"I'm getting really sick of you people..."

Those words were uttered to me and my two coworkers today. Let me just reiterate:


Do NOT give your business to Leo Rayburn, D.C., or Michael E. Turner, D.C.


These gentlemen, though I don't know their medical abilities, are vile, insidious, unprofessional people. They were obviously very annoyed by the fact that we were there, and had nothing but contempt for what we were doing. C'est la vie, right? In fact, Dr. Turner was being pretty confrontatoinal with us, so one of my coworkers stood up to him. Exasperated, he pointed to said coworker.

"She," he declared, "may NOT conduct any inspections here. In fact, she's not welcomed in my office." (What effrontery!)

The chiropractor:

My poor coworker!! Though she maintained a stony exterior, it still seemed like she was ready to cry. I offered to stay with her for the rest of the inspection, but she shooed me off to carry on.

My coworker:

I then checked out the office with a worker from the State Health Department. It was pretty cool. The worker couldn't have been more than 5-7 years older than I, so I felt a bit more confident being there. Every day I grow slightly more confident in my knowledge about the new anti-smoking prop, so I was able to intelligently answer some questions thrown at us by the chiropractors.

All in all, it wasn't as horrendous as an experience as I thought it would be. Though the chiropractors' comments and attitudes had a decidedly sententious air about them, they were bearable. Dr. Rayburn was far more hospitable than his evil counterpart, but both were reminiscent of frat boys on a power trip.

Long story short, they were actually in compliance with the smoking laws this time, so we were unable to cite them for anything. Bummer!!

I'm just wondering why people are so put off by authority. Really, when it comes down to it, most officials (says my sanguine little mind) are here to help. Police officers are supposed to "serve and protect," health workers care about the welfare of the general public, social workers try to provide the best services for their clientele, etc.

My view of how it should be:

I suppose I can see how smokers might perceive us as persecuting them, but we're not! I like to think of myself as a protector of non-smokers, not necessarily an enemy of smokers... it's a difficult distinction. Sigh. For the meantime, I suppose, I just do the best I can.




Anyway, as you can probably tell, I've been checking out a lot of new vocab (compliments of dictionary.com!) and doing an image search on google. Hehe.

Okee, that's it for now. Ciao!

lovin' the new job...

... and here's why:

-today i got to go around to local bars with a coworker to make sure that the establishments were all in compliance with the new anti-smoking regulations. we went to 3 different bars where we played pool, ate appetizers, and had some good (but non-alcoholic) drinks. after all, we were on the clock! :)

-tomorrow, we have a "basic skills training" and sort of a morale-boosting group of games. we're doing lunch at a posh pizza joint in sedona (which should be glorious!), and it's with our counterparts from other cities as well.

-my 3 coworkers are just amazing people, and i'm glad to be cooped up with them in an office for most of the day! :) (one even helped me move this past weekend, and my boss offered to come help, too.)

anyway, things are looking up now! i have community band in a little bit, so i've gotta get to my house (!!) to rest, eat dinner, and keep putting stuff away. y'all come back now! :)

yay, work!! :)

briefly, because it's nearly bedtime for me...

so today i actually did work at work!! :) holy productivity, batman!! with my boss and another coworker, i helped follow-up 2 complaints from the new smoke-free arizona initiative. it was quite the experience!

our first visit, to rayburn chiropractic in camp verde, proved to be the most interesting one. the chiropractor was a complete and total jerk!! he was mean and unprofessional with us from the start, and i was both furious and saddened when we left. feel free to read my review that i submitted about the clinic:

"I visited the clinic this morning, Tuesday, June 19, 2007, and was extremely shocked at the unprofessional, unkind demeanor of the chiropractor! I was with two coworkers at the time, and the chiropractor was incredibly rude (and even mean) to all three of us. In our presence, he placed a wad of chewing tobacco in his mouth and had the audacity to offer us some. I am frankly surprised that he is in business. Please be aware that some of the people in the office (mainly the chiropractor and one receptionist) are incredibly disrespectful to people who treated them with dignity. Be wary if you decide to give your money to this clinic."

(or, better yet, view the whole thing here!) :)

i am also currently filing a complaint with the better business bureau. aren't i swell? :)

it was cool, though, when managers & owners of other businesses (maverick in camp verde was awesome!!!) are willing and eager to comply with state health standards. :)

in other work-related news, i'm going on my first *real* business trip tomorrow!! :D i mean, all expense paid: room, food, travel, etc. i'm psyched!! i'll be going with 3 other coworkers (it's kind of like a paid girls' day, night, and day out!). it should be pretty awesome. :)

finally, personal goals for the next year or so:

-pay off ALL credit card debt (i WILL do it!!)
-make better financial decisions, including investments
-make amends with the few people in my life who are estranged because of me
-get in my top physical condition
-continue to benefit the world while alive

i think that's a good start! also, i'll be moving into a beautiful house this weekend, so i'm super psyched!! as one of my friends says, my "stock is going up!" :)

okee, those are the boring updates for the time being. peace out!

Punished for working?

So lately, it seems like people who fall in the "middle" range of the payscale seem to get hurt the most.

