What's Up? Doc.

I had a blog post almost set to go last week. I watched a number of terrific documentaries recently and thought I would pass my takes on each of them, in the spirit of providing knowledge about the crimes might undo the punishments being exacted on the innocents of the nation, which now swims daily in the conglomerate-owned vast seas of propaganda. No one gave me these films for free (those days are so gone) and no one chatted me up  looking for your eyes to capture as a click to some twisted algorithm tie that indicates if you like this plastic disc you must own this underwear. Fuck advertising.

But my blog post got derailed by events in real life, which somehow (even with my near invisible real life presence) takes precedence and routinely spoils my plans.  Ah, Robert Burns. This morning, as I pound the keyboard, finds me waiting on my Hot Coffee. Can't sip until the needle slips in to steal about four vials for some analysis. Have to get a shit sample off at some point today, too. Fun stuff.

Really, though, I can't complain much. My wonderful spouse did the heavy lifting by landing her current job this January, after 7 months on the unemployment dole. I won't get into her job- that is her business, but even though she was hired as "management" she and I had to wait four months for one benefit from the job to begin. All this just means we both got our health care coverage back after almost one year without it this June.

When I wrote that first sentence in the last paragraph maybe I should have typed, "We hit-it-out-of-the-park-fucking-lucky." Last Wednesday I thought I would give our circus dog, Darby, a well needed and deserved ride to one of his fun spots. The little dude likes the short drive, and short walk about the town to sprinkle his Darbiness on his favorite local flora. We hit the road and the trails at the local bluffs off Panorama Drive and had a great time. We got back and had a sandwich together, as we regularly do, and then I began to feel the effects of  having gotten up at 5AM along with the morning chores coupled with the outing followed by lunch, and all of a sudden it was nappy-poo time. And at about 1PM I went down.

Within an hour my chest felt like a pecan being squeezed in a nutcracker, with the back of my neck pouring out whatever liquid contents remained in my shell. Disorientation class arrived, and I was at my seat early. For over two hours I spent the time taking a couple of  baby aspirin tablets and doodling over the sink with some dishes to convince myself all was under control but the vise-grip around my chest up to my throat never let up. I tried sitting but no luck. I could not lay down the pain was too excruciating, and I worried that if I did get prone I might not be able to get back up.

Being the cheapskate I am a 911 call never entered my mind, nor did just calling the local ambulance service. I'd seen those rates from my many experiences with my dad several years ago. I knew the rates hadn't dropped with the housing prices. Shucks, the mayor of this berg who owns the local ambulance service and who basically has a monopoly here in the county, had just gone before the city council and county supervisors and they gave him everything he asked for in terms of service and rate increases for his ambulance business. I hung on until 4PM when I texted my wife if she could leave a little early, because I was not feeling too well.

I might have waited until she got home had I not experienced a very small event like this one about 3 weeks prior in the back yard after mowing the lawn. That episode was not nearly as intense, and one baby aspirin with a sit down alleviated the minor chest pain. I knew all this could just as easily be some GERD attack, but I had no acid reflex feeling in my throat nor any of the usual burping-the brains-out while syncopating farts in rhythm to the ultimate personal humiliation dance routine that accompanies gastritis and all its wonderful subsidiaries like H. pylori and the like. This was probably the heart attack I never worried about, and so I put in the text message with a follow up call which got her voice message prompt.

I could relax a little bit because the hospital and various doctors could not take everything we own, because Jumping-Jeebus in the Cosmic Rebus of Life I had fucking insurance once again. So relaxed as a fool can be we drove to the ER room at the local Kaiser where blood pressure was taken, an EKG produced and a thorough exam of my feeble state dictated a hospital stay with more tests would be in order. The doctor asked if he should call the ambulance service, and, of course, I told him no. We would drive once he confirmed that I had a room ready.

My stay lasted roughly 30 hours. The nursing staff did outstanding and professional work, as did all the various aids and workers who keep a hospital running. I even had the electronics maintenance guy pop in to make sure my television set was working properly. He didn't like walking by and seeing the tv off, so he checked to make sure all was well with his set. He probably thought I was from Mars when I said I didn't watch much television, and really all I wanted to do was sleep in between blood pressure exams and drawing blood for tests on various body parts. "Televisions are here to help you get well." Cool, but I kept the thing off for all but fifteen minutes until the end of my visit.

