Whattaweek!

Monday: AM: Eye doctor's appointment, to see about cataract surgery. Alert to all aging peeps everywhere: if your eye doctor says you have early cataracts and you need to let them ripen... you need a new eye doctor. That is apparently very 'old school.' The last two times my eye doctor checked my vision, he noted that my prescription hadn't changed, but the cataracts were getting worse and nothing could be done about them until they 'ripened.' I hate that term. Anyway. Turns out he was wrong. Imagine that. New Doc says 'hey, if they are affecting you at this point, and you want to take care of it, let's take care of it.' So we did the exam, and his office has tentatively scheduled the first round the 13th and the second the 27th. I am excited: for the first time in my life, I'll have clear distance vision; I'll still need glasses for reading, but not for driving, gardening, etc.. The biggest glitch is that for those two weeks, I won't be able to read clearly (2 weeks without reading? Yikes!)

The irritating side is that no one wants to tell me how much this is going to cost. Well, the doctor says the going price is $2500/eye and 'that's everything.' Except it isn't. That's his work. And that's before the insurance stuff reduces that, and then I pay X% of the insurance-agreed-upon price (IAP). But they won't tell me what that IAP is. Then they tell me they have no idea what I'm talking about  when I ask 'what's the facility cost for the surgery center?' That drew a complete blank: "We don't do that." Well, no. But since that's the only center they use, and he does surgery there every flippin' week, you might think that my request isn't the first they've heard.

So I went over to the surgery center - in another wing of the same damned building - and asked them if they would give me the facility code, so that I could tell the insurance company and the insurance people could look it up. "It doesn't work that way. The doctor's office will make the appointment, and then it goes through the AccessCenter, who'll get in touch with your insurance company and then somebody will call you with the costs." (NB: I'm not asking for costs, just the facility code that they use for billing. They wont' even give me the phone number for the people who'd have the code!)

I give up after five minutes of trying to get a straight answer I go back to my office, and send an email to the insurance person who'd told me 'you ever have any questions, you just contact me and I'll get you answers right away.' Yeah, right. It's now Friday evening, and she's still not gotten back to me. The AccessCenter is also silent.

Monday afternoon, which I'd allotted to reading a pile of tenure/promotion files, was blown because the campus closed again for bad weather, which never materialized but did result in a lost day of research because all the places on campus I needed to get were closed. Tuesday was full of teaching and grading and omg were the papers awful. Highest grade? C-/D+. No one understood the assignment, or how to write a paper synthesizing anything. Wednesday was spent on the t/p files and getting the next round of paperwork for our VAP in place. She got hired after 5 on Wednesday, basically because I hounded people all afternoon. Wednesday night was dog school. Thursday was bad: it began with me forcing the students to look at their awful papers and trying to explain to them once again what the assignment was: take the discussions we've had, the readings you've been supposed to do and the outside research that you were to do and haven't - and synthesize that: how can we use the Greek myths on X and Y as sources to discover the values of Ancient Greece. You can't do the paper without doing the outside research - it's trying to build a three legged stool with only 1.5 legs! They say they understand. I don't believe them.

Thursday afternoon I was so tired I just came home and collapsed. Friday: History Day - ah, the joys of History Day. That took until 12:30. Did paperwork and calls until 1, when I ran off to lunch with our new VAP MsM and A the Shakespearean. Ran out of lunch early so I could make another appointment, after which I ran back to campus for yet another t/p meeting, which lasted until after 5. Home to pee the pups, off again to meet friends for a birthday dinner. Home from that by 9, wired and tired.

My weekend plans are to read, nap and play with glass and the animals. And to hide from everybody who might think about wanting something from me. So there.