Category Archives: Rants

Sep3

Scam Artist: Western Dental

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Folks who’ve been reading my blog know that I had a lot of problems with my teeth this past spring, culminating in having a molar extracted. It’s been six months since my last cleaning, so I called to make an appointment at the local Western Dental office. I figured the dental chain would probably have lower prices than a dentist in a private practice. When I spoke to the woman on the phone (who was not in the same town where the dental clinic I’d be visiting was, but at some corporate office), I told her I needed to have my teeth cleaned. She told me there was a special running, and I could get the cleaning for $39.99 with free x-rays and exam.

On the day of my 10:30 appointment, I arrived early, at 10am. I tried to confirm with the receptionist that the cleaning would cost $39.99. I told her that was the price I was quoted when I made my appointment. She told me the exam and x-rays would be free, but she couldn’t quote me a price until after the dentist examined me and recommended treatment. She said if I needed an extraction or a root canal, it would cost more than $39.99. I told her I understood that, but I wanted to confirm the cost of the cleaning. I told her I didn’t want to spend any time there unless I was going to get a $39.99 cleaning. She said they would get to my cleaning that day, and that the $39.99 special was still in effect.

Although I arrived at 10am for the 10:30 appointment, I  was not called to the back until 11:15. At 11am I asked the receptionist how much longer I would have to wait. She confirmed my name and then left the front desk to ask someone when I would be seen. When she came back, she told me I would be next. I sat there another 15 minutes before the x-ray technician called me to the back.

When the x-ray tech asked me how I was doing, I told her I had not expected to sit in the waiting room for 45 minutes.  She apologized and said they were down one x-ray tech,but  she didn’t know why. She also acted like I was an idiot to have made an appointment on a Monday, which she said is pediatric dental clinic day. I didn’t know that because when I called to make the appointment, I talked to someone at the corporate office. In any case, I am not a pediatric patient, so I don’t know why the pediatric clinic determined when I was seen.

In addition to every messed up thing that happened in the office, I am also concerned about the x-ray tech flipping a switch in the hallway, then sticking her hands in my mouth. How often is that switch cleaned throughout the day? Also, although the computer keyboard was covered with plastic, she touched it after having her hands in my mouth. How often is that plastic changed? Is it changed after each patient? I shudder to think she’d had her hands in someone else’s mouth, then on the keyboard, then in my mouth, then on the keyboard. Gross!
 
After the x-rays were taken, the tech tried to get me into a cubical where I would be examined by the dentist, but none were available, so she sent me back to the waiting room. I sat there over 30 minutes. When I asked when I would be seen, a different receptionist tried to tell me the wait was so long because I was a new patient. The x-rays are computerized. They didn’t have to be developed. I don’t know what was taking so long.  I think I was repeatedly forgotten.
 
In any case, five minutes later, I was called to the back and put in a chair. The dentist was soon there to examine my mouth. I told him I was there for a cleaning, told him I had a regular dentist in another state, but needed a cleaning now while I am in the area working. He looked in my mouth for less than a minute, but managed to ask me a question I had just answered, showing me that he was not paying attention to what I was saying. (I had just told him I was working in the area. The next question out of his mouth was, “So you’re here for a visit?) He told me he had to write up his observations, then one of the “ladies” would be along to do my cleaning.
 
Ten minutes later a woman came over. I asked her if she were going to do my cleaning. She laughed and said, “We’ll get to that.” She was there to explain the cost of my treatment options. 
 
She immediately started talking about dental implants, even though I had given no indication I had any interest in dental implants. (If I wanted dental implants, I would have that work done by my regular dentist.) She was kind enough to tell me which of my teeth had been extracted. I laughed at her and told her I knew which of my teeth were missing. She tried to explain the payment plan for the implants I didn’t want and hadn’t asked about, but I told her I had no interest in implants, that I just wanted a cleaning.
 
Then she told me I need a filling to the tune of $303! That seems exceptionally expensive to me. I told her I was not prepared to have a tooth filled, that right now I just wanted to have my teeth cleaned. (At this point, I was beginning to feel like a broken record.)
 

