Addiction

I've become hooked on a few diversions of late. Fortunately they're nothing along the Robert Downey, Jr. lines of addictions. Mine are legal yet still more than likely killing off massive amounts of brain cells. One in particular has become a fairly prevalent time killer. Some months ago I found a web site that allows you to listen to various police and fire scanners. For the longest time I had been listening to the scanner for a neighboring county. For the most part it's pretty boring, a lot of traffic stops, routine calls to respond to home alarms that have gone off for whatever reason, and the occasional EMS dispatch (which can be interesting, including the time they were dispatched to a fire station for a guy who cut off a couple of his fingers and went there only to find the station empty, everyone off on a call).

Within the past six weeks the scanner for the town I live in finally came online, and I'm hooked on listening to it. Like the neighboring county, there are a lot of boring traffic stops and alarm calls, but it's interesting to hear the dispatches because I now know exactly what's going on in town. When I get on my laptop at home later in the evenings I often will go to the scanner page and start listening there using earphones so as to not bother anyone. I may need professional help to kick this addiction. But it's going to be hard, because as I write this I'm listening to transmissions from police and fire/rescue maybe half a mile from where I am at the moment about a dead black male floating face down in the river that runs through town. Now I'll fall prey to the gambler's fallacy that if I continue to listen in the future I'll hear something just as interesting.

Bummed

Today at lunch time I had to run over to my orthodontist's office to pick up a mouthguard for myself. It'll help whenever I play any sports and when I sleep at night to keep me from damaging my new (and expensive) braces. On my way back to my office I happened across one of the saddest scenes I've encountered in a long, long time. At a stop sign I noticed a sheriff's car in front of a house to my right. It was then that I noticed the front yard was covered with personal belongings. An sheriff's eviction crew was busy at work dispossessing an elderly couple from their home. My good mood for the day was immediately quashed when I saw that. It's one thing to read the news stories of the slumping housing market and people being forced from their homes, or to see the foreclosure notices in the newspaper. But it's another thing altogether to actually see the effects of our teetering economy first hand, especially when it involved senior citizens. I missed the Great Depression the first time; it would seem that history is repeating itself for a whole new generation to enjoy.

Done

It's over and official. When I got my reminder calls from my orthodontist last week, they told me it takes roughly ninety minutes to put braces on, and they were absolutely right. Makes sense that they would know what they're talking about considering they do that sort of thing every day. I entered their office around 10:20 this morning and left just before noon looking like the character of Jaws from the 1979 James Bond movie, Moonraker. No pain, just an odd sensation of pressure being applied to my teeth. I knew that keeping my braces clean would be a challenge, but dinner this evening was a harsh reminder. After eating I checked my teeth in the mirror only to find large pieces of food caught in the brackets and wires. And to think I get paranoid if I suspect I have a small piece of food caught in my upper teeth. The next couple of years are going to be quite interesting.

I must say that I'm enjoying watching my N.Y. Giants lay a smack down on the hapless Atlanta Falcons as we reach halftime.

Oh poopie!

I've got so many appointments and dates on my calendar at the moment I don't know whether I'm coming or going. So it's nice whenever I get reminder calls from my doctor's or dentist's office of upcoming appointments. Today I got not one but two reminder calls from the orthodontist for my appointment on Monday. After my last appointment a couple of weeks ago I was not exactly sure what we were going to be doing this next time in the process of getting my mouth ready for braces. They put spacers between my upper molars the last time, so I'm looking forward to getting them taken out so I can floss. But I was sure that my third and last visit (for now) on November 6 would involve actually putting the braces on my teeth.

Wrong.

In both of my reminder calls I was asked if I was ready to get the braces put on, because that's what on the agenda for Monday's appointment. Crap. I wasn't expecting that but I guess I'm ready for it. Kind of getting used to my mouth being sore: it was sore after my oral surgery in August, it was sore for a week after they put the spacers in. The more things change, the more they stay the same. Needless to say this coming weekend will be a gastronomical orgy of tooth enamel gouging foods, snacks, and candy that I won't be able to eat until November 2009 (at least).

In the Booth

Happened across another interesting web site today, this one called In the Booth. It features 15 pages of pictures taken from photo booths that used to be commonplace, now just novelties in malls. Some of the pictures on the site are interesting, some are funny, some are just plain strange--like the one here where the girl is apparently posing with her recently deceased boyfriend. If you'd like to find out for yourself, click here!

Sometimes they write themselves

Kids get excited about the most simplest of things, don't they?

While you weren't looking...

...the national debt ceiling was quietly raised to $9.8 trillion. I'd say invest in gold, but at this point I think weapons and ammunition are better investments.

Priorities

In what to me seems like an awful sense of priorities, our president is set to veto a bill funding the State Children's Health Insurance Program. He as well as other members of the GOP are objecting that the bill increases spending on the program by $30 billion and raises the income eligibility level to $80,000 per year. Clearly the GOP thinking here is that the lower strata of the middle class are doing just fine and don't need this type of assistance. Just ask Joe Bluecollar, who's just had his house foreclosed on, and I'm sure he'll tell you he's in great shape. But the duplicity here is simply amazing. The GOP balks at increasing spending for a valuable health care program by $30 billion, yet has no problems with Robert Gates going hat in hand to Congress asking for another $190 billion for our goodwill tours in Iraq and Afghanistan. Support the troops, to hell with our children. So now children who do not have health insurance will be paying visits to emergency rooms across the country, which are obligated to treat them. Who's going to pay? We are, one way or the other. Hospitals, already dealing with major reductions in payments from Medicaid and Medicare, will be eating the costs of these unpaid ER visits in terms of layoffs, creating fewer jobs, and in some instances, outright closures. But on the bright side, things could be worse; they could appoint Blackwater Security to oversee the health programs. Multiple 5.56mm rounds are the cure all for any illness you may have. Sorry, george, but with your veto you've failed the American people again.