I saw two doctors. Each visit was brief, but to the points. The doctors were cordial, seemed to care about my well being, and gave me sound professional advice concerning what tests were going to be necessary during my time in the hospital. A CTscan and x-rays revealed no masses or tumors, and gave no indication for the pain. The EKG and blood pressure readings were negative, but a chemical stress test would be necessary to rule out a heart attack. I would get that during my final five hours in the building along with a ultrasound test. Every procedure required my signature, which basically said go ahead and do it,  I know I can't sue and me or my family can only go through an arbitration process should something go terribly wrong. The joys of "tort reform."

The entire stay felt like I was in a perpetual dream state of semi-consciousness. I would doze off in mid sentence talking to my wife, or to the nurse. I don't know if they were amused, resigned, pained or relieved. I was just "sick object" to be treated. Seemed like the perfect mindset from my vantage point, although female nurses and aides always seemed worried when the floppy gown was moving that some "surprise" might be forthcoming. I assured them on the several times this came up that I was no transgender, and had decent underwear all the same. It wasn't a great comeback, but even in my addled state you could feel the immediate relief. I got to wondering how many small ugly episodes of On The Way To Uranus, with all the obligatory slime induced special effects getting emitted,  these aids had to confront in the course of a working day. Then I fell back to sleep. It seemed to take forever to move from the bed to a wheel chair to a room for a scan or exam. I could not tell east from west, north from south and had no concept of time unless a nurse was doing a countdown on some injection.  And food was a no no, because you had to fast for your particular test.  

I could have stayed that Thursday night and checked out Friday morning. I know my wife was relieved to  have me get home that evening cleared of any real damage. I still felt woozy-weird, but, hey, I used to go work feeling that way plenty of times in my youth, and I was alert enough to know that the longer the hospital stay the higher the odds some micro bacterial pathogen gets into that little vein opening where the medicines go in, or the blood goes out, exacting a dread infection that could kill you.  I remembered the packed ER room at the hospital when I arrived, and thought maybe one of those souls downstairs might really need a room. As it turns out, I was the classic ER user- a newly insured churned individual who had been out of the health care market for awhile ( not the uninsured or the illegal immigrant who are both painted by the forces of evil to stir fear in the hearts of the ignorant).

Well, of course, all of the above thinking was just a few onion  rings on the meat of the matter. I did not want another hospital day put on the family tab. Week-long vacations to exotic places at 5-star hotels cost less than a two days in a typical US hospital. And all turned out for the best. I had some pains and a fitful Saturday night, but my Sunday evening was feeling almost back to normal, weak but getting stronger.

On Monday I met with my primary care physician who gave me the seal of Kaiser approval for decent health, but ordered the needle and vials and fecal smear the post started with. All could have been wonderful until on my way back home I get a call from one of my dearest friends that he, too, had been in the hospital over chest pains at the same time I had been. He allowed me to tell my tale, and then quickly described his few weeks of heart wrenching pain that resulted in the heart surgery, which placed several stents into the primary valves leading to his heart. The doctors have finished most of the work, but they still have one more stent to place next week.

Life will never be as it was. Life can be good, but the new reality finds the throttle now has a governor. Stupid cliches such as "A man has to know his limitations"  take on new darker tones as summer days shorten. I need another cup of hot coffee.

Thanks for stopping by and spending some time! 

The Race Is On

Wow! Long time without something new on this little blog outpost. I thought maybe a few posts a month this year would be the reality, but that was just the dream talking smoke in my ears.

Why no blog post?

For the past year I tried my hand as a freight agent. Logging (instead of blogging) lots of computer time checking on various logistics boards from freight companies trying to find good paying lanes that truck drivers would book with me. This gig entailed lots of phone time and quote generations on top of the heavy computer hours spent each day just finding and posting hauls. And when one I posted finally got booked that precious cargo meant I became the dispatch person making sure the driver was where he/she was supposed to be from the moment the load was booked to the minute the haul was delivered and the trailer emptied.  Lots of 4AM alarm noise to get going for East Coast traffic when you live on the Left Out Coast.

Freight agent meant  contract worker, a 1099 IRS form unit of America's working class. No vacation, no benefits and no affiliation with any company, although I could only book hauls for one freight carrier's "independent" business owner-operator drivers.  On May Day I said enough to 70 hour weeks earning well under the federal minimum wage. Logistics is big business in America, but like nearly all big business in this country most of those doing the work from booking, warehousing and hauling don't make much dough and have little or no benefits. The 1099 form I received from the business entity I worked through placed "fishing services" as the category for my work. Oh well.