She told me the cleaning would cost $197! WHAT? I had been quoted $39.99 for the cleaning.  I think this was the old bait and switch. You know what that is, right? That’s when a business quotes a low price to a potential customer, only to require a higher price when the customer is actually in the store.

The woman claimed to know nothing about the $39.99 special I was quoted over the phone. Strange, the first receptionist I talked to didn’t tell me there was no such the special, she said that special was still in effect, but the second woman told me the first woman must have been “confused.” I think they tried to trick me into paying more than they quoted me, thinking after they wasted so much of my time, I would just go along with whatever they said I needed to do. I got out of the chair and didn’t let them do any work on me. When the woman asked me if I wanted to take the paperwork explaining the cost of the procedures, I told her no, because I am never coming  back here.

When I walked out of the office, I was so angry! I called the Lady of the House to let her know what had happened, and I started crying while thinking about all the poor people this corporation is taking advantage of. The company gets poor people in there with the promise of free x-rays and payment plans, then jacks up the prices after keeping people there for hours and wearing them down. Luckily I escaped.

I have an appointment for a dental cleaning with a dentist in a nearby town scheduled for September 14. The price is $59.99 for x-rays, exam, and a basic cleaning. When I talked to the  office manager, she told me the dentist might recommend a deep cleaning, depending on the condition of my mouth, and said a deep cleaning costs more. But, she added, it would be up to me to decide if I wanted a basic cleaning or a deep cleaning.

Imagine that. I get to decide what’s best for me.

Apr22

Earth Day

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astronomy, discovery, earth

Today is Earth Day.

According to http://www.earthday.org/earth-day-history-movement,

[e]ach year, Earth Day — April 22 — marks the anniversary of what many consider the birth of the modern environmental movement in 1970.

The idea came to Earth Day founder Gaylord Nelson, then a U.S. Senator from Wisconsin, after witnessing the ravages of the 1969 massive oil spill in Santa Barbara, California. Inspired by the student anti-war movement, he realized that if he could infuse that energy with an emerging public consciousness about air and water pollution, it would force environmental protection onto the national political agenda. Senator Nelson announced the idea for a “national teach-in on the environment” to the national media; persuaded Pete McCloskey, a conservation-minded Republican Congressman, to serve as his co-chair; and recruited Denis Hayes as national coordinator. Hayes built a national staff of 85 to promote events across the land.

As a result, on the 22nd of April, 20 million Americans took to the streets, parks, and auditoriums to demonstrate for a healthy, sustainable environment in massive coast-to-coast rallies. Thousands of colleges and universities organized protests against the deterioration of the environment. Groups that had been fighting against oil spills, polluting factories and power plants, raw sewage, toxic dumps, pesticides, freeways, the loss of wilderness, and the extinction of wildlife suddenly realized they shared common values.

Earth Day 1970 achieved a rare political alignment, enlisting support from Republicans and Democrats, rich and poor, city slickers and farmers, tycoons and labor leaders. The first Earth Day led to the creation of the United States Environmental Protection Agency and the passage of the Clean Air, Clean Water, and Endangered Species Acts. “It was a gamble,” Gaylord recalled, “but it worked.”

 

As 1990 approached, a group of environmental leaders asked Denis Hayes to organize another big campaign. This time, Earth Day went global, mobilizing 200 million people in 141 countries and lifting environmental issues onto the world stage. Earth Day 1990 gave a huge boost to recycling efforts worldwide and helped pave the way for the 1992 United Nations Earth Summit in Rio de Janeiro. It also prompted President Bill Clinton to award Senator Nelson the Presidential Medal of Freedom (1995) — the highest honor given to civilians in the United States — for his role as Earth Day founder.

 

I hope Earth Day actually helps the earth. I’m afraid it’s just a day to make people feel better about their shopping habits when in reality their other 364 days of the year are anti-earth days. I’m not saying I’m an environmental angel. I drive a gas guzzling vehicle, I use electricity, and I love me a long hot shower. However, I’m also not walking around feeling like it’s ok to empty eight 8 oz plastic water bottles a day because I recycle them.

