Brenda, a non-buffista friend just ordered one of these: [link] . No review yet, but she got a bunch of good feedback on it before ordering.

Thanks, Hec! I am now cruising for interesting fonts and images.

Tomorrow is Busy Day. Both kids go to school, Liv has her swim lesson and I volunteer in Owen's classroom. I should really do dinner prep tonight.

I have so much trouble NOT wishing some unfortunate, sudden illness on the douchebags who insist that "health" is all about choices.

Some minor surgery ~ma for tomorrow morning, please. Hubby's going to have a procedure that will involve some local anesthesia and injections next to his spinal column. It should go smoothly, but I figure good thoughts are always in fashion.

I figure good thoughts are always in fashion.

They absolutely are. Good luck to the hubby, and minimal-worry-ma to you too.

Two words: Lee. Atwater. I'm just saying. Being the meanest asshole in the room saved him too. Till it didn't.ETA: That's not directed at Connie's DH.

Surgery~ma, Connie.

This burn is turning an interesting shade of maroon.

For Teppy.

My basic argument. it isn't a civil right, but health care is a basic need for a civilized society. And Seriously, if all the poor people die off, who is going to clean you office.

There was an article in the NY Times a week or two back about this issue. The author noted that in the rest of the developed world, provision of basic health services is just part of being in a community. (And, of course, that was the whole original idea of insurance, for everyone to pool their risk together). But in America, for too many people that kind of community feeling gets short-circuited by the fear that someone, somewhere, is Getting More Than Their Share. (The thought that someone is getting less than their share doesn't seem to excite the imagination in quite the same way.)

We have that strain in Australia too. (And hey, there are people getting more than their share, and welfare fraud is worth pursuing, but you don't throw out the baby with the bathwater.) But we also have universal health care coverage for non-elective stuff, and a regulated health insurance industry, and dammit, if I need to see a doctor I know my insurer will cover them, just by virtue of them being properly licensed.

IN a nutshell, I agree with beth. I don't care whether one regards it as a right or not. A society has no standing to call itself civilised if it doesn't make provision for its most vulnerable members.

(There are also a few economic reasons why the US health insurance industry functions poorly re market efficiency, and I think they're very relevant to working out a better way and indeed making the economic case for health reform; but ultimately, for me it comes back to whether you want to be a civilised society or not.)

When I mentioned it to a coworker, he said, "Sure. I do that too. If the place smells like dead scorpion, maybe the other scorpions won't want to come around anymore."

Interesting plan. Of course, they're cannibals, so it may not bother them so much. I don't think it'd attract them though, they're not scavengers,

I would much rather have palmetto bugs than the little German roaches. My first house and a couple of apartments had huge infestations of German roaches, to the point that when I turned on the kitchen light at night, the counters were moving.

Yeah, that's a strong ick factor right there. Apparently roach movements (the common ones, anyway) can largely be explained by just two considerations - how dark is it, and how many other roaches are there?

The world's largest (though not longest) roach lives in Australia, but in tropical regions, well away from Melbourne. (Plus, it doesn't fly and isn't considered a pest.)

the fear that someone, somewhere, is Getting More Than Their Share.

I've argued before that this is the entire driving value of the current right wing in the US. It is the only framework that explains the anti-abortion, anti-immigrant, "what's wrong with Kansas" shit which honestly is completely fucking unbelievable otherwise.

(I don't mean that people can't legitimately have differences of opinion. But the way that people will vote and act so entirely against their own interests when they're barely scraping by as is? This is where is comes from.)

New York City used to have Rattus rattus (known as black rats, roof rats or ship rats), and Rattus norvegicus (brown rats). The brown rats are bigger and meaner and killed all the roof rats.

Just so they're not on my roof.