Don’t Tase Me for Medicare Fraud, Bro

 

I’ve been a bad puppy. At least it seems that way. But I never meant for it to go down like it did. Still, I suppose it’s ultimately my fault, my responsibility and I’m the one who’s got to make it right.

Let me tell you what happened.

About six months ago I received a notice from my Medicare supplemental insurance provider—let’s call them “Purple Cross Purple Shield”-- that my pharmacy had not collected enough of a co pay on a prescription purchase I’d made months earlier. “This is not a bill,” they assured me. “We will deduct the money from over payments you make in the future.” Apparently they got tired of waiting for over payments, because last week I did receive a bill in the mail for the full amount of the underpayment. All 22 cents of it.

That’s 22 cents.

Cents, not dollars.

Cents.

Now, I have no idea how much it cost them to send me that bill. The bill for 22 cents, that is. I have no idea how much it cost them to enclose a postage paid envelope or if it will cost them anything on their end when they receive it back, and I don’t know how much it will cost them to process that payment when they receive it. All 22 cents of it. But it didn’t make a lot of sense (that’s “sense” not “cents”) to me why an organization that had handled my health care costs promptly and efficiently up to that point would suddenly start hyperventilating over 22 cents,  Then I read a little further into the letter, and there it was. “The Centers for Medicare & Medicaid Services requires us to attempt to collect the balance owed.” So it’s not Purple Cross Purple Shield that decided to go into full collection mode over the 22 cents at all. It’s the government agency charged with controlling health care costs. Now I was beginning to understand.

On the plus side, the government agency never claimed that I purposely withheld the 22 cents, but they did insist on their right to a reimbursement of those funds. In a more perfect world, the agency might have gone after my pharmacy, which, after all, was the one that made the mistake about the amount of the 22 cent deductible. In a more perfect and reasonable world, the government would have written off anything under, say, $10 to $40 at a minimum, because is surely costs them more than that to try to collect it. Still, that wouldn’t have absolved me of my guilt for…for…for whatever it is I must have done wrong that ultimately put the full force of the United States government all over my ancient ass for 22 cents. Cents, not dollars. 

Cents. 

 Twenty two of 'em..

Don’t think I’m down on government, though. Not for a minute. Because they were there to help too. They wanted to help me so bad they made me the following offer:

“We understand that even the smallest unplanned expense can cause difficulty, and we have payment options available if you’re unable to pay the full amount due at this time.” The full amount of which was--you guessed it--22 cents.

Let me be honest here. I thought about it. I really did. After all, they are the ones who offered to set up payment arrangements for the money I owed them—all 22 cents of it. They also assured me not to worry that my coverage would stop “while we’re working this issue out.” All 22 cents of issue. But at my age I don’t have enough time left to do all the stupid that dealing with the government requires. So instead, here’s what I’m going to do. I’m going to write out a check for 22 cents. I’m going to put my account number on the check like they asked, and enclose it in the prepaid envelope along with the handy payment coupon they also mailed me. But before I drop it in the mail slot, I’m going to enclose one more thing—my request for a written receipt.

An Urgent Business Matter

 So I lied. Get over it.

Maybe I haven't written quite as much as I said I would, but maybe I'll pick up from this point on. Or not. But in any event, this is the second post of the year, so I've doubled my output from last year. Gotta give me points for that.

You can take a few points away too, 'cause this is an older story I'm posting. But, see, there's nowhere to sell it. Besides it's short--blog sized--and I haven't posted a story here in some time. Besideser, I like this o ne. You may not, but you're probably not a a Nigerian. So there.

Here we go....

#

An Urgent Business Matter

by

Steve Barber

Lt. Colonel Smiths Magado waddled across the room and gingerly settled his overly fat ass onto a cushioned office chair. He squirmed. No good. He'd have to try something else.

Magado dragged the ottoman over and reached down with both hands, hefting his nearly two pound penis out of his boxers and resting it on the foot stool. He sat back exhausted, hyperventilating and sweating profusely. But even as wiped out as he was, Magado had to smile. If only my father could see me now, he thought, not without some pride. His late father had constantly teased him about his "shortcomings."

