RE: newsletter consistency. I've been terribly inconsistent, too, largely because of medical events in the past 15 months. Nothing as life-threatening as you've experienced.... yet. But major life changes are ahead to regain a cure for my right leg issues instead of getting worse.
I'm also in the broke-ass mf club. (Is there a secret handshake or safe words?)
After 2 years on a list, I'll move within 6 weeks to a nice subsidized old people apt, which should ease my financially precarious situation a little. Though most of my newsletter writing ended last March, the little newsletter income actually raised my rent at the new place by $31.
I could use more income but I'm starting to doubt that the Fraudfather is gonna appoint me to be ambassador to Holland as he's not answering my letters.
I'm familiar with depression, too, though I think mine's been more situational. Nearly 15 yrs of it from 1996 on due to post-divorce traumas I didn't expect, and a few shorter ones since like the year after Marlene died. In my case, having worked in a state mental institution and subsequent bad experiences with every counselor I went to once or twice earlier. I didn't seek counseling or treatment at all, trying to tough my way through it. I just didn't trust the mental health professionals at all.
I hope that you've found a good counselor, though, as I now recognize that's a critical part of treatment and possible recovery. I also requested help from my PCP and have been on Bupropn (Wellbutrin) for the past 18 months. It's good to hear your ketamine treatments are helping.
I think us West Coast and Hawaii residents - like New England residents - have a margin of safety from the incoming Plunderskunks due to fairly progressive state governments. But I'm not kidding myself. By 2026, the Techbozos will be skimming off every budget at every level of govt, privatizing every program at every level of govt and shipping us brokeass MFs to North Korea to fulfill their dietary needs.
In any case, I too am glad you still have energy to write now and then.
As for the perils you face with American healthcare, NEVER surrender hope. Not when you can sell your hope for 50 cents on the dollar. on the Aryancoin market. In the meantime, be well mmmkay?
Weldon, little did I know that you had something in common with Elon (Cursed Be His Name) Musk, namely regular ketamine sessions.
Sorry to hear about your health struggles. Sounds like shit is all fucked up and shit, which is our normal state of affairs, and what more is to say about that? I'm done with agonizing over politics, Trump, the Republicans, and the fucking Democrats, who had three jobs this year (beat Trump, keep the Senate, and take back the House), and they failed at all three. Fucking losers.
I've been off the various capitalist media platforms since the election because I just don't care any more. To quote the Reverend Jeremiah Wright, God damn America, and it's inability to to give a fuck about anything that matters, and it's love of bread and circuses (which consists mainly of watching the poor die, women get used as incubators, trans people get erased, and rich incompetent white fucks run everything into the ground, while their God Emperor Trump shoves another Quarterpounder into his dripping maw). My country 'tis of thee, sweet land of liberty (if you can afford it). I'm done.
As I am one of those lucky ones who won't bear the brunt (other than psychically) of the next four years of Kakistocracy, I am going to go full Tartuffe and tend my garden, while continuing to help out various charitable organizations that seem to be doing the most good for the most people (and that don't pay their administrators the equivalent of an SEC football coach). Not another fucking dime to politicians, though. Fuck them all. I'm convinced that the only thing that will bring about any real, lasting change is violent revolution. As Fred Douglas put it, "Power concedes nothing without a demand. It never did and it never will. If there is no struggle, there is no progress." The Civil War was the only thing that could end slavery. What will eventually end the rapaciousness and greed of capitalism is an exercise left to the reader. I have a feeling that the combination of climate change and the continued rise in income inequality will reach a boiling point where nothing is sustainable, and the kettle will scream. It (probably) won't happen in our lifetimes, but who knows. Maybe the commies are right and Trump II will finally heighten the contradictions to the point that the eschaton will be immanentized. Fucking Atrios. More likely we'll just continue to muddle through somehow, as things go from bad to worse.
Sorry for the doomerism, but god forgive me, I honestly thought that better times were ahead, and that American really was a place where people's better natures would triumph. Maybe they still will. But I've basically been living in a funk since 1980, when the First Horseman of the Apocalypse was elected and I realized that there were many, many assholes who just didn't give a fuck for anyone but themselves, and those people basically ran things. Then came the second horsemen, Bush Jr., which was eight years of living hell. Trump was the third, and I guess they decided not to bother with a fourth and just brought him back to finish the job. Whatever. Maybe I'm just a raving loony who needs to increase my Xanax dosage.
