Health Care and XFiles In One Easy Post
Yesterday was my annual exam which is no big deal except I had to wait one hour for what was 5 minutes with the doctor. Kind of a burn, but why don’t I be grateful that I don’t have to go that often. At least I brought my own reading material. According to the nurse, I’m at exactly the height/weight that I have on my driver’s license. There should be an award for that. First I wrote plaque – but seriously, who wants a plaque? How about a $5 discount on your co-pay for your next visit?

I don’t know enough about the health care business to have a strong opinion on what’s going to fix it. I think everybody involved could use improvement, starting with the doctors and moving on to the insurers, the drug companies and then to the patients, themselves. I think you need to get all those parties in a room talking before making any big billion dollar health care reform.

One thing I don’t understand about the insurance I have now, is the blizzard of paper that follows every appointment. A couple of years ago I had a series of health issues which weren’t serious but involved about 6 trips to the doctor in 6 months – highly unusual for me. Every trip and every lab test involved a separate statement from the clinic, sometimes 3 or 4 pages long. Then a statement from the insurance. Then a statement from the clinic. Then a statement from the insurance. Then I’d get a bill from the clinic for $11. How much did the time, energy and resources cost for them to get $11 out of me?

My most recent Netflix was the first disc of the first season of The XFiles. I was a huge XFiles fan. I thought I started with the first season but looking at the episode guide, I started with the second season. The wiki says the series debuted in September 93 and it holds up really well. Mulder’s hair is funny and Scully’s wardrobe with the fancy suits with giant shoulders look ridiculous but the stories are still good.

I remember looking forward to that show on Friday nights. End of the work week. Crack open a cold beer. I was living in my Aunt Aileen’s basement and I had already met Bob but usually I didn’t see him until Saturday so it was my show. Also that was when I first got on the Internet and alt.tv.x-files was my first usenet group and XFiles fandom led to my one and only time in a chatroom, I joined an XFiles chat on AOL. They were teenaged boys and on the east coast, so they’d already seen a show that hadn’t aired where I was. Yeah, it seems obvious now but at the time it was all new and weird.

I’ve been wanting to watch the first three seasons again for awhile. That’s one of my winter projects.