Magado's father, Mgbatu Magado, had been the Principal Vice Chairman of Abuja State Bank and Trust, the primary holding company for foreign investments in his country. Six months earlier, the senior Magado died in a tragic Internet accident that was still under investigation. Fortunately, before his death, he had confided in his son as to the whereabouts of certain unclaimed funds he planned to secret out of the country. His death put a hold on any such transfer. But the Colonel was working to change that.

Magado punched the “on” button on his computer, waited for it to get up to speed, then accessed his email. There it was. The response he’d been waiting for. Someone had risen to the bait. He reached for the keyboard, but the ottoman on which his penis rested kept him too far away to type. He turned sideways, and somehow managed to grab the keyboard and deposit it onto his ample lap.

Alma Grinkle of Saskatoon had accepted his offer. I'll make her a rich woman, thought the Colonel, but I'll be even richer. And I'll still have my huge penis too. 

"My dear Miss Alma," typed Magado. "It is with delightness that I receive your missive this day. Please to know funds at your bank tomorrow morning earliest. My friend, yes I say my good friend Miss Alma, most wonderful lady, I looking forward meet you seventh January when we concluding transactions."

He finished the email with additional platitudes, sent it along to Alma, then electronically transferred the funds from his father's account to Alma's bank.

The Colonel was basking in the glow of a job well done when his watch alarm reminded him it was time to change his penile patches. The directions cautioned "one patch at a time," but he'd reasoned if one was good, two must be better.

He applied both patches, and sat back to watch his penis grow again. But this time it was different. Something was wrong. It was growing way too much, way too fast. Crap. Directions. I should have followed the directions. 

#

The following morning, Alma Grinkle scanned through the newspaper while finishing her morning tea. A page two headline leaped out at her: "Top Nigerian Army Officer Killed by Exploding Penis."

Alma sighed and shook her head. She put on her hat and gloves, grabbed her keys and headed out the door toward her bank. How awful for him, she thought. He was such a sweet man.

Bucket O' Food List

A belated Happy New Year to you all.

I've made a resolution. I'm definitely going to post more on my blog this year than I did last year. Fortunately, that won't be too difficult. If I manage one more I'll have doubled my output.

But enough about resolutions and writing. I'm here to talk about food.

It's been almost three and a half years since I've had a cigarette. I haven't slipped up one time. Nope. Not once. But, you know, this is not going to be a preachy post. I don't consider myself an ex-smoker anyhow. I consider myself a non-practcing smoker. Once the Death Comet is confirmed to be approaching Earth, I'll be the first one in line at the Smoke Shoppe, looking for a carton of Kents.

I can hear you telling me, “You said we were going to talk about food. All you're talking about is cigarettes.”

Well, that's true to a degree. But I'll urge patience, Grasshopper. It's merely a lead in.

See, when people give up one sin, they often take up another in its place. In my case, I've replaced the cigarettes with food. Mostly carbs or fats. I eat lots of cheese. Fresh croissants are wonderful with butter and blackberry jam. Bagels with cream cheese are good too. If I make a peanut butter sammich, it has to have butter on it too.

You get the picture. The picture is not pretty. It's about fifty pounds heavier than it used to be. It needs to get lighter.

I've decided I've got to combat the carbs and fats, but before I do I need to run through my Bucket O' Food List one time.

What's a Bucket O' Food List, you ask? I know you know that a Bucket List is a list of all the things you want to do before you croak. A Bucket O' Food List is the same thing, except it's only about food. And even though I'm not planning on croaking any time soon, I still see no reason to avoid these delicious food items, especially seeing as though I'm going to have to give them up soon.