Case in point: I have been searching for a place to live in the Cottonwood area, as the 45-minute daily commute is getting old (and expensive!). I found a lovely complex down the street from my work, but was told I "over-qualify" with my income. Um... I'm working for the County, making just a few hundred more than I did as a teacher. My credit card bills (and recently negative checking account) don't seem to think I "over-qualify" at all! Turns out that, in order to live in said apartment complex, I'd need to gross $20,000 or under per year. So... I'm getting punished for having a somewhat fair-paying job?! Should I just work at the $20k level to get cheaper housing? Grr...

Another case in point: An acquaintance of mine has recently felt suicidal. She's been trying to get help by going to our local guidance center. However, she was turned away because she makes too much money! They asked her, "Are you suicidal?" She replied, "Yes." They asked, "Are you on the State health insurance?" She said, "No, I have insurance through my employer." They sent her away!!! They sent a depressed, suicidal working woman away because she made TOO MUCH MONEY.

Unbelievable! According to experts in the area, if a person who makes "too much" is suicidal, that person has very few options. What typically happens, I'm told, is that the suicidal person (or a friend) can call 9-1-1 and have the person rushed to the E.R. Upon arrival, the person will be held for 72 hours and then released. Released!! Insane! I guess there aren't many services (in my area at least) for the suicidals of moderate income.

Speaking of money, my goal for the rest of this year is to get as physically and financially "fit" as possible. It's a tough charge, I know, but I'm gonna do it! I currently bank with Bank of America, which I want to stop doing as soon as possible. In the past week, I've been hit with $140 in overdraft fees for withdrawing just $15 over my assets. Grrr... I tried to get a loan to pay off my credit cards, but the interest rate on the loan for which I was approved is almost 25%!! I'd end up paying almost $5,000 in interest in just 5 years... No, thank you.

Anyway, I must fix my finances now, while I'm young and single and have no dependents. I'm planning on taking a personal finance course at the local community college in August, so hopefully that'll help. I've found out that my coworker (who's in her early 30s) is equally clueless about finances, so I'll be our office liaison between the financial world and the county health workers. Sigh. Also, said coworker and I are both trying to get an extra job (or two) on the side, because the County doesn't pay all that well. We're both willing to be tutors for the aforementioned community college (where we can set our own hours), and I'm also thinking about being a server in a local restaurant. Perhaps I can find another thing or two also. (Who needs a life, right?) :) I briefly looked into donating an egg, but it sounds like a horrifying, painful, and time-consuming process! Sigh.

I used to work at a group home for adolescents who had diagnosed emotional and/or behavioral problems. A lot of them were in and out of the juvenile detention system, and I was astounded at how many resources they were able to obtain. For example, I mentored one girl who ended up back in juvi due to a fight with another girl. (I had been present for the fight- on a college campus in broad daylight- and I had had to restrain her. In the parking lot. With dozens of people walking by. It was bloody and stupid.) Anyway, she was a good gal who let other people get the best of her, so she wound up in juvi (again) for some poor choices. I mentored her there, and she earned her GED on the government's dime. She then took classes through a community college, and the state offered her a 4-year degree... for free!! I wish *I* had been a troubled juvenile delinquent; I wouldn't have $42,000 in student loans right now!! Man, to play the system...

Anyway, I can't complain too much; I'm at work right now, getting paid hourly, and have little to do today. It's nice to relax and putz around on the internet for a bit AND get paid for it. (Yes, Yavapai residents, these are your tax dollars at work!) I suppose my social commentary for the time being is over. Peace.

I don't get bored...

I like to pride myself on never getting bored. I like that fact about myself very much. However, I currently write from a coffee shop near my new job, and I have over an hour to kill before community band starts. I also had an hour to kill for lunch- SOOOO much time! (As a teacher, my "lunch" usually consisted of 15 minutes of eating & catching up on school gossip. Now, as a "9-5" employee, I have an HOUR each day... I don't even know what to do with all that time!)

Anyway, I found a bunch of interesting stuff online today... A lot of this comes from bored.com, a website that is definitely worth checking out! :)

Check out these interesting "office slang" terms

Also, perhaps you'd be interested in random, crazy projects you can do


I happened to look up "10-codes" as well... that's the codes officials use on the CB radios:

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ten-code AND
http://spiffy.ci.uiuc.edu/~kline/Stuff/ten-codes.html

Yay!! How fun, right? I also checked out news stuff, which proved interesting. Seems China has some issues with putting artificial blood proteins in transfusion blood... And almost 50 people died in Bangladesh recently from a huge mudslide. Crazy times!

Anyway, it seems the coffee shop actually closes at 6 (grrr), so I must be off. Wish me luck killing the next hour! Ciao :)

So lately, I've been pretty exhausted physically. Maybe it's because I have a 45-minute commute twice a day. Maybe it's because my new job requires much more sitting than teaching. Maybe it's because my body is trying to recover from the school year. Maybe it's because I've contracted some rare infectious disease. Who knows? (Most likely, it's some combination of the above factors... especially the infectious disease one.)

