January and February in Arizona: schizophrenic.
Anyone from anywhere else would wonder how I can possibly compare the first months of the year with a mental illness. It's really quite simple.
First week of January: 60s
Second week of January: 70s
Third week of January: 65
Fourth week of January: 40s
First week of February: 55
Second week of February: 70s (my prediction)
That's the temperature, rising up and down, back and forth, all over the place.
Not only is the temperature wild and crazy, but so is the weather. Rain, sun, rain, sun, clouds, clouds, sun, rain, sun, clouds, Snow. You can never be prepared for anything--you never know what the day will end with.
And what's worse, is if you go shopping, store displays are just there to rub it in. Going shopping the second week of January, all the winter stuff is on clearance. Blah, you think, too hot for this stuff.
Going shopping the next week, there are shorts and t-shirts everywhere. Geez, you think, shivering in a sweater, jacket and three shirts, isn't it a bit cold for shorts?
And the worst part? It doesn't get any better after February--the weather's loony here 12 months a year.
That's what I hate about Arizona. The weather's unstable and I never know what to wear. If I complain that it's too cold, it's because it was 90 degrees yesterday and I'm wearing a t-shirt--and it's 55 degrees today. If I complain it's too hot, it's probably because it was 32 degrees and rainy this morning, so I decided to wear a sweater and rain jacket to work. And it's after work, sunny and a humid 85 degrees.
If you want reliable weather...if you always want to be prepared by wearing the right thing...Arizona is not the place for you.
Showing posts with label Arizona. Show all posts
Showing posts with label Arizona. Show all posts
1.2.08
30.1.08
Native Arizonan
After days of waiting, biting down all my fingernails at the thought of incurring $50 late fee charges because of bureaucratic miscommunication, I am now officially an Arizona resident again. Whew.
25.1.08
Putting the "care" in healthcare.
You're a student. You wake up: very sore throat, dry painful deep-chest cough, migraine, sniffly, achey. So you call in sick to work, let your teachers know you won't be in class (if you're responsible, like me). Laying in bed, you decide to call mommy & daddy to see what you should do. Mommy thinks about your symptoms, looks up the Mayo Clinic's flu symptoms check list. You have all symptoms except two. There's a good chance you can get pneumonia if you don't get treated (especially if you lead a high-pace lifestyle, like I do). So you go to good ol' Campus Health, the cheap, reliable place for students to get treated on campus.
Not.
This was me on Wednesday. I went to Campus Health. I called in advance and was told there would be about an hour wait, but some people would leave and flu symptoms would put me in ahead of others with less serious symptoms. Cool.
I saw my friend Mike there. He had similar symptoms, had felt sick a few days earlier. He went in to triage because he kept throwing up. What did they do? Gave him a pamphlet on how to stop vomiting and sent him home. Great.
An hour and a half later, I finally get called in. Everyone who came before me and everyone who came after me, except for about five people, had gone in before I got called. That's about 35 people Campus Health deemed to have more serious symptoms than I did, as I sat in the waiting room in an uncomfortable chair, shivering violently because I had the chills.
The nurse takes me in, has me sit down. I tell her I think I have the flu. She says "uh, huh." I tell her my symptoms. She glares at me. She takes my temperature. "You don't have a high enough fever to have the flu." I tell her I felt I needed to come in because I'm afraid I'll get sicker if I don't get treated, like I'll get strep throat (has happened on many occasions in the past). "Your throat's not sore enough to have strep throat," she says without asking how sore my throat is. She doesn't ask what my pain level is like on a 1-5 scale, which I've been told by another medical professional is a requirement.
She looks in my ears. "They're sort of swollen, but I don't think you have an ear infection."
She looks down my throat. "Nope, it's not red. You probably have the beginnings of an ear infection."
She gives me a tylenol and tells me to go to urgent care somewhere else. She says they're too busy to see me tonight.
I start crying because I'm so frustrated. An hour and a half wait and all I get is a headache pill and a referral? Rediculous. No wonder I hate going to the doctor when I don't feel well.
"Oh, you must be a little bit uncomfortable," she says.
YOU THINK?????
"Do you have a car?" she asks, pointing out the other urgent care options on the list she hands me, without bothering to ask if I feel well enough to drive myself somewhere--which, at the time, I don't.
Infuriated, I leave the clinic and tell my parents about the episode over the phone, in tears. They are also upset. My mom calls the MinuteClinic hotline (the one the nurse suggested, and also the closest to my apartment), and finds out they don't take our insurance. But I don't want to go to an emergency room. If I have the flu, then EVERYONE else in Tucson must also be ill and in the emergency room.
So, I go to the MinuteClinic, which is in a CVS. Kind of weird, kind of ghetto. It's a 20 minute wait. And I have to pee really badly, because I didn't go the whole time I was at Campus Health because I thought the second I went into the bathroom they'd call me to come in. Some good that did me.
The nurse practitioner at the MinuteClinic is very friendly and helpful. I tell her my symptoms, and she automatically says that sounds like the flu. I tell her what Campus Health told me, and she shakes her head. I tell her about the pamphlet they gave Mike, and she laughs scornfully. Campus assholes.
She gives me a flu test--she takes a long q-tip and swabs the insides of each nostril, way up inside and very ticklish. It takes 15 minutes to "cook", during which time she fills out my information on the computer and takes down all of my symptoms again.
After 15 minutes, the test says I am positive for Type A Influenza. Gee.
She prescribes me two meds and I get to go to the pharmacy to have them filled. And, there was a promo with my insurance company, so I only had to pay for the visit, not for the flu test. $59 is better than $96.
I was also told not to go to school or work for five days so I don't morph into a sticky bundle of pneumonia. If I'd followed Campus Health's instructions, I'd be out spreading the plague all over the place, and probably waking up with cold sweats and rust-colored sputum (the danger signs the nurse practitioner said I needed to watch out for for pneumonia).
