After a rather good night’s kip I opened my Lego Advent
Calendar and pondered.
After I’d shaved I saw that everyone else had got up. I say
“got up” – the dogs had gone from sleeping on the bed to sleeping on the
sofa and dog beds.
I made toast and had my usual rummage round the Internet.
It was the same as ever. Fewer and fewer people seem to be posting on social
media (or if they are, I don’t see it), but one of the posts I saw made
me think. There’s been an episode in America where the
head honcho of a healthcare insurance scheme was recently killed. Healthcare in
America is different to here in the UK. In the UK we have (for the most part)
one organization which provides healthcare as is needed. That healthcare being
given on the grounds of independently generated guidelines being applied to
each case. In America it seems that healthcare is provided in the basis of how
much money you’ve paid the insurance company, and the insurance companies are
getting more and more picky about what they will pay for in order to maximise
their profits. Not that they will pay out the full amount anyway. And
healthcare ain’t cheap. I can remember thirty years ago my boss at the time
priced up the cost of a standard treatment for anyone presenting with a
particular form of blood cancer. Back then the treatment cost one hundred and
ten thousand pounds. I can remember a friend spending a couple of weeks in an
ITU bed and an American friend telling me that even with insurance, in the USA
you’d have to sell your house to make up the money not covered by the
insurance.
Healthcare ain’t cheap.
But so many Americans feel the state-provided healthcare
offered by pretty much the rest of the world is fundamentally a bad thing. I
wish I knew why.
I decided against going to the woods this morning. The
weather was alternating between glorious sunshine ant torrential rain showers
every fifteen minutes, and the dogs were asleep anyway. They seem to know when
we are going out (when they get very over-excited) and when we aren’t (when
they carry on sleeping).
Instead I drove up to the post office to post a couple of
cards and to collect a parcel. Apparently Royal Mail had tried to deliver a
parcel on Saturday; I only found out when I looked at my Amazon account and saw
that it said “Held for pickup at carrier location”. The chap at the
parcel office wasn’t impressed that I had no delivery slip. He didn’t actually
call me a liar when I said that one hadn’t been left but wasn’t keen on typing
the tracking number into his system. Particularly when on the second attempt he
wondered if it might have been on the other system. It was on the second system
after all. Sadly being on the second system meant that the parcel had just been
chucked on a huge pile out the back of the sorting office on Saturday evening
and the staff would deal with it when they has people in. Apparently this chap
was working on his own.
I was told they will send me an email if and when they find
it, but ironically the parcel arrived at home a couple of hours later.
I went on to Tesco where again there were dozens (if not
hundreds) of people blundering around completely unaware that there were
dozens (if not hundreds) of other people in the shop as well.
I’d arrived at Tesco in sunshine; I left in torrential
rain. By the time I’d made us both a cuppa the sunshine was back again.
I did have plans to repair the poggered cupboard in the
bedroom today, but “er indoors TM” said that it
wasn’t a job I could do on my own. I think that was more “not allowed to”
rather than “not capable of”, but that left me at something of a loose
end.
I wrote up some CPD then had a
little look at my bank account. Every month I’ve been giving money to the Kent
Wildlife Trust. I have no idea who or what they are, and I only set up the
payments on account of the impressive chest being brandished by the young lady
on their fundraising stall at the County show a few years ago.
In all honesty I’d rather give a bung to the goat
sanctuary.
When at a loose end I usually spend my time watching telly.
I started off with episodes of “Four in a Bed”. Today’s episodes
followed the standard format of three rather good bed and breakfast
establishments being criticized for every piddling detail by someone who
considered themselves to be a “big businessman” who in fact was running
a rather piss-poor dive.
I followed this with an episode of “Downton Abbey”
in which it transpired that Lady Edith’s paramour has vanished leaving her
tubbed, and once “er indoors TM” had set off
bowling I watched more of “The Empress”. She too was tubbed, but seemed
more chuffed about it than Lady Edith was.
As I watched telly the torrential rain continually alternated
with clear spells…
And the Normal People have arrived in my Lego
Advent story…
No comments:
Post a Comment