Miss Sasha, Mr. Sasha and Panky will be staying overnight with us on Friday. We keep our house as clean as two people with multiple jobs can, which is to say that it’s tidy with cat fur tumbleweeds. That’s fine for us, but when we started thinking about what a two-year-old might pick up and sample for flavor, out came rubber gloves and the shop vac. Tonight, Pete boiled the bathroom. Tomorrow, he’ll set up a bed, I’ll clean the cat boxes, vacuum everything and we’re going to shampoo a carpet. At home in North Dakota, Panky lives with cats and a 125 lb. dog, so the little guy’s unlikely to nibble cat poop. I think. Anyway, it’s been awhile since I lived with a toddler, but I remember that no matter how clean the house, the child will find something that formed its own disastrous ecosystem.

You’ll be pleased to hear I made fresh yogurt. You know: to boost the immune system.

This is a guest post by Barbara O’Brien of Mahablog.

Health Care Reform: The Morning After

Many politicians and pundits warned us that the health care reform (HCR) legislation that just became law will destroy America. Government bureaucrats will take over health care decisions, we were told. The old and infirm would be hauled away by death panels. Everything about the way we receive our medical care will change, and change drastically, they said.

Medicare recipients have been frightened by stories that their benefits will be cut. Middle-age people are worried they will lose their jobs when the law’s dreaded regulations, or taxes, or maybe regulations with taxes, would destroy their employers’ businesses.

The truth is, very little will change for most people. If you were insured by employee benefits before HCR, you will be insured by exactly the same policy in exactly the same way after HCR. You will have access to the same doctors on the same terms. “Government bureaucrats” will no more be involved in your health care than they were before.

And the same is true of Medicare, which of course is a government program, although many of the people who opposed the HCR bill don’t seem to know that.

Here are the “cataclysmic” changes to health care that are now in effect, or which will go into effect within the next six months for people who are already in group insurance plans:

• The law says you can’t lose your insurance coverage because you get sick. Before, in many states, if you were stricken with a severe illness such as mesothelioma cancer that would be expensive to treat, your insurer could use just about any excuse to cancel your coverage. That is over.

• HCR has ended lifetime limits on coverage. As long as you are receiving medical care, your insurer pays the bills.

• Your children can be covered on your existing policy until they are 26 years old.

• In six months, insurers cannot refuse to insure people under the age of 19 because of “pre-existing conditions.” This provision will go into effect for everyone in 2014.

And if you are on Medicare, you will be asked to struggle with the following:

• You get a free annual checkup.

• The co-pays and deductibles on many preventive care services are eliminated.

• If you are in the Medicare D “doughnut hole,” you will get a $250 rebate check in a few weeks. The hole itself will be closed gradually and will be gone by 2020.

But what about all those terrible regulations and taxes that are about to drive businesses out of business? Um, there really isn’t much to report. Oh, wait, here’s one — a 10 percent tax on indoor tanning services that use ultraviolet lamps will go into effect July 1. That’s about it.

However, beginning this year a tax credit will be available for some small businesses to help provide insurance coverage for employees.

Soon the politicians and pundits will start trying to frighten you about the provisions that will go into effect after this year. I assure you they are about as scary as the provisions that go into effect this year, but I will discuss them in a follow-up post.

— Barbara O’Brien

Pete took this picture in the park yesterday. It rained all today and we’re expecting tomorrow a big storm or rain event, as the hysterical weather schnooks now say. I’d taken a vacation day to get tomato seeds into starter trays, but that didn’t happen. Instead, to cheer myself up, I took down the weighty winter drapes; then laundered, fluffed and hung the light summer sheers. They’re fresh and clean, and almost enough to carry me through the basement flood stories I will certainly hear all day tomorrow.

Winter kicked our asses and spring is sleeping with our girlfriend. Fuck!

Pete and I walked around Princeton in a spitting rain, looking for a pair of black shoes to replace scuffs I’d worn to shreds over the winter. We’d already been through shoe stores every weekend for a month and I was a little testy about it, so today, we went straight to what we knew would be an expensive source. Four stores later, we were about to give up again when The Walking Store lay between us and our car. We walked in, I fended off a salesperson and sat down to scan the shelves. By this time, the pain in my hip was screamy-scream-screaming, so when my eye came to rest on a pair of UC24s, I gimpy-gimp-gimped to them and found the salesman at my elbow. I came clean.

Tata: I’m having trouble tying my right shoe, so I’m looking for slip-ons. The filthy things I’m wearing were a terrible compromise, but they didn’t exactly succeed. I’d like to throw them away immediately.
Salesman: You’ve chosen a shoe that will support your feet and cushion properly. Let me put some orthodic inserts into them. Try this.

I limped across the store. I limped back. I limped to the front window and limped back. These shoes were so brilliant the screaming died down. The salesman brought me Obeo sandals that felt pretty good, but there was something else calling my name: the crazy, crazy, crazy Danskos in colors and patterns that were no laughing matter. I pointed to a pair and said, “Leopard print. My favorite color.”

Earlier, we’d stumbled around Stein Mart and found these badass Liz Claiborn kicks with a kitten heel on sale for 50% off. They reminded me of the shoes Sherilyn Fenn modeled for the first few episodes of Twin Peaks – not that these shoes resemble those. No way. But that character would wear these. Also: I hate plaid, but love the patent leather tassels. You can almost smell the Campari, the soda, and the brimstone.

I will wear these to brief special occasions where no one mistakes me for a nice person.

There, in The Walking Store, these shoes looked like the kind of moist temptation you’ve been warned about all your life. The priest, the minister, the rabbi all agree: you’re safer crossing the street before you look at the Dutch shoes, but I tried them on anyway. In 1973, Dad sent us kids sabots – Dutch wooden shoes – which I outgrew immediately. But today, I put these on and the sensation in my feet stirred an old, old memory. I limped to the front window and limped back. Then I stood up straight and walked evenly to the front of the store, free of pain. It was a fucking miracle with a good news/bad news component. On the one hand, I tell people all the time: buy the good shoes to protect your knees and spine. On the other: I bought the cheap shoes and paid for that. The salesman threw away the old shoes like he had freed me from the curse of stupid, crippling scuffs, and I suppose he was.

Then I had to call Daria and tell her I bought wooden shoes.