At any rate: Be good to yourself, and get out of life whatever pleasure is available to you. I hope you're around for awhile, at least until things get either slightly better or a little less worse. The world is a better place with you here.
Wait, you can get Xanax? My shrink absolutely refuses to prescribe it; he says there's a strong correlation between benzos and dementia. I made what I thought was the irrefutable argument that the cancer is likely to kill me long before the Xanax would rot my brain, but no joy.
Yeah, me and Elon . . . we have an average net worth of $200 billion. I don't know what I'm whining about. He seems more like a ketamine party guy; I can't imagine trying to interact with anybody else while under the influence. One of the main things I like about it is I get to not think or talk for a while. Just burrow into the couch (me & JD—my doctor's office has great furniture), put on the K-hole playlist and turn off the troublesome parts of the brain.
Fuckin' Elon, man. Trump has appointed at least a half dozen billionaires and he's worth more than all of them put together. He may actually have bought the U.S., or leased it, and for a pittance.
You're taking the right course, I think. Nothing to be done, really, or nothing that isn't extreme. Bless Barry Goldwater's heart. Best to mind your sanity. I don't have the self-discipline for it. I do miss seeing you around, though.
Thanks for the kind words and good wishes. Back at ya.
Damn it, I mistyped - my prescription is for Zoloft, not Xanax (which I highly recommend if you can get it - it's definitely taken some of the edge off). I get those two confused for some reason.
I might come back to Facebook after the first of the year. We'll see. It's been nice not having to deal with the inevitable post-mortems and finger-pointing. Staying away from current events mostly, and I've been watching more sports that I ever have in my life. If Marx was around now, he'd say that that was the actual opiate of the masses (unless you're losing your shirt betting on it, of course).
Well, shit, I had schemes in mind. I'm a Lexapro man myself, primarily because the people running Medicare and Medicaid insist that people taking the ketamine treatments—the mirror molecule esketamine delivered via a nasal spray, actually, because nobody can make money on the dirt-cheap real thing—take a traditional antidepressant or they won't pay. I have tried Zoloft in the past and like pretty much every other antidepressant known to insurance companies, it didn't do much for me. Ah well.
Welcome to the club of expensive treatments. I have ITP and no it is not an oil additive. Every once and awhile, my platelets take a vacation. Drop as far as a 1000 and after a number of drugs (steroids, IVIGs, etc. I end up at Rituxan. Four doses of that at 28,000 per dose and the platelets reappear. It has worked twice so far. Next step would be N-Plate pills.
It seems my stint in the USMC at Camp Lejeune drinking and showering in the water over two years created the issue. The water was tainted. The VA covers my issues. I have regular Medicare and Supplemental plus Part D. I think I paid for a lunch twice. Medicare Advantage is a rip off. And Supplemental policy (Plan N) is not cheap. It does cover Part B.
You might check with regular Medicare before you go back to it. There might be some issues. Once you leave regular Medicare, it is difficult to return.
Hope you get better. Never worried about the funds. I figured something was happening. Peace Weldon.
Hey, Bill. Thanks for the good wishes and the support. I'm sorry to hear about your troubles, and glad you're not getting financially clobbered for them. I have read a bit about the difficulty of jettisoning Medicare Advantage; hoping I can navigate it successfully. Thanks again.
Talk with Medicare first before you pitch Medicare Advantage. Once you go to a MA plan, you ,may lose the right to full coverage. In particular the Medicare Gap plans (Plan g or f or whatever) which cover what Traditional Medicare does not cover.
Gosh darn, I wish we had talked about this beforehand. Lets see how it turns out for you. I hope I am full of it.
You know if you talk, there are people who could and probably would pitch in to do something. Resubscribed.
You! You again, huzzah! Never have I been happier to see again what was once a regular name in my inbox! And never have I been so angry at health insurance and its evil will to kill people - and the idea you might be one of them? This just makes me want to Hulk smash something. Do everything to live. Listen to some Oliver Nelson. Illegitimi, yeah, non, yeah, carbor - but you know the drill. So good to see you again.
RE: newsletter consistency. I've been terribly inconsistent, too, largely because of medical events in the past 15 months. Nothing as life-threatening as you've experienced.... yet. But major life changes are ahead to regain a cure for my right leg issues instead of getting worse.
