Hahn's Journal

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Subject:	Cantaloop!
Time:	9:56 am.
Mood:	nostalgic.
Music:	Us3.

I was pretty much humming this all through 10th grade.

Also:

Stay classy, YouTube.

Comments: Read 2 or Add Your Own.

Subject:	First world problems
Time:	9:46 am.
Mood:	disappointed.
Music:	Karsh Kale.

So my phone died at some point on Sunday. Since it was my alarm clock, I've been relying on Naked Alarm Clock.

Then last night, a goddamn Windows update forced a reboot at 3am or some shit while I was fast asleep. So I slept in and now my boss is grumpy.

And my torrents lay unfinished as well.

/shakefist @ technology

Comments: Read 9 or Add Your Own.

Subject:	Tax dollars at work
Time:	11:33 am.
Mood:	working.
Music:	Hybrid.

How the US funds the Taliban

Just in case anyone still thinks there is any genuine meaning to this war.

"... the practice of buying the Taliban's protection is not a secret. I asked Col. David Haight ... What did he think about security companies paying off insurgents? "The American soldier in me is repulsed by it,"

Comments: Read 2 or Add Your Own.

Subject:	.doc workers
Time:	4:03 pm.
Mood:	working.
Music:	Daft Punk.

Dear highly educated/highly paid professionals who create elaborate "tables" with the Tab key instead of an actual table:

The pain you cause me with additional hours of work is dwarfed by the pain of personal disappointment. I know you can do better! You're smart! Smart enough not to instruct me to "just copy-paste this column" when the closest thing in your lovely document that resembles a column--as the term is commonly understood--is a stitched homunculus that may look passable in the sterile incubation tube of your desktop but rapidly disintegrates into a ghastly lump of margin-breaking despair when exposed to the daylight of PDFland or HTMLville.

Comments: Read 13 or Add Your Own.

Subject:	Quivering palm
Time:	1:35 pm.
Mood:	lazy.
Music:	Way Out West.

Forget my last post.
Health Care Conundrum '09 has been solved.

Comments: Read 10 or Add Your Own.

Subject:	Mansylvania was already taken?
Time:	11:58 am.
Mood:	hungry.
Music:	Meat Beat Manifesto.

This is now on my morning bus shelter.

( This preview is rated D for distracting )

Comments: Read 10 or Add Your Own.

Subject:	'Cause there aren't enough health care blogs
Time:	4:39 pm.
Mood:	pensive.
Music:	Bonobo.

I read this piece when it was first published, but my recent (very minor) clinic visit lets me read it again in a new light.

What do we all think about the Goldhill plan?

His gist is that, contrary to the current progressive sentiment "health care is broken because it's too free market/capitalist/unforgiving", it's actually broken because it's not free/capitalist/unforgiving enough.

Like most monopolies, the system is shielded from all the supply and demand forces that brought us ever-better and ever-cheaper technology everywhere else. The patient is not really a consumer because we don't know what anything costs, we're not spending transferable currency, and middlemen intrude upon even the most tiny routine transactions.

It's compassionate to say "sick and injured people shouldn't be bothered with the price--we should just help them". We can talk about letting more people into the lifeboat all day, but if the lifeboat is shit then we all drown. Also, most people don't realize how much wealthier we would be if we actually controlled the health care dollars that are spent on our behalf between employers and state/federal programs (hint: it's 7 figures).

He suggests that there can be no cost control as long as we have aggregation. My favorite analogy is the "lunch with 10 co-workers":

What do you order for lunch if everyone receives an individual bill? You'll choose a side salad, or a steak depending on your needs. You can judge the price of each item as fair or unfair. Each dollar is weighed against everything else it could be spent on.

What do you order for lunch if the group agrees in advance to split the bill evenly? Suddenly you are no longer the judge of what is excessive, unnecessary, or unfairly priced. Furthermore, the bill is gonna be out-of-control anyway, and you only pay 10% of every item you choose, so why not get the third martini?

I don't think Americans enjoy going on X-ray benders, but the hospital, drug, and equipment people know how the game is played. $6 billion is spent per year on advertising for things like Latisse and Hoveround. A portion of every sale these ads capture comes out of your wallet.

After my surgery and the follow-up two weeks later, I asked the staff if I could get a copy of the real invoice (not just my co-pay). I could not, as per the terms set by my insurance company. As sweet as this deal seems at the time, I have to remember that on the other 364 days of the year I'm not being treated, I'm paying out the ass to provide someone else with this placation. Basically, cost control is doomed as long as we have a "use it or lose it" incentive.

My favorite part is the whole "total compensation" BS where the employer extols their own insurance contribution on our paychecks. This has been around long enough that we don't find it bizarre, but we should. Health care is important and necessary, sure, but so is shelter and food and yet we somehow cope.

How would you feel if your $1,000 paycheck were replaced with a $500 paycheck accompanied by a list of approved in-network apartment buildings and grocery stores where you could live and shop at a discount? If they don't appeal to you, fine--you simply forfeit the $500. The money you earned vanishes into the ether and is not credited to you in any way should you change careers, get laid off, retire, or die.

So Mr. Goldhill basically advocate mandatory savings accounts, with public credit extended in cases of catastrophe. The key idea is that we become empowered to pursue health in a more total sense (food, environment, recreation, etc.) instead of just thermometers and pills. Color me intrigued.

Comments: Read 5 or Add Your Own.

Subject:	Shoop da woop
Time:	3:53 pm.
Mood:	working.
Music:	Orbital.

How did Adobe products become industry standard?

They take a year to open.
They freeze my computer when attempting to self-update.
They steal my file associations and printer defaults constantly.
The browser plugins are insecure and crashy.
The files they produce get weird "number out of range" errors when other people try to open them.