Anyway, my brain is hungry for knowledge!! I'm loving the new job so far (from where I currently write... muwahaha), as my learning curve is pretty huge right now. I've learned many health- and policy-related things every day, and I love it! Today, I had to have a TB training with one of the nurses here at County. She was very knowledgeable, and also informed me that the art of detecting and preventing TB is a highly subjective process. I suppose I'm constantly surprised when the sciences don't seem to know as much as I had thought they did. (I remember in college when I took astronomy, and I was just shocked that scientists only have theories about how the moon formed- they don't actually know!!)

Right. So I'm planning on taking some community college courses beginning in August to further my neverending quest for knowledge. (I'm also planning on getting a second job and joining the community band, just so I don't go stir-crazy.) I'm reeeeeally interested in taking some more science courses, especially Biology, Chemistry, Anatomy/Physiology, and anything health-related. I wish they had survey courses on diseases (communicable, infectious, hell, I don't care!) for the general public. I'd be in heaven. However, the local community college doesn't seem to offer the kind of classes I want to take in the evening. Most upsetting. Why can't I, the standard full-time employee, learn more about the sciences after putting in my 8 hours? Someday, I suppose...

For now, I keep on reading Health Department policies and procedures, and watch a few more tobacco prevention programs. Have a lovely day, nonexistent readers! :)

Procrastinator Extraordinaire!!

So I'm holding off sleep because I have a few thoughts that are itching to get out... (Oooh, and by the way, today was my first job as a Health Educator! Teaching's over, and I can't really believe it...)

First, poverty. Of course I'm all about eradicating it, but my friend and I happened across an interesting situation yesterday... You see, my friend and I are big fans of good pizza. We ordered three (3) large pizzas (don't ask me why; my friend's a glutton), and went to pick them up. In the parking lot, we were approached by two overweight Latina women in an older car. Though I couldn't hear the conversation, I was told the gist: these women were asking us for food to give to them and their children.... Long story.

In the end, we gave them 4 pieces of our pizza, though I am mad at myself for scowling about it beforehand. (Should people who are begging really be obese? Do they really need the food so much if their bodies are overweight? My friend joked that back when poverty was more visible, the beggars were haggard, pallid, and skinny. No longer!) Anyway, there was a time when I gave all I could in a loving and kind way; now I gripe about it. I think the paradigm shift came when I started working a *real* job and started paying off some *real* college/credit card debt. Then, my attitude drastically changed: Why should I work my butt off (and still have a negative net worth) and give it to people who do little (if anything) to better their situation? I mean, really... how can we justify our horribly flawed welfare system? Sigh. I used to feel entirely different about this, but now I fear I'm becoming... Republican.

Next, attachment. Buddhism purports that attachment to worldly things/people/ideas is dangerous; freedom is only truly obtained from releasing all that you try so desperately to have. Of course, being an American AND a woman, I am the ultimate victim of attachment (attachment to significant others, friends, family members, animals, objects, etc.). I find something good (namely a good or even reasonable relationship), and I want to keep it. I want someone to claim me, saying, "Yes, I want you. YOU! There is so much that you offer that I want, and I want you to surround me for as long as humanly possible with it." or something... I haven't really come up with a way to express it well yet.

Now, the problem with attachment is that I think I'm still confusing it with love. (As an aside, I found some images of "love" that I am going to share...)


1.) The optimistic side (courtesy of affirmagy.com):

(If you can't read it, click on the picture for a larger image.)



2.) The painful side (courtesy of explodingdog.com):

(Caption from the site: "I love you this much.")



3.) What I yearn for (explodingdog.com again):

(Caption from the site: "I'm ready to face the world with you."




4.) How I seem to feel quite frequently (you guessed it: explodingdog!):

("We were so different, yet so in love.")





Right. Anyway, I've met two incredible people this past year. (Well, more, but the particular rant at the moment only pertains to two men.) One, we'll call him "Slug," and I grew very attached to one another. So much so that we called it "love." (What "love" is, exactly, is clearly anyone's guess.) This attachment, even though I knew the end result would be separation, caused me to feel that maybe some major differences could be looked over in the name of love. Not so much.

Enter guy two: "Barley." Barley and I got along famously, and thoroughly enjoyed one another's company. We were (and still are) hiking buddies, backpacking buddies, and so forth. It is known, though, that Barley will be leaving in about 3 months to follow a successful and lucrative career. While I am upset about this, I know it only stems from attachment; if I truly cared about the lad, I would rejoice in the bright future ahead of him.

Both of these stories boil down to attachment. I wanted to be with Slug and Barley (at separate points) so much that I was willing to forfeit some of my own personality. Not healthy, nor what I truly want. While I am still heartbroken over both situations, there is a light at the end of the tunnel: This is my time to really work on myself, who I am, and what I want. I have very few responsibilities at this point in my life, and I wish to take full advantage of that fact.

Oh, dear... I feel like these ramblings aren't very coherent, and I'm past my bedtime. Thus, nonexistent readers, I bid you adieu for now. Perhaps someday I'll be better at this whole blogging business. Good night!

Also (and this is on 8.13.07), I'm posting a pic on my oldest entry, so that I can use it as a profile pic. (Long story.) Peace!