tiny update

I know I’m long overdue for a new post, but I’m really into my book right now, so I’m spending my spare time reading.  But I do want to update you on the results of the insulin heist by my co-worker.  I ended up squealing on him, which I don’t regret for a minute, and the pharmacy manager gave him a “get out of jail free” card, and that was it!  Can you believe it?  I was actually kind of disappointed in my boss after I heard that, but I’m over it now, and I just joke around about which merchandise totaling $219 I should walk out of the store with.  Humor, people; it’s how I get through the day.

I am sick

Somehow I got sick.  So I am taking a couple days off work, and doing absolutely nothing.  Today I went to Redbox, rented a couple movies, and it’s been an amazing day.  I plan to do more of the same tomorrow.

work rant

OK.  It has to happen.  Sorry you guys have to read this.  I normally complain to Hannah after work, but she’s sleeping.  And this time, I’m not complaining about a patient, but a co-worker.

I witnessed something at work today which really made me mad — and almost makes me want to call the Loss Prevention office.  One of my co-workers, we’ll call him J, decided he would help his grandma by picking up her Lantus for her yesterday.  He came through the drive-thru and end of story, right?  No, he leaves work today, goes out to his car, and then minutes later comes back in with a prescription bag in his hand.  HE LEFT HER INSULIN IN HIS CAR THE ENTIRE DAY!  The high was 90 today!  He’s such an idiot.  So does he refill the prescription, call her insurance for an override, and then pay another copay?  No.  He gets two new vials from the refrigerator and takes them home!  For those of you playing along, that is essentially robbing the store of $218.99.  That is a direct cash loss because you’re stupid and think you can leave your drugs in the car like a library book or a movie from Blockbuster.  My question to you is:  would you have left your double cheeseburger that you got from McDonald’s in the car?  (He’s overweight, so that joke is kind of lost if you don’t know him.)

Okay, so some people in the crowd want me to give him the benefit of the doubt.  “Whatever, it was a silly mistake and you should just make fun of him once he leaves the store.”  No, I can’t believe he didn’t pay for a refill!  Can you imagine walking back into McDonald’s after leaving your double cheeseburger in the car overnight and asking them to exchange it for a new fresh one?  They would laugh in your face!  (And a double cheeseburger only costs $1.  It’s even more preposterous to ask them to exchange 219 double cheeseburgers!)  But golly, here at the drugstore, it’s not your fault that you’re not responsible.  We’re just like a department store with a great return policy.  Except for the fact that by law we can’t dispense drugs which have already left the pharmacy.  But that’s not your fault, I guess.  Are we not teaching personal responsibility anymore?

of golf and holes

Troy, this one’s for you…  Thanks for the text today bro!

Yeah, I know it’s been a long time, but you have to trust me that it is for the better.  Anything I would have said prior to today would have just been venting out of frustration.  Of late, it seems that I am just playing the role of the Vicodin police.  Which, whatever, is kind of my job, but I’ve been letting my frustrations slip into my real life.  Take this article I saw on Purdue’s homepage.  (Just so you know if you’re not familiar, only the biggest news stories from Purdue get posted on the front page.)  Let me quote the first line of the story:

Golfers who play well are more likely to see the hole as larger than their poor-playing counterparts, according to a Purdue University researcher.

This for some reason absolutely infuriated me last week.  I haven’t even read the entire article because it is completely uninteresting and would only make me more mad.  I had to stop reading after a quote from this psychologist chick Jessica Witt,

We know a relationship exists between performance and perception, but we are uncertain how they affect each other. For example, do golfers see the hole as bigger so they putt better? Or if they putt better, does that mean they see the hole as bigger? I believe it is a cyclical relationship, but more studies are needed to clarify if one affects the other.

WHO THE HELL CARES?  Why is this news?  Am I alone in thinking that no more studies need to be done on this?  Is this how my tax dollars are spent?  I am stunned that the National Institutes of Health funded this garbage, when I know these funds could be used for research that actually matters.  While writing about this story, I stumbled upon a graphic which was to be included in the University News Service story to help clarify this incredibly difficult concept of the cyclical relationship between performance and perception, but was edited from the final publication at the last minute.  This is a Ternary Complex exclusive:

So I’ve got this idea that Jessica Witt is so self-righteous that she Googles herself on a weekly basis, so my guess is here in a few days I’m going to get a nasty e-mail from her or one of her MUF (Masters in Ultimate Frisbee) students telling me to take this down.

You see what I mean?  I warned you I become mean-spirited when I get frustrated.  Maybe I’m not as calmed down as I thought I was.  Either way, YouTube has become my safeplace.  I love spending hours on there just seeing where the related videos take me.  People can be so creative and goofy.  I love it!

The thing about work which frustrates me is that I spent all this year learning about how to best serve, educate, and manage a proverbial entity called “the patient.”  All the profs say, “when treating your patients…” or “be sure to educate your patient that…”  And we as students naturally tend to envision our grandmas as this proverbial “patient.”  I scoured over my notes for hours on end every single day of the year trying to learn as much as I possibly could to be the most help to this “patient.”  But then I talk to these drug-seekers like the lady who called the pharmacy today on three separate occasions to ask three different people when Medicaid would pay for her “Vico-dans” next, or the opiate-addicts who I’m supposed to feel good about because I’m replacing their heroin use with Suboxone addiction, and my idealism is chipped away little by little.

I race home to the quietude of YouTube or my book.  I listen to Steve P.’s sermons and get so excited about the fall that I start dancing.  I long for the day that I get regular again (yes, I’m talking about my bowels here).

There’s a recurring theme that Dostoevsky keeps bringing up about life, which I discovered several months ago on my own.  I’ll be able to write about his interpretation of it a bit later, but I want to quickly introduce my ideas on it to you now.  It’s the idea that in order to find anything important to you in life, you have to lose it first by knowingly giving it up – that you have to fall to the lowest of lows before you can start your climb to redemption.  I remember well my lowest day.  It was Saturday, January 26, 2008.  I’m nearing my 6 month mark of a rocky, but gradual climb.  I have much to be thankful for, and little to be frustrated about, even though it takes a reminder every once in a while.  I’m really growing in my faith, and am very excited about the new push at Northview for “Living a Life on Loan” in service to those in my community.

Coming soon (if I get to it):  a review of Lafayette Civic Theater Under the Stars and another video!