An Open Letter

Oct 5/10


To "The Ultimate Multitasker"

I know, it happens.  You've just sat down to take a nice crunchy shit, and your phone rings.  How embarrassing!  But, like most embarrassing things, it happens to pretty much everyone at some point. You just reach on down and nudge whatever magic button silences it, and deal with it when you're done.

Okay, okay, there are those rare exceptions, when you're expecting a call and it's life-or-death, or there's an emergency.  You notice it's one of those calls, assess your situation within the shit process, and deal with it accordingly.  If you haven't really started yet, or you're pretty much done but in the wait-and-see if there's more period, then I think it would be borderline acceptable to take a super-important call. 

However, if you're right in the middle of the process, grunting like a 90 yr old redneck fucking a sheep on top, and making that horrible rubber boots walking in really wet mud noise on the bottom, you let it go to voicemail.  You do not try to take a call in this situation.  Ever. 

Okay.  One exception.  If you're expecting a conference call from Bill Gates, Stephen Hawking, the Pope, Queen Elizabeth II, Prez Obama, Oprah, Bob Dylan, Salman Rushdie, Francis Ford Coppola and the talking robot from Lost In Space, telling you how awesome you are, then you can take the call.  But try to keep the sheepfuck grunting on the quiet side. 

And if it's a call from your bank, to set up an appointment to refinance your mortgage, it can wait.

And if you need to confirm the date with your wife, DON'T YOU FUCKING CALL HER WHILE STILL GRUNTING AND GURGLING. 

There is not a single phone call in the world that needs to be dialed while you're taking a crap.  You know how you can tell that call was a really bad idea?  Cause she kept making you repeat yourself when the other noises you were making drowned out your voice.  That could wait.  Oh, and the confirmation call back to your banker....that could wait too.

Sincerely

Ren

ps: You should probably go see a doctor.  Even minus the phone call, that just wasn't right.

Fingerpicking Guitar Techniques - DVD - Stefan Grossman

I've been trying to learn guitar for ages now. Maybe sometime I'll put up some pics of my guitar collection. I've tried a bunch of books, and even private 1-on-1 lessons, but I never seemed to get anywhere.

With the books I always found myself wondering just what the heck the guitarist was actually doing with his hands to make the chord shapes. Or I'd lose the melody of the song and play as if I was typing the notes with no sense of rhythm at all. Sure there's a cd included with most books, but you then need to take your practice over to a cd player and since moving all my music to my computer, I just don't have one handy anymore.

With private lessons I solved those problems, but gained some new ones. You can buy a pretty nice guitar for what just a few months of lessons would cost you. Also, I'm incredibly shy about playing in front of people. Even though that's pretty much the whole point of having the teacher there I'd usually end up getting too nervous and uncomfortable to play along, and just try to cut the lesson short so I could go home to practice by myself.  Also, when you're working with a teacher, you have to work on their agenda.  Oh they'll say you're the boss, and that they can teach you whatever you'd like, but it never seems to work out that way.  They always want you to work through this one book first, or do these theory exercises.  And really, all you want to do is play something.  Even just learning one little song to show your family and friends when they demand a performance.  After all the lessons I took, all I knew was a couple chords with no clue of how to put them together, a couple scales, and a handful of blues solo leads that sound okay if you have a band behind you, and sound completely rubbish playing all alone. 



So, after some thought about giving up on guitar altogether, I finally decided to take the plunge and try a lesson DVD.  For me at least it solves all my problems.  It's like having a teacher in the room, but you can pause him and make him go back whenever you like.  Also,you don't have to feel like you're being judged, so you can be more comfortable.  Sure you've got to put your practice space in front of a tv/dvd player.....but that works perfectly for my space. And once again, you've got to deal with the teacher's agenda.  But in the case of a DVD, you can probably find one that suits your needs, and there's so many reviews on the net that you know what you're getting before you jump in.  And hell, even at $30-$40 for most good lesson dvds, it's still cheaper than a 1-hour lesson so if you hate it, you're not out much.  And if you love it, you're going to get way more than 1 hour out of the content.

Mary and Max (2009)

It's not the best trailer ever, but it does give you at least a warning that this film is a little odd. It's odd but sweet. If you have ever in your life felt like you didn't quite fit in, you will identify with these characters. A little girl from Australia, and a middle-aged man from New York strike up a pen-pal friendship that lasts for years. Simply amazing.

Stuff I Like

One thing I’m known for among my friends is the ability to filter through a lot of the crap in the world and discover new (to me/them) and wonderful things that probably wouldn’t have come to their attention otherwise. Whether it be music, movies, or even the occasional TV show, I’m always there to share some new find. Now, to make it easier, and keep it all in one place, I will start putting introductions to these things on my blog.

New Blog

Another day, another blog. I’ve started a few, with grand plans to make important posts in all of them. Always, I have left them empty, because, to start an amazing blog full of important posts, you must start with one mighty fine, important post.

This blog however is going to be full of rubbish. So enjoy.

The "Funding Cut" to Alberta Pharmacies

Image via Wikipedia

I know I haven't posted anything in ages, and I apologize, but I'll try to be a little more regular in the future.

