Thursday, February 28, 2008

Jill's Next Record

I've been a big fan of Jill Sobule's music for a long time.

Right now, she's raising funds for her next studio CD.
Expect this type of thing to become more common as
"record companies" continue to be . . . well, record
companies! LOL

You can go take a look at the fundraiser HERE. *

Let's get this thing done, folks - I want to hear it!

****** UPDATE --- Jill has reached her goal, donations are
closed ******

* Disclosure: if you donate through this link, they
will "credit" my donation upward 25 cents per $1 as part
of some grand referral scheme! I don't think I get enough
traffic here to change my already-donated level even if
everyone bought a CD . . . but at least you know!

Tuesday, February 05, 2008

Sporadic Update

Let's see, what's been going on here?

Our "kitten", who was THIS size when we got him:


Is now THIS size:


YOW! He's only five months old. We are starting to suspect
that there is a little Maine Coon cat in his lineage. He's huge.

We attended the Richard Thompson "1000 Years of Popular
Music" concert in Boston. Gotta love those rockin' 1300s!
We noticed that pretty much every song written before
the 1700s mentions hell or the devil (at least the ones
they CHOSE to do). What does that mean?

What else . . .

The New England Patriots didn't win the Super Bowl.
Honestly - the way they played defence that day,
they didn't deserve to win it. There - I said it.
See? At least ONE person in NE can admit it!!

I had the misfortune to be on the road after the
game ended, so I was surrounded by drunk drivers
who were also angry and/or depressed. I stopped
at a store on the way and there were people
in the parking lot CRYING. "I can't believe
they lost!!", etc. It was as if the team had
done this horrible thing TO THEM. A bit
much, I thought.

They still had a great season. And we still have the
Celtics.

Here's a pic of the family, in our seats "high above courtside",
as Johnny Most would have said:


Does Master L look a bit jaded? He's been going to games since he
was five months old, so I'm not sure he appreciates it all the
time. Familiarity, etc. But at least he can say he's had his pants
off in the seating area. :) And that's worth something, isn't it?

The big pain weighing on me now:
After a couple of years of being dissatisfied with our dentist,
we finally got a new (and local) one. Our old practice had
been owned by a dentist I thought was really good. I think
I was his patient for 22 years. BUT - he got into the
"high-end cosmetic dentistry", you see. And then he
couldn't be bothered with his "regular" patients anymore.
So, he hired a bunch of quackers fresh out of school to
cover the regular dentistry. One of them did a root canal
on me (tooth #14, for those keeping score). During the
procedure I could tell she was going too far with the
hand drill and TRIED to stop her - saying "STOP!" as
best I could with all the hardware in my mouth.
Ignored. Two cranks later, I heard a crack.
Even with the anaesthesia, I now had serious pain.
Which was obviously wrong, because I didn't have
that kind of pain BEFORE the procedure.
I was glad-handed and reassured by the quackers
that "you can hear all kinds of sounds during
these procedures, they don't necessarily mean
anything."

No? Then why the pain?

"Give it time to settle down."

Uh, huh. Months go by. More excuses.
Almost two years elapse. The surgeon who
did the procedure is mysteriously no longer
employed there. . . I wonder why?

My old dentist sells the
practice. He writes my wife a letter saying he's
going to take time to pursue his "auto racing"
hobby". I meet with him and the new owner
of the practice to discuss the issue. They offer
to "redo" the root canal. The new guy steps
to the plate . . .

While he's in the tooth, he notes to the hygienist
that the original surgeon completely missed one
of the canals, and didn't fully clean out one of the
others. After, he proclaims, "I think we saved the
tooth."

Great, I think. Can the old surgeon give me back the
$900 I paid?

The tooth quiets down for awhile, but then develops
an infection. A round of anti-biotics kill it off.

And now, it's back again. Foolishly, I got in touch
with my old dentist, figuring "we had a relationship"
and he "might give a shit". Yeah. So much for that.
All he did was try to tell me about how "nothing that
occurred even comes close to malpractice".

BUT. . . he slipped, because he told me that he had
FIRED the surgeon's HUSBAND (yes, the two of them
are oral surgeons) because he was inept, but he
had the utmost respect for the woman who did my
surgery. Funny though . . the last time I was at
that office (and he's not the owner), the HUSBAND'S
name was on the list of surgeons. Hers was not.
I finally located her at another practice about 10
miles from there. So WHO got fired???

Isn't it great when someone you trust turns out
to be a lyin' bastard??? Oh, yeah. . .

So - do I get a lawyer and go back and sue the
original surgeon? What do you think?

Sorry I don't have any pics to go with that last
story.