So here's my Bucket O' Food List, presented in no particular order:

1. A shore dinner, including steamed lobster, clams on the half shell and steamers, corn on the cob and roasted 'taters. Lots of butter shall be consumed with this meal.
2. A Maine blueberry pie.
3. The above mentioned fresh croissant with butter and blackberry jam.
4. Chocolate chip cookies.
5. A boneless leg of lamb, spit roasted medium rare, covered with my mystery dry rub and poked and larded with a bunch of garlic cloves, spinach sprinkled with vinegar (butter added), baked potato with sour cream, chives, salt, pepper, butter.
6. Home made lemon sherbet.
7. A complete Thanksgiving dinner, even if it isn't Thanksgiving. No green bean casserole.
8. Enough cashews in one sitting to seriously hurt me.
9. A bagel with lox, onions and cream cheese from Zingerman's. And since I'm already there, I'll get a pastrami on rye for dessert.
10. Three slightly pan seared sea scallops, covered with a pat of sherry butter, and placed on a bed of cous-cous cooked in chicken broth, then mixed with finely chopped green onions and spearmint, grilled thinly sliced eggplant, lightly brushed with olive oil, and a couple of crabcakes from Phillip's Restaurant in Baltimore. All preceded by a shrimp cocktail. And oysters on the half shell. With horseradish, lemon and hot sauce. And don't skimp on the salt and pepper.
11. A pizza from Bocce's Pizzeria in Buffalo. Double cheese and double pepperoni.
12. One Beef on Weck, loaded with horseradish, from pretty much any sleazy bar in Buffalo.
13. An Italian sausage sub with caramelized green peppers and onions.
14. Hot peach cobbler served with a scoop of homemade vanilla ice cream.

I'll tick these off over time. Yes, I will. And as soon as I'm done I'll be ready to lead an austere life and start shedding the pounds. You'll be proud of me too, won't you?

So what are the foods on your Bucket O' Food List? What do you want to make sure you eat before you croak or swear off good food? Let me know in the comments section. And if it sounds really good I'll not only add it to my list, I'll beg you for the recipe.

O hai.

Miss me?

Yeah, I know I've been gone for awhile.

Well, okay. Longer than awhile.

See, I got myself involved with this group of writers called "An Army of Ermas" and wound up writing some columns for them which meant I wasn't writing posts for me because if I write too much I turn into a goat. Or something. Anyhow, Ermas went to teh Intrawebbies Heaven a couple of months ago so now I have the time to write about whatever it is I write about on this blog.

So I'm back. At least for now. We'll see if I have the fortitude to keep it going this time.

If you want to see what I did write about while I was gone, you can go here. You can also check out the other amazing writers, most of whom are way funnier than I ever thought of being. Then you can come back here and see if I've gotten any better. Let me tell you, the odds are against it.

But you never know. Hunny hasn't left me yet,so there are sure to be some interesting things that will happen with or because of her. We still have the new puppy, and it's possible I might write elventy posts about her (have I told you she talks?). And there are those books I've read that I'd like to make some book comments about. So stay tuned. I just might get back in the habit of doing this thing again.

Caberet Lobstah Stew

Hunny's gone. No, not permanently. But she is out in Vegas this week, cavorting around with a couple of old chums and leaving me here all alone. By myself. You know what that means, don't you? Yep. Wet towels on the bathroom floor, dirty underwear hanging from the chandelier, beer cans strewn helter skelter and most importantly, raised toilet seats. I'll tell you what else it means. Lobstah stew for me and one of my buddies.

My regular readers, those two of you who may have read part of one of my blog posts, might remember Hunny as the person who made me kill the lust-filled cricket under therefrigerator, and as the one who likes to keep her garbage in the refrigerator. There's another thing about her that you probably don't know. She hates seafood. If Hunny had her way there would be no seafood. No shrimp cocktail, no oysters on the half shell, no fish and chips, no fish sticks, no McFish sandwiches. But there would be chicken. Lots and lots of chicken. This is a problem for me. It's not that I don't like chicken, but I never signed on for 24/7 chicken. I like some variety in my food. Fortunately, last Sunday, I got to have it.

On Saturday, I went to the grocery store hungry, in hopes I'd overspend on seafood. I did. I bought enough shrimp and scallops to kill a horse, and the two lobsters were a nice touch too. I did a little prep work that evening by cooking and shelling the lobster. Here's the procedure:

First, name your lobsters as you get your pot of salted water boiling.

Next, thrust the little buggers into the rapidly boiling water head first. No, it's not that it's more merciful that way, it's just so you don't have to hear them scream.