So, I'm going to file a complaint on campus. Clearly, the triage people just wanted to go home (it was getting close to 5 pm). And what kind of urgent care center is only open until 5 pm, especially on a campus with 37,000 students and god-knows-how-many faculty, staff and employees? And giving a bad diagnosis just so you can turn students away? That's outrageous, and it's poor practice.
Not.
This was me on Wednesday. I went to Campus Health. I called in advance and was told there would be about an hour wait, but some people would leave and flu symptoms would put me in ahead of others with less serious symptoms. Cool.
I saw my friend Mike there. He had similar symptoms, had felt sick a few days earlier. He went in to triage because he kept throwing up. What did they do? Gave him a pamphlet on how to stop vomiting and sent him home. Great.
An hour and a half later, I finally get called in. Everyone who came before me and everyone who came after me, except for about five people, had gone in before I got called. That's about 35 people Campus Health deemed to have more serious symptoms than I did, as I sat in the waiting room in an uncomfortable chair, shivering violently because I had the chills.
The nurse takes me in, has me sit down. I tell her I think I have the flu. She says "uh, huh." I tell her my symptoms. She glares at me. She takes my temperature. "You don't have a high enough fever to have the flu." I tell her I felt I needed to come in because I'm afraid I'll get sicker if I don't get treated, like I'll get strep throat (has happened on many occasions in the past). "Your throat's not sore enough to have strep throat," she says without asking how sore my throat is. She doesn't ask what my pain level is like on a 1-5 scale, which I've been told by another medical professional is a requirement.
She looks in my ears. "They're sort of swollen, but I don't think you have an ear infection."
She looks down my throat. "Nope, it's not red. You probably have the beginnings of an ear infection."
She gives me a tylenol and tells me to go to urgent care somewhere else. She says they're too busy to see me tonight.
I start crying because I'm so frustrated. An hour and a half wait and all I get is a headache pill and a referral? Rediculous. No wonder I hate going to the doctor when I don't feel well.
"Oh, you must be a little bit uncomfortable," she says.
YOU THINK?????
"Do you have a car?" she asks, pointing out the other urgent care options on the list she hands me, without bothering to ask if I feel well enough to drive myself somewhere--which, at the time, I don't.
Infuriated, I leave the clinic and tell my parents about the episode over the phone, in tears. They are also upset. My mom calls the MinuteClinic hotline (the one the nurse suggested, and also the closest to my apartment), and finds out they don't take our insurance. But I don't want to go to an emergency room. If I have the flu, then EVERYONE else in Tucson must also be ill and in the emergency room.
So, I go to the MinuteClinic, which is in a CVS. Kind of weird, kind of ghetto. It's a 20 minute wait. And I have to pee really badly, because I didn't go the whole time I was at Campus Health because I thought the second I went into the bathroom they'd call me to come in. Some good that did me.
The nurse practitioner at the MinuteClinic is very friendly and helpful. I tell her my symptoms, and she automatically says that sounds like the flu. I tell her what Campus Health told me, and she shakes her head. I tell her about the pamphlet they gave Mike, and she laughs scornfully. Campus assholes.
She gives me a flu test--she takes a long q-tip and swabs the insides of each nostril, way up inside and very ticklish. It takes 15 minutes to "cook", during which time she fills out my information on the computer and takes down all of my symptoms again.
After 15 minutes, the test says I am positive for Type A Influenza. Gee.
She prescribes me two meds and I get to go to the pharmacy to have them filled. And, there was a promo with my insurance company, so I only had to pay for the visit, not for the flu test. $59 is better than $96.
I was also told not to go to school or work for five days so I don't morph into a sticky bundle of pneumonia. If I'd followed Campus Health's instructions, I'd be out spreading the plague all over the place, and probably waking up with cold sweats and rust-colored sputum (the danger signs the nurse practitioner said I needed to watch out for for pneumonia).
So, I'm going to file a complaint on campus. Clearly, the triage people just wanted to go home (it was getting close to 5 pm). And what kind of urgent care center is only open until 5 pm, especially on a campus with 37,000 students and god-knows-how-many faculty, staff and employees? And giving a bad diagnosis just so you can turn students away? That's outrageous, and it's poor practice.
18.1.08
Update to the Saga
So, more about my Bursar's account charges, just in case anyone's interested. This one comes with some good advice...
The reason I was charged in-state AND out-of-state tuition is because I applied to graduate school at The University of Arizona. Apparently this changed my status to that of an out-of-state student, I incurred charges for the current semester, and I had to fill out a domicile affidavit. Now I have to wait a week until I can be considered an Arizonan again. Yay. But, the good news is it had absolutely nothing to do with Prop 300. Hah.
So, if you want to apply to grad school at the UA and you're still an undergrad there, wait until the first few weeks of school have passed (if possible, based on deadlines) and THEN apply. I don't think they can charge you a few weeks into the semester. Not that they should be able to charge you for out-of-state tuition if you've already paid you're in-state tuition, but I'm not in charge, now am I?
The reason I was charged in-state AND out-of-state tuition is because I applied to graduate school at The University of Arizona. Apparently this changed my status to that of an out-of-state student, I incurred charges for the current semester, and I had to fill out a domicile affidavit. Now I have to wait a week until I can be considered an Arizonan again. Yay. But, the good news is it had absolutely nothing to do with Prop 300. Hah.
So, if you want to apply to grad school at the UA and you're still an undergrad there, wait until the first few weeks of school have passed (if possible, based on deadlines) and THEN apply. I don't think they can charge you a few weeks into the semester. Not that they should be able to charge you for out-of-state tuition if you've already paid you're in-state tuition, but I'm not in charge, now am I?
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