/huggles Foxit and Gimp

Comments: Read 11 or Add Your Own.

Subject:	Inanity
Time:	11:51 am.
Mood:	blah.
Music:	Crystal Method.

"Remember: the definition of insanity is doing the same thing over and over and expecting a different result!"

I know I need to stop reading news sites but I hate how, as a discussion grows longer, the probability of this smug little turd appearing approaches 1.

• No it fucking isn't.
"unsoundness of mind as a consequence of brain-disease; madness, lunacy" (OED)

• In this universe, it is virtually impossible to attempt a feat at two different points in time under identical conditions. Even if your motions and effort are identical, the environment has changed. You aren't even composed of the same cells and electrons that you were last time.

• What happens when you apply this lesson to working out? dating? job hunting? Many important things in life are an exercise in repetition.

Comments: Read 7 or Add Your Own.

Subject:	Postapoc theme park
Time:	11:36 am.
Mood:	curious.
Music:	Tali.

I've never visited Detroit, but this photo journal is downright haunting.

Comments: Read 6 or Add Your Own.

Subject:	Where can one buy those moustache disguises nowadays
Time:	11:37 am.
Mood:	lazy.
Music:	Amethystium.

Comments: Read 2 or Add Your Own.

Subject:	Boring post
Time:	2:08 pm.
Mood:	working.
Music:	Kid Loco.

Yay: After 5 years, my boss finally sprung for a scanner so I don't have to walk to the library and e-mail (inbox-destroying) images to myself constantly.

Boo: Tone deaf IT peeps strike again.

My ticket: "Hi, I'm locked out of the web server. My login is [blah blah blah]. I need to make edits to our lab's website before the end of the day. Any advice? Thanks."

~3 days later~

IT guy: "Hello. Thanks for contacting us! Try this password instead. I think you'll be pleased with the results!"

Well it works. But I think I'd be more pleased if you'd stop changing my password without notifying me.

Comments: Add Your Own.

Subject:	HCR
Time:	9:52 am.
Mood:	thoughtful.
Music:	Boards of Canada.

So I was mildly impressed with the press conference thingy, if only to hear an American president talk about insurance companies like a grownup for the first time since the 90s. I'm still intensely suspicious about Obama's easygoing friendship with our military/financial/medical overlords but at least he grasps the issue. Whether or not anything changes over the next four years is the trillion dollar question.

I'm amazed by how many working people jump onto the bizarre bandwagon of "stop whining and expecting the government to do everything for you. If you want a doctor visit badly enough, you'll work overtime and save up for it like it's a wide screen TV."

But I already do look at it from a consumer's perspective. We are all paying customers of Federal Government Inc. Looking over their a la carte menu of goods and services, I would have to place "keeping me alive" pretty high on the list. In fact, if they can't do that I'd have to say their priorities suck and they fail as a company.

The whole "bureaucrat between you and your doctor" meme makes me livid. News flash geniuses: the people who manage your health today are not hired, promoted, and paid based on your health outcomes. They work hard day and night to please the investment banks and hedge funds that hold their stock. That's it.

How much of our labor, measured in dollars, ends up going toward crap that doesn't matter?

I'm not convinced that a nation needs deductibles, co-pays, and pre-existing conditions in order to prosper.

I'm not convinced that a nation needs unbounded debt trading in order to prosper.

I'm not convinced that a nation needs aimless foreign conquest in order to prosper.

</hippie>

Comments: Read 5 or Add Your Own.

Subject:	Resolution
Time:	9:28 am.
Mood:	working.
Music:	Moloko.

I've decided to stop being emo about my lack of discernible talents.

Comments: Read 10 or Add Your Own.

Subject:	Normal Day
Time:	1:52 pm.
Mood:	impressed.
Music:	Tali.

I can't endorse the opiate abuse, but the rest of it is pretty awesome.

Comments: Read 4 or Add Your Own.

Subject:	nom
Time:	12:06 pm.
Mood:	hungry.
Music:	Skeewiff.

Lunch time!

Now to find a flavor that can overpower 150 doses of envelope glue.

Comments: Read 4 or Add Your Own.

Subject:	Toobz
Time:	11:05 am.
Mood:	curious.
Music:	Groove Armada.

Probably best not to read too much into this, but some days I feel like YouTube knows me better than anyone. The recommendations serve as a daily self-reflection-- a window revealing a murky collage of my impulses.

Comments: Read 3 or Add Your Own.

Subject:	Hawt
Time:	8:23 pm.
Mood:	hot.
Music:	Hybrid.

Ugh, can't find the air leak in my bedroom.

Outside temperature is 93.
AC running at maximum.
Doors closed, windows closed.
Inside temperature is 89.

The output feels dry and cool but it only extends 1-2 feet.

Comments: Read 9 or Add Your Own.

Subject:	You don't say
Time:	2:01 pm.
Mood:	lazy.
Music:	Orbital.

From Time magazine "The Future of Work":

"Rob Carter, chief information officer at FedEx, thinks the best training for anyone who wants to succeed in 10 years is the online game World of Warcraft. Carter says WoW, as its 10 million devotees worldwide call it, offers a peek into the workplace of the future. Each team faces a fast-paced, complicated series of obstacles called quests, and each player, via his online avatar, must contribute to resolving them or else lose his place on the team. The player who contributes most gets to lead the team — until someone else contributes more. The game, which many Gen Yers learned as teens, is intensely collaborative, constantly demanding and often surprising. "It takes exactly the same skill set people will need more of in the future to collaborate on work projects," says Carter. "The kids are already doing it."

Comments: Read 12 or Add Your Own.

Subject:	Yoropa
Time:	2:42 pm.
Mood:	tired.
Music:	Smoke City.

Pick your poison!
I'm craving gyros with extra tzatziki.

Comments: Read 8 or Add Your Own.