I'm also in the broke-ass mf club. (Is there a secret handshake or safe words?)
After 2 years on a list, I'll move within 6 weeks to a nice subsidized old people apt, which should ease my financially precarious situation a little. Though most of my newsletter writing ended last March, the little newsletter income actually raised my rent at the new place by $31.
I could use more income but I'm starting to doubt that the Fraudfather is gonna appoint me to be ambassador to Holland as he's not answering my letters.
I'm familiar with depression, too, though I think mine's been more situational. Nearly 15 yrs of it from 1996 on due to post-divorce traumas I didn't expect, and a few shorter ones since like the year after Marlene died. In my case, having worked in a state mental institution and subsequent bad experiences with every counselor I went to once or twice earlier. I didn't seek counseling or treatment at all, trying to tough my way through it. I just didn't trust the mental health professionals at all.
I hope that you've found a good counselor, though, as I now recognize that's a critical part of treatment and possible recovery. I also requested help from my PCP and have been on Bupropn (Wellbutrin) for the past 18 months. It's good to hear your ketamine treatments are helping.
I think us West Coast and Hawaii residents - like New England residents - have a margin of safety from the incoming Plunderskunks due to fairly progressive state governments. But I'm not kidding myself. By 2026, the Techbozos will be skimming off every budget at every level of govt, privatizing every program at every level of govt and shipping us brokeass MFs to North Korea to fulfill their dietary needs.
In any case, I too am glad you still have energy to write now and then.
As for the perils you face with American healthcare, NEVER surrender hope. Not when you can sell your hope for 50 cents on the dollar. on the Aryancoin market. In the meantime, be well mmmkay?
Thanks, Kevin. Hoping for the best for us all.
Weldon, little did I know that you had something in common with Elon (Cursed Be His Name) Musk, namely regular ketamine sessions.
Sorry to hear about your health struggles. Sounds like shit is all fucked up and shit, which is our normal state of affairs, and what more is to say about that? I'm done with agonizing over politics, Trump, the Republicans, and the fucking Democrats, who had three jobs this year (beat Trump, keep the Senate, and take back the House), and they failed at all three. Fucking losers.
I've been off the various capitalist media platforms since the election because I just don't care any more. To quote the Reverend Jeremiah Wright, God damn America, and it's inability to to give a fuck about anything that matters, and it's love of bread and circuses (which consists mainly of watching the poor die, women get used as incubators, trans people get erased, and rich incompetent white fucks run everything into the ground, while their God Emperor Trump shoves another Quarterpounder into his dripping maw). My country 'tis of thee, sweet land of liberty (if you can afford it). I'm done.
As I am one of those lucky ones who won't bear the brunt (other than psychically) of the next four years of Kakistocracy, I am going to go full Tartuffe and tend my garden, while continuing to help out various charitable organizations that seem to be doing the most good for the most people (and that don't pay their administrators the equivalent of an SEC football coach). Not another fucking dime to politicians, though. Fuck them all. I'm convinced that the only thing that will bring about any real, lasting change is violent revolution. As Fred Douglas put it, "Power concedes nothing without a demand. It never did and it never will. If there is no struggle, there is no progress." The Civil War was the only thing that could end slavery. What will eventually end the rapaciousness and greed of capitalism is an exercise left to the reader. I have a feeling that the combination of climate change and the continued rise in income inequality will reach a boiling point where nothing is sustainable, and the kettle will scream. It (probably) won't happen in our lifetimes, but who knows. Maybe the commies are right and Trump II will finally heighten the contradictions to the point that the eschaton will be immanentized. Fucking Atrios. More likely we'll just continue to muddle through somehow, as things go from bad to worse.
Sorry for the doomerism, but god forgive me, I honestly thought that better times were ahead, and that American really was a place where people's better natures would triumph. Maybe they still will. But I've basically been living in a funk since 1980, when the First Horseman of the Apocalypse was elected and I realized that there were many, many assholes who just didn't give a fuck for anyone but themselves, and those people basically ran things. Then came the second horsemen, Bush Jr., which was eight years of living hell. Trump was the third, and I guess they decided not to bother with a fourth and just brought him back to finish the job. Whatever. Maybe I'm just a raving loony who needs to increase my Xanax dosage.