Cook them briefly just enough so that they've stopped struggling and that they've begun to turn a lovely shade of red-green. It's important not to overcook them because they'll cook more when they're added to the stew. You're looking for a color like this:

Here's Artee on the left and cray on the right. See how Artee's trying to struggle to the surface? He almost made it, crying like a schoolgirl all the way, but I pushed his head back underwater and he eventually gave up the ghost.

Remove the lobsters from the water let sit until they're cool enough to handle.

Crack the shells, remove the meat from the tail, claws, body (yes there's body meat) and legs. It's work but it's worth it.

Refrigerate the lobster meat; retain the shells.

Chop finely one bunch of green onions and one shallot. Saute the shallot and onions in butter. Retain the chopped green onion tops for garnish.

When the shallots and onions are soft, toss in the lobster shells. If you have any other seafood shells (I had shrimp shells) add them too.

Pour in three cups of milk and three cups of half and half. I used more because I needed extra stock for the seafood linguine I was making.

Simmer on low for an hour or until Hell freezes over I've simmered for up to 2 ½ hours before and it only made the stock better.

Strain the stock and discard the veggies and shells.

Return the stock to the stove, add in the chopped and/or torn lobster and bring up to temperature.

Add one teaspoon of paprika for color; salt and pepper to taste.

Add one to two ounces of dry sherry, if desired. I desired.

Finally, add in a schlop of butter and stir in.

Ladle into bowls, garnish with the onion greens and serve.

You'll notice there are no potatoes in this stew. There are no carrots. The onions (except for the garnish) have been strained out. There is only one star, and it is the lobster. Lobster needs little help to shine. In fact, too many ingredients would only take away from what this dish has to offer. So keep it simple and remember to take your gout medicine.

By the way, we also had seafood linguine. Here's a pic. Be jealous.

And I have leftovers.

And you don't.

Sleep Study, Part the Second

Suppose you were a dog, and suppose somebody grabbed your snout, stuck it in their mouth and then blew a continuous stream of warm, fetid air into your nostrils for the next eight hours. That's pretty much what happened to me last Thursday night, except for the dog and snout part. Yes, that's right. Five months after I had Sleep Study,  Part the First, I finally got around to Sleep Study, Part the Second.

If you read the earlier post, you'll remember I promised a follow up report. The thing is, I hated the first part of the test so much that I did everything I could to avoid setting up the second part. But my daughters were not amused, and my doctor was not amused, and especially the people who stand to make money by renting me their equipment were not amused, so I finally bit the bullet and went in for the rest of it.

The preparation was much the same. It started in a small torture chamber where they loaded me up with twenty pounds of wires and electrodes placed every few inches all over my body, with the technicians taking special pains to both glue and duct tape them to the hairiest parts. Yeah, that included my lower legs. How electrodes attached to my lower legs can help them detect sleep apnea, a breathing issue, is beyond me, but what do I know? I wasn't complaining. At least they didn't use pop rivets this time.

Once they got me all wired up we returned to my room for the mask fitting. The bed had already been turned down, but, sadly, there was no chocolate mint on the pillow. I blew off the poor service and allowed the tech to stick the mask onto my face and adjust the straps to the point that they dug into my skin deep enough to cause gangrene. The seal would be better that way, he told me. I'm pretty sure he expected me to believe that.

"You'll feel a slight rush of air when I turn the machine on," the guy said. Right. And I'm sure when Julius and Ethel Rosenberg were strapped into their respective electric chairs, somebody told them, " You'll feel a slight tingle."

He flipped the switch. Hurricane Katrina blew up my nose and out my mouth.

"You've got to keep your mouth closed," he said.

I closed my mouth. My head asploded.

Ten minutes later, I finally figured out how to breathe with the gear on. The technician turned out the light, and wished me a good night's sleep. He retired to his SEEKRUT HIED OWT where he proceeded to watch me all night when he wasn't videotaping me for whatever kinky website they sell those things to.

I'll say this. The experience wasn't particularly pleasant, but I was somehow able to sleep all the way through with that stuff covering my nose except for one interruption when the tech guy had to come in and retighten the mask. He didn't re-tuck me in and he didn't give me a good night kiss, which was, I believe, best for both of us.

