19 posts tagged “rant”

I don't care if "ungood" isn't a word!

And I do realize there are much bigger things going on the world.  But instead of talking about those, I'm going to whine about my own (and my family's) problems.

I woke this morning to find the headache I went to bed with getting worse.  Of course I used my last migraine pill on vacation and hadn't yet refilled, and of course it required doctor's authorization, and of course I didn't have my family doc's number.  I called my mom and couldn't reach her because as I later found out, she was helping my brother, whose car had been totaled.  The car my parents just recently bought him (after his piece of junk car got stolen last year), that his apartment complex forced him to park on the highway while renovations to his parking lot were being made, was totaled along with three other cars as a truck lost a wheel and barreled into them all.  Fun!

Given his issues, I was grateful to only be dealing with a headache.  I located the number online, requested they call in a prescription for name brand only, and decided to try to go to work.  I lasted barely 2 hours before I couldn't take it anymore; I went to CVS to get my prescription and go home.

Or so I thought.

CVS gives me my prescription; generic.  I explain this won't work for me (as I learned last December) and I'd asked for the name brand; they try to correct it, but the computer informs them my insurance won't pay for anything but generic.  A call to my insurance company confirms it: they now will only pay for the generic version of my migraine pills.  My only option is to have my doctor fill out a form and send it to them specifying why I must have name brand, and this form must be approved and processed (read: this will take days).  This is where I cry in CVS on the phone with the poor customer service girl.

I call my mom and ask her to run by my doctor's and get them to make this form happen; in the meantime, I go back to the pharmacy section and opt to pay $36 for ONE PILL.  (That's how expensive this drug is.)  The only problem is, my credit card won't be accepted.  And I have $25 in my checking account.  Migraine still raging, I had to run to the bank to deposit a check I had (uh, thank goodness?).  I come back with cash and down my $36 pill and wait for sweet relief.

I then find out from my parents that the credit card has been compromised and blocked since a $500+ charge was made in Rancho Cordova.  I don't know how, since a) Rancho Cordova is hundreds of miles away from where I was in CA, b) I have the credit card, and c) CA has pretty strict credit card use regulations, and this was an in-store charge.  This is a card that I share with my parents, who are now freaking out since they're going on vacation next week and their VISA is now out of commission (we can't get another for 10-14 days).

This is the point where I nap and allow sweet headache relief to come in.  I wake up several hours later to a call from my mother telling me that the saints at my insurance company have rejected my doctor's request to pay for the name brand medication, saying I don't meet the requirements.  If "generic medicine does not work for patient" is not a requirement, I want to know what one is.  For now I'm trying a newer migraine med suggested by the CVS pharmacist (who was so incredibly nice to me) with no generic available, although I'm concerned since I just read some criticisms of this drug.  If it really is just a repackaged Imitrex though, hopefully it'll do the job.  If this doesn't work, I'll try again with the insurance company.  I'm betting they'd rather pay $250 once a year for me to get 9 migraine pills than pay for the ER or mental hospital visits that will result from migraine pain.

And now I'm hoping that despite sleeping 6 hours this afternoon, I can fall asleep at a decent time tonight.  Sorry for the long and whiny post, but I needed to vent.  Thankfully this day is over in one minute!

Okay, now I've been on some sort of unstoppable chick flick lately and I'm not ashamed.  It happens, okay?!  Sometimes we all need a little fluff.  So I Netflixed Nights in Rodanthe and forced Brian to watch it with me.  This is where you need to imagine Comic Book Guy from the Simpsons:

"Worst.  Movie.  Ever."

Yes, I know.  I probably should've seen this coming.  But oh, man.  I mean, if I movie has Richard Gere and Diane Lane shouldn't there be some sort of goodness in there?  Nope, none to be found.  I could dissect all the ways it sucked, including no character development, disappointing score (not that there was much to work with...), and painfully contrived plot details. 

But I think what stood out to me most was: have these people ever seen a hurricane?  Maybe eastern coastline hurricanes are different than ones we get in the Gulf.  Perhaps there, hurricanes just suddenly BAM! appear, with no wind or rain ahead of time, and maybe there people don't bother preparing or boarding anything up until the hurricane is upon them, and maybe there people opt to make out RIGHT IN FRONT OF A WINDOW rather than take shelter in a protected part of a building.  Maybe that's how it works in North Carolina, but I suspect not.

Also:  The "nights" in the title suggested to me I would at least get to see some hot hot Richard Gere lovin'.  Instead, I got a terrible love scene that I suppose was intended to be sentimental, but which failed since it was impossible for me to care about these characters (see "no character development" above).  NOTE TO HOLLYWOOD:  If you're going to make a movie this bad, please at least show me Richard Gere's butt.  That is the absolute least you can do.