At any rate: Be good to yourself, and get out of life whatever pleasure is available to you. I hope you're around for awhile, at least until things get either slightly better or a little less worse. The world is a better place with you here.
Ed
Wait, you can get Xanax? My shrink absolutely refuses to prescribe it; he says there's a strong correlation between benzos and dementia. I made what I thought was the irrefutable argument that the cancer is likely to kill me long before the Xanax would rot my brain, but no joy.
Yeah, me and Elon . . . we have an average net worth of $200 billion. I don't know what I'm whining about. He seems more like a ketamine party guy; I can't imagine trying to interact with anybody else while under the influence. One of the main things I like about it is I get to not think or talk for a while. Just burrow into the couch (me & JD—my doctor's office has great furniture), put on the K-hole playlist and turn off the troublesome parts of the brain.
Fuckin' Elon, man. Trump has appointed at least a half dozen billionaires and he's worth more than all of them put together. He may actually have bought the U.S., or leased it, and for a pittance.
You're taking the right course, I think. Nothing to be done, really, or nothing that isn't extreme. Bless Barry Goldwater's heart. Best to mind your sanity. I don't have the self-discipline for it. I do miss seeing you around, though.
Thanks for the kind words and good wishes. Back at ya.
Damn it, I mistyped - my prescription is for Zoloft, not Xanax (which I highly recommend if you can get it - it's definitely taken some of the edge off). I get those two confused for some reason.
I might come back to Facebook after the first of the year. We'll see. It's been nice not having to deal with the inevitable post-mortems and finger-pointing. Staying away from current events mostly, and I've been watching more sports that I ever have in my life. If Marx was around now, he'd say that that was the actual opiate of the masses (unless you're losing your shirt betting on it, of course).
Enjoy the holidays.
Well, shit, I had schemes in mind. I'm a Lexapro man myself, primarily because the people running Medicare and Medicaid insist that people taking the ketamine treatments—the mirror molecule esketamine delivered via a nasal spray, actually, because nobody can make money on the dirt-cheap real thing—take a traditional antidepressant or they won't pay. I have tried Zoloft in the past and like pretty much every other antidepressant known to insurance companies, it didn't do much for me. Ah well.
Weldon, I responded to your email. For music, "Going down the Road Feelin' Bad" by the Grateful Dead. It never gets old.
Jack
Weldon:
Welcome to the club of expensive treatments. I have ITP and no it is not an oil additive. Every once and awhile, my platelets take a vacation. Drop as far as a 1000 and after a number of drugs (steroids, IVIGs, etc. I end up at Rituxan. Four doses of that at 28,000 per dose and the platelets reappear. It has worked twice so far. Next step would be N-Plate pills.
It seems my stint in the USMC at Camp Lejeune drinking and showering in the water over two years created the issue. The water was tainted. The VA covers my issues. I have regular Medicare and Supplemental plus Part D. I think I paid for a lunch twice. Medicare Advantage is a rip off. And Supplemental policy (Plan N) is not cheap. It does cover Part B.
You might check with regular Medicare before you go back to it. There might be some issues. Once you leave regular Medicare, it is difficult to return.
Hope you get better. Never worried about the funds. I figured something was happening. Peace Weldon.
Bill
Hey, Bill. Thanks for the good wishes and the support. I'm sorry to hear about your troubles, and glad you're not getting financially clobbered for them. I have read a bit about the difficulty of jettisoning Medicare Advantage; hoping I can navigate it successfully. Thanks again.
Weldon:
Talk with Medicare first before you pitch Medicare Advantage. Once you go to a MA plan, you ,may lose the right to full coverage. In particular the Medicare Gap plans (Plan g or f or whatever) which cover what Traditional Medicare does not cover.
Gosh darn, I wish we had talked about this beforehand. Lets see how it turns out for you. I hope I am full of it.
You know if you talk, there are people who could and probably would pitch in to do something. Resubscribed.
You! You again, huzzah! Never have I been happier to see again what was once a regular name in my inbox! And never have I been so angry at health insurance and its evil will to kill people - and the idea you might be one of them? This just makes me want to Hulk smash something. Do everything to live. Listen to some Oliver Nelson. Illegitimi, yeah, non, yeah, carbor - but you know the drill. So good to see you again.
Hi, Hilary. Thanks for the warm welcome; means a lot. I'm happy to see you as well.