and throw you across the room. I don’t want to have to become the parent, and be comforting and sympathetic and all that bullshit. And never ever again get to just yell and scream at an equal, my wife, and then make up. She took that from me. And she takes more every day.
Give me back my wife, you selfish, childish, needy bitch. Or just drop dead. So I can be free of both of us. I don’t have to be here. I don’t have to do this. I can leave.
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I just don’t have anywhere to go now. You became my home.
Ugly enough for you?
the bad
Subtitle: dwindling from the middle class
I’m not above begging. We have been notified:
Dear Demented, Pre-senile(so no DHS help because yer not 60), Manic Depressive, Preconditions etc., person. Please be advised that your Health Plan coverage ended as of October 9, 2009 because you have incurred $100,00 in processed claims. You should have stayed healthier, but you didn’t. Be grateful you have SSD. We know we are, because we expect to get as much of it as possible in the near future, and here’s why:
As a reminder, the Health Plan has a maximum benefit of $100,000. You will be responsible for any claims incurred over $100,000 that we approved and paid out at 100% without checking first to see if you had any of the $100,000 left. Just consider us another creditor that will be making those annoying phone calls night and day to harass you into paying us our money. And thanks for participating in the program! The data we gathered will be invaluable to us. Not to you of course. But have a nice quality of life. If you can.
OK, I admit I took a few liberties with the formatted letter notifying us that we are now among the many people falling through the doughnut hole between Employed Health Care participation and Medicare.
So I called her family Doctor to change her next appointment to a Free Clinic Day since the Insurance Card won’t “work” anymore, who has been treating her, her daughter, and her granddaughter(and tolerating me at her free clinic)for many years.
Guess what? She’s had to join the Health Care network. She couldn’t afford to maintain her Clinic, Free and otherwise independently any longer. So now her Clinic is a member of the Deaconess network! Oh, by the way, the Free Clinic had to go. I mean, Deaconess may be one of the best in the city in dealing with patients who have pre-senile dementia, but they still have to make a buck. Off of every patient’s Health Care Provider. That IS how the system works. So, non-Patients Of Means need not show up any longer. But have a nice quality of life. If you can.
We knew it was coming. All she has to do is not get sick or go crazy. That’s what they call it when you don’t have Health Insurance, not Bipolarism symptoms or Religious Ideation brought on by stress, Sundowning, or necessary medication adjustments by Health Plan Doctors as indicated by blood work and other expensive but necessary tests. Necessary IF you have Health Care coverage. Otherwise, get in line and beg like all the other bums.
I will. I will hit up every doctor and therapist she’s ever seen for samples and signatures on PaP’s. I will find a way for the blood work she has to have done to make sure she doesn’t go into kidney or renal failure can be done. I’ll find a way to pay for any emergency trips to the ER or Inpatient stays at Geriatric Diagnostic Units that she needs.
And we will wait until she gets to climb out of the “doughnut hole” next May. That is, if Medicare is still there, and they haven’t pushed her qualifying date off even further. I mean, we are in the middle of “Health Care Reform”.
Which I’m sure will benefit the rapidly disappearing middle class and the exponentially growing marginalized class(the shiny new Politically Correct term for Poor). Not the Wealthy. I mean this IS America! Home of Capitalism or yer a commie pinko fascist! What? I left out Or the Terrorist win and Get a job you bum? My bad.
One thing that’s puzzling me is when they compare mandatory health insurance to mandatory auto insurance. I mean, if you don’t own a car, you aren’t required to have auto insurance. So, what don’t you have to have to not be required to have the mandatory health insurance? Life? Health? Citizenship? Oh come on! They aren’t gonna take away your Life or Citizenship!
Speaking of begging, I saw this thing on TV about Anonymous Donations you can make online to anybody! You just need to provide their email address! You get a copy of the check cashed by the recipient as proof that your donation was actually received by the person you wanted to donate to Anonymously. Here I am, begging. It doesn’t have to be anonymous. When it comes to my wife or family, I’ll do just about anything. Just ask.
Here’s the site: http://www.givinganon.org/ My email address is jimmyparavane@gmail.com. Can you spare a brother $100K? $50K? $10K? five bucks? Seriously, looking at the medical bills we’ve stacked up without knowing we’d reached her cap, and needed to just let her suffer or die, well, I’ll take any amount. What? I’m not allowed to ask for money here? Oh. My bad.
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So, how’s your QOL? That’s Quality Of Life, for those of you not familiar with the Health Care lingo. Yet. Ours is just peachy.