And on a side note rant, why does recycling get all the publicity when reduce and resuse come first? Hey, I actually know the answer to my own question. If consumers reduce and reuse first, big business isn’t going to make as much money off of us. Recycling is an afterthought. Corporations do NOT want us to buy less, so we’re made to feel a bit better about what we do buy when we’re told the empty container can be recycled.

Do we  know how much of what can be recycled actually is? I tried to find a statistic to share, but couldn’t find much information on this topic. According to https://alumni.stanford.edu/get/page/magazine/article/?article_id=47701,

[d]epending on the [public recycling] bin and on the city’s recycling system, between 60 and 80 percent of recycling is actually recycled. Those numbers have probably improved over the past few years…

The article goes on to compare single stream and multi-stream recycling programs in New York City and Phoenix at the turn of the 21st century. Of course, this article gives information only about what people put into public recycling bins, not what percentage of everything that can be recycled actually is.

Here’s my #1 tip for saving the earth: Stop buying all that brand new crap you don’t even need.

Image courtesy of https://www.pexels.com/photo/sky-earth-galaxy-universe-2422/.

Apr21

Earth Day Rant

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Ok, so this rant isn’t actually about Earth Day. Rather, it’s a rant about an image I found when I was looking for images to go with my Earth Day post. Honestly, I had no plan or desire to write a rant. I just wanted to say hey everybody, it’s Earth Day, think about what you can do to help the environment, here’s a little history of Earth Day, thanks for reading.

But when I scrolled through the images that popped up when I did a Google search on Earth Day, I saw this:

Hey everybody! Let’s use an image of a basically naked woman to save the earth! (Caption mine)

Really? It’s the 21st century, and that’s the image some folks are using to celebrate Earth Day? First of all, who is the intended audience of this image? Probably not a classroom full of 3rd graders. (However, certain members of a middle school environmental club might be very excited by this picture.) Is this an image somebody thought would get men interested in Earth Day? Even if this illustration is aimed at men/teenage boys/lesbins/fairy fans of any gender, will it actually influence anyone? I can’t imagine someone saying, I used to not give a fuck about the earth, but then I saw a picture of a naked chick covered in flowers, and now I CARE!

Is the woman in the picture supposed to be Mother Earth? I can halfway accept the image as Earth Day propaganda if someone can make a case that the woman is Mother Earth. But wouldn’t Mother Earth be fatter? Super models and actresses aside, most mothers do not have bellies that flat or breast that perky and full. Perhaps I’m mistaken and this is not Mother Earth, but Maiden Earth. (But really, have you ever once heard one single person refer to “Maiden Earth”?) Give me a picture of a chubby gal with stretchmarks (and extra points for body hair) representing Mother Earth on Earth Day, and I’ll get behind that.

I think this is yet another example of using a socially acceptable, beyond natural (and I’m not talking about the pointy ears and the flowers for hair), “perfect,” skinny, young woman’s body to sell something. I don’t think this is an acceptable way to sell anything, but especially not Earth Day.

Earth Day Comments & Graphics

This gal is more what I have in mind when I think of Mother Earth.

(Both images from http://www.magickalgraphics.com/earthday2.htm, where they “offer beautiful free Earth Day graphics, animations, comments, glitter, pictures, Images and codes.”)

Apr18

Inappropriate

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I went with my friend to a function at her kid’s middle school.

It was a Saturday, and the event was a festival of sorts. There were two stages where kids from the school (band, chorus, dancers, mimes) were performing.There were activities going on, like a bike rodeo outside and (I’m not even kidding) making fish prints in the art room. (To make a fish print, take a cold dead fish and brush paint on its body. Then place paper on top of the painted fish and press gently on the paper all along the fish’s body. Remove the paper carefully and admire your fish print.) There were Girl Scouts selling cookies and lots informational tables. There were so many people running around: kids who attend the middle school, the younger and older siblings of those kids, parents, grandparents, probably aunts and uncles and cousins too.