What's finally got me out of my writing funk is the recent announcement that the Alberta government was "making significant cutbacks to community pharmacy". "100's of rural pharmacies might have to close their doors". Check out this site I care about my pharmacist for what pharmacists are saying about it. As a pharmacist myself how can I not be outraged at something like that?

Maybe because it's a load of bullshit.

First off, the government doesn't "fund" community pharmacies. They are independent businesses (or members of corporate chains) who have contracts with the government to provide pharmacy services for specific Alberta citizens (seniors, social services, disability, etc). These contracts limit the amount they can charge patients on government sponsored programs for filling their prescriptions. To simplify, this consists of the actual invoiced cost of the drug, a tiny "inventory allowance", and a dispensing fee. All in all, the pharmacy makes about $10 "profit" on each prescription. (this is before all other expenditures, such as rent, wages, supplies, etc, so the actual "profit" is much, much less)

So where is this big "cut to funding" coming from? Did the government change the contract so they are paying less of a dispensing fee? Did they axe the inventory allowance (a tiny amount that is almost insulting anyway)? No. So what did they do?

They made the drug itself cost less. They made deals with the pharmaceutical companies, and negotiated a direct cut to the cost of generic drugs. And since pharmacists do not mark-up the drugs, this is a savings that will transfer straight to Albertans, either directly or as savings for the government drug plans.

So now, you're probably wondering, how the hell this is being portrayed as a "funding cut to pharmacies". I mean, look at it. With everything presented here so far, it should be completely revenue-neutral to the pharmacies themselves. Hell, if anything, it should be beneficial, as they will have to carry less inventory just sitting on the shelves waiting for a customer to need it.



Ready for me to tell you the real story?

The one little thing that the articles (and that crybaby pharmacist website) forgot to tell you. Or they hinted at it, but didn't explain. A large portion of pharmacy "funding" comes from the drug manufacturers in the form of rebates. It's been a while since I've been in a position to see the actual dollar value, but it's a very significant amount. Basically, the drug companies will pay the pharmacy to sell their product over a different companies product. So, yeah, when a person gets a prescription, they pay what the pharmacy paid for the drug, with no mark-up, but they don't get any benefit of that little kick-back rebate payment. That goes right to the cash register, and to the black side of the ledger.

But that still doesn't explain where this "government cuts to funding" has come from. Pretty easy to close the loop from here, but I'll do it for you. They have forced a reduction in the up-front cost of the generic drugs. In the end, the drug company isn't going to take the hit to their bottom line, so the rebate payments will be reduced, or axed outright. This is the "funding cut" that the stories are telling you about.



So, that still sounds pretty bad, why aren't I concerned?

Well, for one, I'm simply annoyed at how dishonestly the pharmacists in the news have been portraying this. THE GOVERNMENT DID NOT CUT YOUR FUCKING FUNDING!!!! As far as I can tell, they didn't even ban rebate payments (like they did in Ontario). They simply have negotiated a better "at-the-register" price for themselves and for all of your customers. Really, this isn't about the lost money. It's about doing things the way they've always been done, and resisting a change when it comes.

Personally I don't think the rebate system had any place within our socialized medicine system. Progressive pharmacists are always whining about how our only source of revenue is tied to a product. Well, who made it that way? You certainly didn't do yourself any favours by having the rebates for selling generic drugs be the only way you could be profitable.

Even when we've had the chance, we haven't charged people for our additional services. Remember that "pharmacist prescribing" that was such a big step forward a couple years ago? How much money do you charge for that process? Er....if you're like every pharmacy I've seen it's a big fat $0. When that came through I was working for Shoppers Drug Mart. You can say a lot of things about them, but one thing I've always thought they've done well is charge a fee for services, and justify it. But when pharmacists got the right to prescribe, what did they charge. NOTHING. They decided that gaining another dispensing fee for the filling of the prescription was enough.

So there's a spot these hard-done-by pharmacies can make some of their "cut" funding back. Charge for your pharmacists time involved in prescribing. If someone asks your pharmacist for that service, you charge for it. And even if the pharmacist decides that the person doesn't meet the criteria for a prescription, you charge them for the time it took to decide that.

Raise your OTC prices. Or even better, charge directly for OTC consults. Do you think the $0.50 you make on a bottle of $4 cough syrup is reasonable when your pharmacist spent 10 minutes finding out whether it was safe for the patient and explaining how to use it? What if the pharmacist spends 10 minutes counseling a patient on something and they don't buy anything. Why the hell is that free? What if the patient grills your pharmacist for 20 minutes, finds out 10 products he needs to get to cure all of his ills, and then goes to Walmart since they have it all for cheaper. Why is that free?

That's where your money should be coming from. Not from sneaky little back-room deals. If you're calling yourself part of the "government funded health care system", then your revenue for what they pay for should be up front and on the table. And seriously....we're the "most trusted profession"....so don't go to the media with a story that hovers on the edge of being an outright lie. If you're too embarrassed to admit what the government cuts really are, then maybe it's time to get a new source of revenue. One that you're proud of and would put right in the headline of the news story if some group tried to take it from you.