Perhaps this, like Nicholas Sparks's other book-turned-movie The Notebook, is going to be one of those things I'll hate intensely at first and then grow to appreciate and enjoy.  But I sincerely doubt it, as I will from now on burn any copy of this movie I happen to come across.

Though not a Christian, I sing at an Anglican church every Sunday morning.  Honestly, it's a great job--I'm paid to sing, which I of course love to do; it keeps my sight-singing and musicianship skills up; every few weeks we're treated to a free home-cooked meal; and the people there are among the nicest you'll ever meet.

Today, unfortunately, was one of the very few times at this particular church when I've found myself outright offended by part of the sermon and ashamed to be there.  I'll admit, I tend to tune out a bit during this portion; it's sort of my own meditation time, and I enjoy it every week.  Today though, as the deacon spoke of casting out devils, he began a list of what I suppose were devils or just negative things in our society, including "the lies of evolution being taught in the schools" and "a culture that accepts homosexuality."  I'll ignore the former comment, which amuses more than offends me (unless I think too much about it), and focus on the latter.

Firstly, the idea that our culture does accept homosexuality is absurd.  Marriage between first cousins is more widely accepted than the marriage of two unrelated people of the same gender.  The state with the reputation for being among the most liberal and progressive somehow managed to overturn its own decision to allow homosexuals the same right as other human beings.  Because gay people aren't put to death for their beliefs--which, by the way, they certainly have been and are if you take into consideration the vigilante actions of the ignorant extremists--we're to believe our culture is accepting?  No, I would never claim that ours is currently a culture that "accepts" homosexuality.

Secondly and more importantly, the idea that a culture that accepts all of its individuals as worthwhile and equal is a bad thing literally hurts me.  As the service went on this morning, I felt myself deflating more and more; how can people still think this way?  How can people who profess to love everyone have so much unrecognized hate in their hearts?  If logic makes more sense to you than my emotional appeal, then how can people condemn something as unnatural when it's been documented as occurring in hundreds of species besides our own?  How can anyone feel people would CHOOSE this lifestyle in the face of such unabashed discrimination against it?

In the South, I hear a lot of trumpeting about "family values" and "protecting children."  Absolutely protect children.  Protect them from the ignorance of previous generations and teach them the family value of unconditional love.  Don't teach them to fear the unfamiliar, teach them to understand it.  After the service today, I saw the two little girls whose grandparents bring them to this church every few weeks and got so upset I had to leave quickly; though I had previously thought this was a more accepting church, I now realize these little girls will be brought up to fear as evil those "sinful homosexuals."

Obviously this is a topic which I (and so many others) feel passionate about.  Even if I'm not religious, I am respectful of the religions of others; we all find our strength and comfort in something, and who am I to dictate how and where others should find theirs?  But to use religion as an excuse for ignorance is indefensible.  For some, the purpose of religion is to find truth and meaning; in that case, you should not, cannot condemn people without knowing or understanding them.  For others, the purpose is to find peace, to enjoy a sense of community, and to feel and give love; in that case, how can you exclude an entire population of people from enjoying the same comforts of humanity to which you are entitled?

As I get older, I'm increasingly afraid that I won't live to see the day when we all truly are equal.  If I don't live long enough for that, so be it.  But I refuse to give up the hope that it will happen.

Is there anything more frustrating than software not doing what it's supposed to the night before you need to have something done?

Nope.

I'm sorry, I'm just not sure how one store can piss me off so much.  I wish, I wish Target sold an affordable fake Christmas tree, but they don't.  In any event, I fell in love with and bought a really cute and surprisingly inexpensive Christmas tree from Wal-Mart.  Miraculously, I just got the motivation to put it up--I was all about it!  I was excited!  I took all the pieces out and began to assemble it...

...only to be stopped immediately by the lack of the crucial center piece of the tree stand!  Ho-ho-ha!

What the fuck, Wal-Mart?  How can this tree be lacking the single thing it needs to you know, STAND UP.

I'm so pissed off.  I'm further pissed off by the fact that customer service is closed now, so I'll have to wait till tomorrow to take the tree back.  Oh, that's right--I must pack back up this entire fucking tree to bring the whole thing back, all for one tiny plastic piece.  I might punch a baby.  I just might.  Just warning you.  If you're gonna be at Wal-Mart in Calera tomorrow, and you're near the Christmas trees, and you're holding a baby, you should probably watch the hell out.

On top of all this, I don't even have the receipt, since my mom bought this for me in Prattville.  They scanned me a copy of it, but of course, it won't print right.  Babies!  The punching of the babies!!!

I'm so pissed off.

Okay, due to a lot of madness I forgot to do a Things on Tuesday.  But here's your thing I loathe for today:

Is anyone else suddenly and for no discernible reason getting an influx of private messaging spam on Vox?  I've gotten two in the last day, and it's really pissing me off.  

