Me

Back in October, I found a charge on my credit card for $340. The merchant was listed as GOOGLE*ADS4756092809. I didn’t recognize the charge, so I called the CC company and reported fraud. They cancelled my card, and I had to wait two weeks for another one.

I got a letter today that the investigation is complete, and the merchant (Google) has confirmed that it is a valid charge. That letter had a phone number on it, so I called.

The reason that the charges were considered valid, according to the woman on the phone, is that I provided no supporting documentation, and the merchant did provide some.

My first question was how I am supposed to provide documentation of a charge that I had no knowledge of. She didn’t know.

So I tried a different approach. I asked what documentation the merchant provided. She didn’t know that either. She said that I would have to contact the merchant directly.

So I asked for the merchant’s phone number. She didn’t know that either. She then unhelpfully suggested that I contact the Google Advertising Department and gave me that number.

I asker her what my options are. All I can do is refuse to pay it, and if I do so, the credit card company will cancel my credit card, then report the delinquent amount to my credit record, with interest each month. They will put a note on there that I dispute it, but that means nothing. My credit will still be trashed.

So next, I called Google Ads. The person who answered the call told me that they can’t release any information on the account, because I am not the account holder. I tried using the automated system, and all I know is that the account was suspended for violating Google’s terms of service.

It looks like I am going to have to pay this. I could call a lawyer and sue, but that would cost me more than just paying it, with no guarantee that I would win anything. I have no other recourse. I don’t even know what this charge is for, who it was paid to, or how they got my CC number, but I am just screwed out of $340.

One of the things that I have always been big about is personal freedom. I may or may not want to go on a cruise, but it is my right to decide. I may or may not want to get a vaccine, but it is my right. As long as my behavior isn’t directly causing harm to someone else, I expect others to mind their own business.

I also expect and respect the same of others. If you want to have a sandwich delivered by Doordash, that’s your business. If you want to take a cruise, or if you want to hide in your house from the black helicopters, again that’s your business. If one man wishes to marry another man, I will argue that the government has no business in stopping them. Likewise, if another man refuses to perform the ceremony or to bake the wedding cake, I believe that is also outside of the government’s legitimate authority to force them to do so.

When I see people on the left AND on the right who say, “I don’t care if the government passed this dictate or that restriction because I don’t want to do that, anyhow,” I believe that it diminishes all of us.

I may not agree with your speech, your religion, or your chosen pursuit of happiness, but I will fight for your right to do so, just as I expect you to do for mine. Either we all hang together, or we will surely all hang separately.

No post today. I am at my son’s wedding.

When I did my end of the year post last year, I didn’t think that 2021 would be a good year at all. As it turns out, the year didn’t go as badly as I had feared. The country could be doing worse, and personally, I am in pretty good shape.

• In January, this blog left blogger and came here to its new home.
• I had an emergency room trip in February.
• In March, I had enough of being a teacher and went back to the medical field.
• April saw my house get hit by lightning for the third time in the past four years.
• In June, I managed to spend a few days in Las Vegas.
• In July I went lobstering in South Florida and spent a few days fishing in Maine.
• I spent August working many hours of OT in the COVID wings.
• In November, I went on a cruise.

I worked a lot of hours this year. My average workweek at the hospital was right at 50 hours a week. I know that some changes are coming, because I can’t keep up this schedule, and I am also convinced that my boss couldn’t lead a platoon of Marines into a whorehouse.

In the meantime, I will continue preparing for the bad times that I think are coming. For today, I will just enjoy the last day of 2021 as I wonder what 2022 will bring.

I ordered my wife a Christmas gift from Amazon. It was on sale at a ‘Black Friday’ price of $349 and a delivery date of December 6. The package was reported to me as “lost in transit” on December 9. I was told to cancel the order and reorder it, so that is what I did. The new price was $620 with a delivery date of December 17. I contacted Amazon to ask them to honor the original price. This is what I was told:

We strive to maintain low and competitive prices on everything we carry. We constantly compare Amazon’s prices to our competitors’ prices to make sure that our prices are as low or lower than all relevant competitors. As a result, we don’t offer price matching.

I explained to the guy that I was not looking for a price match, I wanted Amazon to honor the price that they originally offer it to me for, and since it was THEIR fault that it was lost in transit, they should be the ones to replace it at the original price.

