I hate that a good deal is staring me in my face for my kinda pricey face care products, but I'm stocked up on all my key components. THIS IS JUST WHAT THEY WANT, DAMMIT.

God, I *wish* my blood sugar was 130. My doctor would do jump-skips of joy if it was 130.

I went to a meeting with a diabetic counselor when I was first diagnosed--gosh, ten years now, I think. She was maybe 21, 22, bored to tears, and she droned through the standard warnings re: nerve degeneration, damage to extremities, blindness, etc. "Of course," she said with a shrug, "you'll probably end up losing a leg or your eyesight anyway, but we want to delay that as long as possible . . ." I don't remember the rest of her spiel. But at the next doctor's appointment, I told my doctor, a terrific woman who is currently the head of the clinic where I first met her as a new intern, about said counselor. Dr. Springer gasped in horror and said, "What was her name?" And she left to make some phone calls.

I don't think Little Miss Boredom had a job at the end of the day.

edit: And ten years on, my eyes show no sign of diabetic-related deterioration and I can still feel my toes--at least as well as I ever could. (Though seeing them is a sometime thing.)

An increasing number of parents are opting out of vaccines: [link] Of course, that means if the child with pertussis breathes on a baby too young for vaccination, that baby can get whooping cough. Whooping cough is often fatal in babies, particularly since it's so rare that doctors don't recognize it. (I recently read The Panic Virus: A True Story of Medicine, Science, and Fear, about the antivax movement. It's a book that makes one cry and throw things.)

Woohoo! Well, a qualified woohoo--so, if any of you remember, I was bitching and moaning at the end of the year because they took away six vacation days and one holiday, at my work. And basically everyone emailed and said "WTFF?" and they said they were just "aligning the policies" (mind you, so far we haven't seemed to get any UPsides to this alignment).

So they just sent an email saying on review, they realize that for some people who just joined that's a large change in compensation, so they're giving us a 1.15% raise, effective Jan 1 (which is when the PTO thing became effective). Now, granted, I figure if you take away six vacation days, which is over one working week, I should get increased compensation of 1/52nd of my salary. Which is closer to 2%. But still. Qualified wooho!

Yay, meara!

When I started with this contracting firm last March, I negotiated 4 weeks paid leave (combo sick/annual), because their starter package was something like 10 days vacation/2 days sick leave for year, and that was not going to work for me.

And yet I didn't seem to have too much leave available. I talked to my supervisor last week and she said, "oops!"--turns out I'd only been accruing it at a rate of 3 weeks/year. So I'm getting a lump sum deposit, yay.

Of course, that's still less than I had as a federal employee, sigh. I had like 3 weeks of accrued sick leave when I left the government, and since I won't be re-hired within a year, it's just gone. Damn it.

Amy, my sister in fruitless bra-shopping, I am going to the mall at lunch (I take a late lunch) to look for bras at Dillards or Macys. (The *real* reason for going to the mall is that my Dad had $20 of gift cards to Godiva that expire tomorrow, and he said he wasn't going to use them and gave them to me. Godiva store in the mall = free chocolate for me. And, I suppose, for Tim. MAYBE.)

Anyway, wish me bra luck!

GODIVA!!!

I mean, much bra luck, my sister!

I figure if I don't find any bras, at least I will have chocolate to console myself. FREE chocolate. FREE GODIVA.

I hate you just a little bit right now, you know.

I remember needing to get a tetanus shot before I could graduate high school. Which still seems weird.

I'm accruing the max possible vacation at my company. I have very flexible work hours and can work from home. I could possibly make more money elsewhere, but I doubt I could negotiate similar benefits.