Brian and I recently discovered the magic that is Skype, a calling service that is free between Internet users and has some terrifically stable video stuff as well (we used to use Yahoo Messenger, but calls usually dropped at least once during long conversations, webcams froze quite frequently, and it just generally ate up a lot of system resources--we could barely do anything else but talk on Yahoo).  I had nothing but praise for this new and wonderful service, which anyone in a long-distance relationship (or even anyone who is temporarily away from loved ones) should check into.  I did notice that the day I downloaded and installed Skype, I was unable to check my university e-mail account, as it just kept refreshing itself over and over again, but since that crap is pretty glitchtastical anyway, I thought little of it.

Until today, when I decided to continue my exploration of Internet phenomena that I'm way behind on and downloaded StumbleUpon.  After a few minutes of Stumbling, I realized that any websites using Shockwave Flash (ending with an ".swf") were not functioning properly--either not bothering to load at all, or sometimes it seemed refreshing over and over again, as before. 

I did the thing Firefox users dread; I opened Internet Explorer.  And to my horror... everything that wasn't working in Firefox worked in IE.  Cue Darth Vader:  Nooooooooooo!!!!

An hour of frustrated battling with my computer and I was no closer to a solution:  I had every necessary plug-in (and probably some unnecessary ones) downloaded and fully updated, as well as the latest update of Firefox.  I downloaded all the "recommended" updates for Windows (I try to stick to the "important" ones, but I figured what the hell)--no dice.  Remembering that my original problem started the day I downloaded Skype, I thought I would have to do the unthinkable:  choose between my beloved Firefox and my new love, Skype.  Joie's Choice, you might say.  (If you wanted to make a moderately offensive reference.)

And then I noticed the little turd of a plug-in Skype automatically installed on my Firefox browser.  I do not need phone numbers on web sites highlighted, thought I!  I can recognize them myself!  Was this the source of my problems, this little unwelcome browser parasite?

I disabled the plug-in, crossed my fingers... and successfully logged into my university e-mail without constant refreshing of the page.  Success!

I was unable to find a known issues page on Skype's website, but a Google search found a lot of other people annoyed with the same problem.  I left a comment on a help page that explained what the plug-in was, so hopefully that will get through to somebody, if they don't already know it.  Fix it!  Or at least give a warning!  Or don't have the plug-in install itself!

Still, my love for Skype remains unchanged.  I hope that it and Firefox may now live in harmony forever with their new friend StumbleUpon.

I have like, 3 minutes to type this before I have to get ready and run to class, but I couldn't resist expressing my disgust over this one.

I just went to movietickets.com to check out movie times for tonight, and I noticed that what apparently is the biggest movie out right now is something I haven't even heard of.  I clicked on it to read a synopsis, and above the synopsis I see:

"Prefer to listen to the synopsis instead?  Just click on the "LISTEN" button and begin listening!"

...What.  The.  Hell.  Are people really incapable of reading ONE paragraph to learn more about the movie?  I could go on this rant for awhile, but I'll stop there.

Who says people don't read anymore?  Oh, wait...

Yes, Amazon, your convenience and general reliability make you a dear friend of mine.  I can overlook the tens of thousands of annoying e-mails you send me when you think have some item that will be of interest to me (side note:  you never do).

What I cannot overlook is that three hours ago, you told me that ordering certain items with standard shipping would be guaranteed to get to my house by Christmas Eve if I ordered in the next 15 hours (or some large number like that).  And now that I've made my final decision to get these items, you tell me my items will arrive after December 25th unless I choose two-day shipping... which eliminates any savings I would've been getting.

What.  What?

I'm slightly stressed, because I know I can get one of these items in town (for a little more expensive, but it evens out when you consider the cost of two-day shipping).  I'm not sure about the other one, however, and for all the hell I know, by the time I figured out if I could find this other DVD, Amazon will have declared next-day shipping the only possible way for me to get my items on time.

Sigh.  =(  I had such a freakin' successful day of Christmas shopping today, and now things start going wrong as I try to wrap it up.  (Erm, no pun intended.)  What to do, what to do.

Edited to Add:  Wow, there are some majorly gross grammatical errors in this entry, not to mention crap that doesn't make sense?  Apparently I'm more tired than I thought.  Too lazy to care or correct anything.

Edit #2:  Ah, okay, I now see what happened.  I'm not sure what the hell the 15-hour countdown was that Amazon was giving me, but apparently my ability to get crap to me by Christmas via standard shipping ended at midnight--I must've been checking on things right before then.  I might stab myself.  I just might.

Edit #3 it's-madness-i-can't-stop:  I did two-day shipping.  I feel like if there's one thing I've learned from The Year 2007, it's to shell out extra cash if (a)you can, and (b)it will bring you peace of mind.  I actually can't shell out extra cash right now, but that's the magic of credit cards, eh?