jexxblog

Today I was really proud of myself.

Even though I like smoking, I realize that it is a problem. It is expensive and smelly, and yes, lung cancer, etc. So I went to the doctor to get a prescription for Chantix. She and I discussed it, and even though there are side effects (abnormal dream patterns, possible nausea and/or constipation), we agreed that this was a fantastic course of action. I know someone who took the drug, and it worked for them. The doctor has prescribed this drug for many patients, to great success. By all accounts, it is the most successful program for quitting smoking permanently. Fan-feckin-tastic. I have my prescription!

Later in the day, I took my prescription to Wal~Mart to have it filled, and I went and had lunch at Chick-Fil-A, and when I came back at the suggested time, the pharmacy tech said that there was a problem with my prescription. Oh, I thought, it’s just taking longer is all. No. My insurance, TRICARE, doesn’t cover Chantix. Well, hell. How much is it going to be? $136.00 for the first week of pills. That’s seven days. In my area, I could buy nearly 5 cartons of cigarettes for that. That’s a month and a half of smoking.

If I took these pills for four weeks (mind you, the recommended usage is three months at least), that would be $544/month. That’s over half my rent on a nice three-bedroom house (with a large, fenced back yard).

This is the thing, it’s not even the money (well, yes it is, but mostly it’s not), it’s that you won’t help me. You, TRICARE, do have a program for smoking cessation which includes the prescription for the lesser (but still helpful) medication Zyban.  Unfortunately, it is only available for folks in Colorado, Kansas, Minnesota and Missouri. Thanks for nuthin’.

I don’t live near a Military Base where I can argue with TRICARE representatives myself, but I can find someone to help me in Charlotte. Well, shit, if I could afford the gas to get me to Charlotte, I might as well drive to frickin’ Fort Bragg and shout down someone in the Military Hospital itself!

So, when the DoD itself does a report on the three leading causes of death (tobacco use, obesity or lack of exercise, and alcohol abuse), and two of those causes are not pharmaceutically covered by TRICARE (smoking cessation and weight loss medications), one has to wonder what the hell the military thinks of us. Thanks for selling me cheap cigarettes at the commissary all these years, Army, I guess I’ll be dead from lung cancer before I start pulling from my husband’s retirement fund. Don’t want to be a burden. Hopefully my passing will be swift, otherwise I’ll still be using retirement TRICARE before you can pull those benefits away from us in the next round of budget cuts.

Thanks for nuthin’.

This past Friday, CR was supposed to go to his friend’s house while I went to Writing Club, but that fell through, so I took him with me. He thinks that he is a member. But he is a member that gets in the effing way and wants to be the center of attention and forgets how to honor other people. Yes, well, he is ten.

Eliza gave us all wind-up sushi toys, and that was to be our prompt for ten minute writing. CR had my wind-up sushi at the other end of the table, because he was racing our sushis. (That’s a set up for the writing.) He brought it back to me just as the writing prompt began.

So, here’s the exercise:

My wind-up sushi has made its way back to me.

I was going to complain about how my writing prompt, like so many of my actual physical things, has ended up in the hands of the Usurper. But he brought it back to me.

Typical. He steals even my complaints.

Even a not-terribly-good parent will find herself sublimating her wants every once in a while–>sacrificing Seinfeld for Blue’s Clues and the Ramones for Kelly Clarkson. It is the way of the Usurper to re-define the world (everyone’s world) to accommodate him.

Suddenly, baseball practice becomes a viable alternative to booze-fueled poker games and casseroles, once a competent solution to menu challenges, become “icky”.

The Usurper makes every outing a yes/no question.

“Is it worth the trouble of getting him dressed?”

Yes/No.

“Will he whine the whole time that he is bored?”

Yes/No.

“Will I be able to placate him with cake?”

Yes/No.

“Will my friends continue to clamor for my company after having been exposed to a virulent strain of the flu carried by the Usurper, who, like the Poor, is always with me?”

Yes. No.

Someday, the Usurper will have a job. And I will charge him rent.

Until then, as in all things, I cling with fingertips and toes to the edge of the bathtub like an unwilling cat determined not to be submerged in the reality belonging to the Usurper and denying me my rightful place on the throne of self-rule.

Thanks to Amber MacArthur and Leo LaPorte on the net@nite podcast, I found this website called wordle, that makes a word cloud out of any text that you cut/paste into the java applet thingie. It. Is. Awesome.

Remember, I am a word nerd.

I made a word cloud for my friend, zazabeans, and you can find it in the gallery here.

I was trying to think of what I am good at doing. It’s um, not a very long list. I was good at giving birth, but really, you can only do that so many times in your life, and then there’s a whole baby to take care of afterwards. No. Thank. You.

Hehe.

So, I know a lot of things, though, and can talk about them *as if* I am an expert. Is there a word for that? Why yes, there is!