My friend and I were there particularly to see her kid dance with her dance class. The dance class is taught at the school as an elective, alternating with art. Some days the kid goes to art class and on other days she goes to dance class. The dance performance was the last event on the program.

We were sitting in the cafeteria, facing the stage, along with at least 100 other friends and family members of the students. As preparations were being made for the performance, a young woman in a romper came out on the stage.

According to http://dictionary.reference.com/browse/romper, a romper is

  1. a loose, one-piece garment combining a shirt or blouse and short, bloomerlike pants, worn by young children.
  2. a similar garment worn by women and girls for sports, leisure activity, etc.

I guess rompers are in again these days. I remember back in the 70s, my mom had two. One was pink and one was yellow. Both were terrycloth. She wore them to the beach and around the house in the summer. They, like the one the woman on stage was wearing, were strapless.

Yes, the definition says the garment consists of “a shirt or blouse,” but this woman’s romper was more like a long tube top. The top was connected to the shorts, and covered her midriff, but it had no sleeves, not even spaghetti straps. There was nothing but a bit of elastic holding the top over the young woman’s breasts.

I guess my first thought was that it was weird that a student would be allowed to wear something strapless to school, even on a Saturday. My second thought was that this woman, though a young woman, looked quite a bit older than a middle school student.

Then the young woman started to speak. She referred to the dancers taking the stage as “my class.” That’s when I whispered to my friend, Is that the teacher? She rolled her eyes and nodded. The teacher was at a school function in a strapless romper!

First I have to say, I am not one of those people who thinks that teachers should look like old-fashioned schoolmarms. Nor do I think that teachers can’t be young and fun or that teachers shouldn’t be seen in public drinking and dancing and whatever. I think that on their own time, adult teachers should be able to do whatever other adults are allowed to do and dress however other adults are allowed to dress.

However, this teacher was not on her own time. She was at a school function, and she was one wardrobe malfunction away from showing her dance students and their friends and family her tits! (Ok, maybe there was a strapless bra under that romper. If so, slippage would have led to slightly less trauma for all involved.)

How could she think that outfit was a good idea?

Mar8

International Women’s Day

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Hey Everybody! Thanks for giving 49.6% of the earth’s population one day a year to call our own. Perhaps if we think of Mother’s Day as a type of women’s day, that’s two days a year to celebrate women. I guess the other 363 days a year belong to men.

(On second thought, I don’t think Mother’s Day is an international holiday, so it really doesn’t count. That means the score is 364 days for men, 1 for women.)

And guess what? According to Quartz (“a digitally native news outlet…for business people in the new global economy”), “men now outnumber women on the planet by 60 million, the highest ever recorded.”

How can this be? “Left to nature alone, the population on earth would be give or take 50% men and 50% women, according to what’s become known as Fisher’s Principle.”

More from Quartz:

Gender imbalance starts at birth: Both China and India are infamous for widespread gender selective abortions and female infanticide. Both countries have birth sex ratios that are well off the worldwide average. In 2013, China saw 1.11 boys born per girl, India 1.12, as compared to 1.07 worldwide. The availability of affordable prenatal diagnostic techniques has only accentuated the trend, which means the gender gap in the general population is bound to widen in the coming years, as more balanced older generations pass away. In an attempt to break the trend, India has legally banned sex determination before birth in 1994, legislation that has, however, been criticized as ineffective. In 2013, China loosened its one-child policy, one of the main drivers of gendercide.

( Read the entire article at http://qz.com/335183/heres-why-men-on-earth-outnumber-women-by-60-million/.)

What’s going to happen if this trend continues and the number of men on the planet increases further? Will we be reduced to International Women’s Afternoon or International Women’s Moment of Silence?

(I didn’t come up with this rant all on my own; I had a little help from my friend. Actually, this rant was originally hers.)

UPDATE: It just occurred to me to see if there is a Women’s History Month. There is. It’s March. Women’s History Month is now. So I guess women get a whole month of the past to celebrate. To find out more about Women’s History Month 2015, go here: http://womenshistorymonth.gov/.