The associate then told me that he could send out a replacement, but that replacement would not arrive until January 19. Checking the Amazon page, they still list the item for sale, and are still advertising a delivery date of December 15-17, with 8 more listed as being in stock.

They have put me in the position of having to buy this item at nearly double the sale price, if I want my wife to have it in time for Christmas.

In fact, this sort of thing is illegal in Florida. It is called a “bait and switch” scam, and is a violation of Florida’s Deceptive and Unfair Practices Act. A person who is the victim of a bait and switch can get damages plus up to $10,000.

I am going to send a certified letter to Amazon’s Registered Agent. If they don’t help me, I will contact an attorney. All I want is what I paid for at the agreed upon price.

2003

The call came in around supper time. It was for a man having chest pain. On arrival, the man was pale, cool, and he just didn’t LOOK well. He was complaining that he was short of breath, having chest pain which radiated down his right arm, and also said he felt “weak.”

A 12 lead EKG revealed that he was having an anterior wall MI, which is the medical term for a heart attack in the front portion of his heart. I started an IV, and gave the standard medications: nitrates, aspirin, oxygen, and morphine.

Once stoned on the morphine, he was an extremely funny man. We all had some big laughs when we got to the hospital. The cardiac alert I had issued while we were on the way to the hospital had worked just as intended- the man was taken to the cath lab, and he was operated on and the clogged artery repaired in less than hour.

2005

Two years later and 400 miles away, the same man walked into an emergency room and collapsed in cardiac arrest. The ER team was able to restart his heart after only a few minutes of effort, but due to a 4 minute delay in beginning CPR while they moved him from the lobby to the ER, he had permanent brain damage. He never regained consciousness, and died ten days later.

This man had a family, he was important to them. This man taught me the value of money, taught me to fish, taught me to play baseball. He taught me how to live my life. He wasn’t always there, but then again, I wasn’t always there for him, especially when he needed me the most, the day he died.

That man was my father.

I don’t blame anyone for his passing, but I use this case to illustrate that we are responsible for the things that others take for granted.

I tell my students that becoming the best practitioner that you possibly can is more than just pride in your job. Those skills are not just for your patients. They can be for your family. Ask yourself a question: “If my father or mother had a heart attack, would I be comfortable knowing that I was the one working to save them?”

If the answer is no, then why are you here? Every patient you see is SOMEONE’S mother, father, brother, or sister.

It has been more than sixteen years since the day he left. I still miss him every day. It still makes me sad twice a year: the anniversary of his birth, and the anniversary of his death. My dad would be in his eighties now. Even as I approach the age that he was when he passed away, I still sometimes long for his wisdom, his guidance, and the steady knowledge that he passed along. There are so many times that I wish I could seek your guidance.

Dad, I still remember that day when I was 12 years old, and we were standing in the back yard burying my pet. You put your arm around me as we dug the grave together, and you said to me, “I know it’s hard, but he knew you loved him.”

That pet is long gone and largely forgotten. However, I still mourn your passing.

Thanksgiving is traditionally a holiday where family and friends gather to appreciate each other’s company and be thankful for their good fortune. While I will be working today and can’t gather with my friends and family, I can still reflect on my good fortunes.

I am thankful that I am relatively healthy, in a decent financial position, and that I have a wonderful, loving woman by my side.

I hope that this day finds each of you who read this blog in similarly happy circumstances.

Posts were short and not as frequent last week because I was out of the country. We travelled to St Marten (the Dutch side of the island). While we were there, we talked to the locals, who were more than happy to give us their opinion on COVID, the vax, and American politics. Since I love doing my “man on the street” intel reports, here goes:

The Dutch citizens on the island were surprisingly conservative. After a few drinks, the people there were more than happy to tell you what they think. The people we spoke with overwhelmingly felt that the vaccine was responsible for quite a few deaths, and once that rumor got started, the people who had yet to be vaccinated began refusing the jab.

Only 60% of the island has been vaccinated. We didn’t see any locals wearing masks. Despite all of that, the COVID infection rate on the island stands at 7.1 per 100,000. That is, 0.00071 percent of the people there are infected with COVID. Even so, the CDC claims that there is a “high risk” of catching COVID on the island. I say “bullshit.” The locals hate Biden, they don’t trust the leaders, and they pointed me to a sign that was put up by the government, pointing out to me that it was suspicious. The people I talked to believed that there was a plot afoot:

They felt that the use of the same slogan from country to country was suspicious as hell.