From the Free Dictionary:

dil·et·tante

n. pl. dil·et·tantes also dil·et·tan·ti
1. A dabbler in an art or a field of knowledge.
2. A lover of the fine arts; a connoisseur.
adj.
Superficial; amateurish.

So, I was thinking of having business cards printed up with “Professional Dilettante” on them as a job title. I don’t have a business, or a title, or a job,  so what could it hurt?

CR just figured out what “deployed” means.

Let me set the scene: I am on the phone with Chuck, driving CR home from his friend’s house. (I know, I know, phoning and driving do not mix, but wait, my behavior becomes even *more* inappropriate) Chuck is explaining to me how he does not know yet where we are moving, as his orders are up at some other place and Recruiting needs to approve them and stuff, so basically, we don’t know Jack.

I said: “I’ll bet it gets complicated, because you have to be deployed soon, as you haven’t been deployed in 88 months or whatever the cut-off is.” (Turns out I’m wrong, but that’s neither here nor there)

So CR asked me what “deployed” means.

So I told him.

…

He’s aware enough of what’s going on to understand some of Afghanistan and Iraq, at least the part where people come home in coffins draped in flags.

He wailed, “What are we going to do if Daddy dies??!” And went on about it, and was crying.

This is where my desire to be truthful warred with my instinct to comfort him. And frankly, to keep peace in my home. I mean, it was really hard. I don’t like this war we are in, and I know that people are dying. I don’t like making promises on the off chance that I cannot keep them, and I do not like lying.

But I did. I lied. I lied a lot. And he knew it.

Famously said by my ten-year-old. Why?

This:

I told him that Uncle Scotty and I grew up on Troma films, and that we turned out okay!

Still, I wish it had been The Toxic Avenger, instead. A much better film. Erm. Relatively. And by better, I mean…well, The Toxic Avenger had Marisa Tomei, anyway. That’s something.

(Writing prompt from last night’s Writing Club meeting at Chelsee’s)

You’re on the verge of discovering something that will change your life forever–what is it?

Shortly, I will discover my true self.

I don’t know what she’ll look like, but I’ll tell you what my prior imaginings were:

When I was a teenager, I convinced myself that a dragon lived beneath my skin. I was a lizard in a people suit. I could feel the pulsating struggle of her wings beneath my shoulder blades and her impatience to be OUT. Even now I feel dense with reptilian muscle sometimes, lengths of me coiling restlessly–

When I was a kid, I felt the lack of a prehensile toe keenly. The tail I was never sure of, but opposable toe-thumbs are my phantom limbs.

My true inner self, now–looks just like me. Does the things that I do–maybe with a bit more panache.

Due to the vagaries of my shirt placement and a bright day at the baseball game (a double-header!), I have one sunburned chesticle. Just one. It looks pretty weird, and I’m sorry that I do not have a photograph. Perhaps I will add one later.

Meanwhile, I *do* have a photograph of Chuck giving CR some advice in the dugout. Enjoy.

That was the prompt at Writing Club today. So I wrote about my experiences at the Yorktown. *grin*

Slavering beasts
rumpling down the alley
making no effort
to conceal their hunger

I laugh in their faces
so close to mine
prying into my experience
divining porn for later

Beery breath assaults me
I feel the heat of their interest
as they crowd me with questions
and ply me with moonshine

More fool they
a barmaid for my nanny
my highschool years intoxicated
and my constitution fierce

Slowly, the poison
reaches their bladders
they must discontinue their pursuit
to relieve basic needs

Only I, iron britches,
rum-soaked rock,
remain unsullied
and free from shame.

Tomorrow I go on a boat with a ton of Cub Scouts. It’s a boat that isn’t going anywhere (the U.S.S. Yorktown ), and we will be camping on it.

There is no smoking on the boat.

There will be lots of children on the boat.

I repeat: no smoking. Also, no food or drink can be brought in, which sucks. A lot. Not even your own water bottle. They sell stuff on the ship (vending machines, I’m assuming?) and have a galley, so they want to make their money. Of course, I am tight as hell (my dad would call it ‘frugal’) and so this irks me.

One good thing: I am carpooling, so less $ on gas (of course, I will give Blake’s daddy gas money). Also, I don’t have to drive, so we won’t get lost (Ha!).

I’m getting kind of excited about this now. I don’t have to chaperon anybody except my own kid and that’ll be fine. Plus, the ladies and gentlemen sleep in separate quarters, and the ladies sleep in what was formerly officer’s quarters, which are nicer than where the boys are sleeping.

Oh! And I’m sure that some of you are worried that my snoring will bother my bunkmates! Guess what? They snore, too! (I had the foresight to try and warn them) So there .

So I will be away from my beloved for three days. But the computer could do with a good rest, anyhow.

(gotcha!)

That Man’s a little peeved at having to be home alone, but he’s working two of those three days anyway. Perhaps he will enjoy having the dogs all to himself!