He woke me up about 6:30 and, after de-masking, de-wiring, de-hairing my body and making me fill out thirty seven forms in three different languages (French, Italian and Hebrew) they sent me on my way.

So now I'm waiting for the insurance company to approve the system the doctor ordered. Like all insurance companies, they are in no hurry to comply, but I expect they will eventually. When they do, I'll have to use the system all the time or they'll take it away. They'll check. I know they will.

The good news is that I've talked to a number of people who are wired into a CPAP machine every night. They tell me that 1) you do get used to it, and 2) I should expect to have weird, bizarre dreams. As a writer of horror stories, I'm all about weird and bizarre dreams. So I'll let you know if I get any good stories out of it.

EPILOGUE

The machine arrives Friday. Pray for me.

*shudder*

Dickwads

I'm a wee bit unhappy with some of my neighbors. They're not close by neighbors, living as they do in a more affluent section of town, but they're close enough that if they played golf at the public course where I play, had a beer at the local gin mill, or picked up chicken at the local KFC like I sometimes do, I'd run into them from time to time. But, of course, they do none of those things. They can afford better.

Now, before you think this is going to be a slam against rich people, think again. The ability to go from poor to rich has always been one of the Great American Dreams and I will never fault anyone for having achieved it. Nor am I envious. I like my public golf course. They know me at my local pub and treat me just fine so I'm happy when I go there. And I really enjoy KFC. Honest.

Okay. Okay, KFC is crap. But the rest of it is true enough. Mostly.

So, why am I perturbed with my almost neighbors? I'ma tell you.

There's a VA hospital not far from where I live (for those of you non-'Mericans, that's a Veterans Administration Hospital). The hospital's even closer to where my well-to-do friends live. The hospital and the upscale neighborhood existed side by each without incident for years. And then the Vietnam vets started getting old. And the Iraq and Afghanistan vets came home needing medical care. The hospital census exploded. With inpatient and outpatient counts through the roof, hospital parking was at a premium. The VA had no choice but to build another parking structure. But, of course, it takes time to build a parking structure and their need was immediate.

Enter the Huron Hills Church. They were only a mile down the road from the hospital, had extra parking space available and were happy to lease it to the government as a temporary staff parking lot. The hospital purchased two vans and arranged a shuttle service, ferrying workers back and forth between the church and the hospital. And everybody was happy.

Well, not quite.

Much like Ted Kennedy objected to the proposed energy-efficient windmill farm in Nantucket Sound that would have obstructed the scenic view from his Hyannis Port compound, the residents of Glazier Way in Ann Arbor have objected to the "howling, screeching shuttle buses" that pass through their otherwise serene neighborhood ruining their reverie. The noise is apparently more than the residents can bear.

"We and our neighbors are the victims of the noise and traffic generated by this commercial enterprise," said the president of the neighborhood association in an article in Ann Arbor.com. "The buses literally wake us up every morning and annoy us all day long."

Well, boo fricken hoo. Excuse me while I shed a tear for the "victims."

Then there was the woman who, in a comment appended to the story, objected to the look of the vans. "That paint job is pretty 'loud' too, "she said. "Maybe something less obtrusive?"

The paint job she objected to can be seen in the top picture in this post. Those "obtrusive colors," are contained in a representation of a red, white and blue American flag. Having served under those colors for three years, I can't quite find it in my heart to agree with her, and I expect the patients of a Veterans Hospital might have the same problem.

But that's not important. What's important is the serenity of the residents--the victims of Glazier Way. Never mind that these shuttle buses are only a temporary inconvenience. Never mind that these shuttle busses are using a public road. Never mind that these shuttle busses transport staff who take care of sick and injured veterans--perhaps preparing their meals or cleaning their treatment rooms or checking vital signs or changing their IV bags. Perhaps they're there just to hold a veteran's hand as he dies. None of that matters. To them.

But like I said, I have nothing against these folks just because they're affluent. In other circumstances a poor person might act this way I suppose. But poor or rich, I do have something against dickwads. And now I know that some of them live on Glazier Way.