So late spring sees me in a variety of ball caps and loose fitting clothes gardening the grounds. Well, gardening might be a generous term. Mowing edging, trimming, raking and watering to keep up with spring-spurring grasses, hedges, leaf sprouts and weeds means I'm a glorified weed whacker doing all I can to stave off the inevitable reclamation of the family domicile by nature. I won't claim the title of gardener. Forget planting and harvesting some fruit or something on this 3rd of an acre plot. Who has time for that shit when you also have the pool duties to keep the old cement-pond appropriately cleansed and swim worthy with pitted plaster and warm water the perfect algae growth compound? Although all this activity keeps a body in shape, the heat these past couple of weeks has sapped my motor of any kick by early afternoon.  And it is still spring here in the Southern San Joaquin, before the real broiler temperatures arrive later this month.

Sipping on a cool one after working up the sweat pores I ponder the tough work done by men and women out in the California fields shaking trees while gathering nuts and fruit, digging in the ground with vegetables and doing all the various tasks with irrigation and maintenance. The Byrds version of Woody Guthrie's Deportee plays in the background. Here's a wonderful version by Arlo Guthrie and Emmy Lou Harris, but the Byrds take is the true classic for me from the Ballad of Easy Rider album the group released in 1969.




I have to give the field hands and the small working farmer huge props for strength, courage  and willpower. Field work is very hard work, by any measure, and unlike the category that it usually falls under in the various government and private think-tank repositories of statistics (unskilled labor) a tremendous amount of skill is necessary to do this work, grow and get the food to market and survive in some of the hottest climate conditions on this planet.

I won't bore you with a bunch of stats but California agriculture generated $37.5 billion for 2010 crop and livestock revenues (most recent statistical year) once again leading the nation for agricultural output by a huge margin. Iowa was a distant second and Texas was numero tres with a little more than half the revenue California totaled. But, all this agriculture grandeur is small solace to the hundreds of thousands who work  here in California in the lowest paying and physically demanding industries in America. California also puts to work more than two and a half times the amount of field hands than does Iowa and Texas combined, and 90% come originally from Mexico.

Kris Kristofferson comes to Bakersfield tonight to play a concert to help the UFW. Cheers, old bright dude, for still caring and doing something good for people who deserve it.  

What too many people fail to realize is that when a nation continues to deny one class of workers rights, privileges and benefits it doesn't take too long for other less stigmatized/scapegoated workers to lose theirs. So we see workers in all sorts of occupations from freight (in my recent case) to major food service locations and food processing plants working desperate hours for terrible wages and no benefits with no protections against the big business ownership class. 

So the Prez comes out and says no more deportations for the youngsters whose parents brought them north to try and earn a dollar the really hard way. This announcement is pure politics trying to seal up votes from a Latino community the Tea Baggers want totally gone, and the liberals seem incapable of protecting.  But, as poorly as liberals and Democrats have performed they stand as beacons of light in comparison to what the Republican Party has done to all minority groups in this nation over this past decade. But, all this tension and rancor  over the poor Mexican immigrant might just be a lot of hot air today over a problem that no longer exists, if truly it ever did.

The recent immigration statistics from the government have come out for 2011 and Asians now account for a larger percentage of USA inbound opportunists than do Latinos by a 36% to 31% margin. The Pew Research Center just recently posted a fascinating report on this social shift. What surprised me most was that Asians are far more satisfied with things here in this country than the all other ethnic groups, and the cumulative citizenry as a whole. It also surprised me to see how generally satisfied all people are in this country with their lives. When all you watch, hear and read in the media is how angry everyone is, you have to ask one basic question. If 75% of all Americans are happy with their lives why so much hostility in the media and politics?

Back here in beautiful California, the state that feeds the world, the news for everyone that the Latino immigration numbers have fallen off a cliff this decade are not comforting to many of our farmers and food processors. The trade associations for big agriculture interests in California are busy meeting with the politicians they have heavily invested with over the years like Rep. Kevin McCarthy and Rep. Dan Lundgren. Too bad for the  big agriculture folks that these two members of the House of Representatives are out there working to make it impossible for Latinos to migrate to this country by supporting profiling laws that have surfaced in Arizona and in some southern states. When an industry continues to seek out only the most desperate of people, who will work for a pittance of what their labor is worth, more stories like this one from the Sacramento Bee are bound to follow.

Asians will not be the new immigrant group to replace the Latino in the fields and dairies. Asians now earn more than any other ethnic group in America by a hefty margin. Asians are the most educated ethnic group in America. This is a group that works hard, smart and not for chump change. 

Where will the labor come, from and at what price going forward? It could be as big a problem as water in these parts, because unlike the rest of the country's agricultural fields which are dominated by very few crops that machinery can harvest fairly efficiently, California has a labor intensive array of a multitude of diverse crops to pick from.

All I know is that I'm generally satisfied with my beverage, and my surroundings and hope to blog a bit more going forward now that my 1099 contract workdays are through. Thanks for stopping by.