Finding Common Ground

So thanks to TJ (theamazingatheist), & Galen (hallcyon) the BlogTV FUNd raiser is going to be much larger than expected. 

So here's the deal. Its going to start this Friday the 15th 9pm EST in TJ's BlogTV room. Money will be raise for Common Ground Relief. Their goal is to raise at least $10k, and it's a 24 hour show. If you'd like to donate, you can do so by clicking here. 

Additionally I'll be hosting as well on his BlogTV at 9pm EST on Jan 16th. I'll still be raising money for Common Ground, however I'll also be raising funds for the Students for Freethought & The Thomas Society, an atheist and Christian group on campus, to go head down to New Orleans and help rebuild as well. I'll be going on this trip as well, video blogging all the way. :) You can see the details for that section of the show and donate by clicking here. 

There's a ton of YouTubers and others helping out with this. For more details on who and what watch the video below. :)

What prizes to give?

College is killing me. Next week is finals and I still haven't scheduled my classes for next quarter yet.

That aside, a real question for you guys...

So over spring break I'm traveling to New Orleans with my student group. Everything's good to go, we just need to raise the remaining funds to provide for housing and such. We don't need much more so we were thinking about doing a BlogTV session. So far it'll be myself and Jon Weyer, the campus preacher I'm going down with.

We were thinking that we'd let people ask whatever questions they want (grilling myself or the preacher), in exchange for any donation amount. Now, for every $10 donated by an individual, they will get put that many times in a drawing for prizes. So far we have a couple copies of Ray Comfort's Origin of Species, a scarlet 'A' scarf - but we want to give out more than these for prizes.

So - what kinds of prizes would you like to see? We need to decide soon - if we do this BlogTV session it'll be early January.

::: Update ::: PZ Meyers agreed to do a short interview towards the beginning of the show to help out. Maybe there's a way to work him into answering a few questions as well. We shall see.

American Medical Care

So I hardly ever get sick – ever. When I do, it’s über yuck. 

For the past 3 days I’ve had a really bad cough, getting progressively worse. When I woke up this morning, it was just as bad. No temperature, just this hacking dry cough. It finally got to the point where it hurt to speak – and breathe. My ears were starting to hurt as well. This pushed me to finally see the doctor.

I generally avoid a doctor’s visit for a couple of reasons
1. Most illnesses cure themselves.
2. I don’t make that much money, and it’ll cost me more to see the doctor than it will to take a day off of work.
3. It’s just expensive! (I guess we could’ve just left this at 2)
4. I’ve had multiple insurance changes/companies 

Because of the different providers I’ve had this past 3 years, I had to go to a new doctor. This was quite a different experience to what I’ve been accustomed to over the years.

It was a walk-in clinic. I did all the usual signing in, insurance card stuff. When I finally went back to see him was the interesting part. Any other time I’ve been to the doctor it’s always been the standard taking the temperature, popsicle stick down the throat saying ‘ah’, checking breathing, and checking my ears…. none of this happened.

The man was sitting at a desk in the room when I walked in, on the phone talking to someone. I waited about 5 minutes for him to finish his conversation about another patient with whoever he was on the phone with. When he was done, he asked me a few questions, and I elaborated on what was wrong. Throughout this entire process he was sitting facing the wall. He never introduced himself, never made eye contact. Just sitting at his desk, facing the wall, writing.

“Until proven otherwise, we have no reason to believe that it’s anything more than a cold.”

He then finally turned around to face me, with a prescription of 10 Benzonatate (for the cough), & 6 Azithromycin (as an antibiotic).

I was a bit pissed about this. Not just for his unprofessionalism, but for the fact that he didn’t check anything. I spent about a total of 10 minutes in the building. He just hurried and sent me off.

I’m not a doctor by any means, but am I wrong for feeling this way? I don’t want to give our med professionals too much shit but… this doesn’t seem quite right.

To top it all off, the pharmacy was unable to run my insurance. There goes $70 to 16 little pills.

Now I’m taking the prescription. 2-3 hours post taking the pills I feel even worse than before. Feels like I’m getting a good chunk of the side effects. Drowsiness, dizziness, headache…

But I digress.

Let me know your thoughts.

Until then, if I have to go to the doctor again, I’m finding a new one.

Origins of Banana Man

I was on the bus on my way home from campus today, and got a call from a friend. The conversation basically went like this:

"Ashley! You're never going to believe this!!"

"What?"

"Ray Comfort's Origin of Species came to campus!"

"Are you sure? We're not supposed to be getting those here..."

"It is, I have one."

"I'm on my way."

So I picked up 4 copies. I went home, did a project, and decided to come back to campus for more around 1:30pm. They were all gone.

I would say I'm surprised about this... but I'm not. Even though Ray Comfort's site said that Ohio State wouldn't be getting a copy, it doesn't surprise me that we got them (we have the largest campus in the nation). What did come as a minor surprise is that he moved up the date. These books weren't supposed to be handed out until the 19th. 

So why'd he move up the date? One preacher I talked to on campus told me it was because "we had to." I wonder if it's because of the Secular Student Alliance's press release that he posted on his blog? He posted this today, trying to sound sly or something.

None-the-less, a video will be coming out of this soon.

New Site

I have no idea what I'm doing with this site, but this is a fun test post no? :)