So it's going up $4,420?!

That's a very steep increase. Did everyone in the dealership besides you just turn 65 or something?

Does it at least also cover your kids?

That's just...huge, to me.

wtf are people supposed to do? Work to live, live to work.

You can get an independent, fully self-paid, family insurance policy for less than that. Does the dealership even contribute anything? Will they let you opt out?

they pay half of the plan that has $5000 deductibles. if you opt for actual coverage, they still pay half of the cheapest plan amount. so they contribute $154 per pay. ( and I'm skeptical about the veracity of that )

Yes, shaw... this is the family plan covers my kids and jinx (we're still married)

When the divorce becomes final she's off... but the court may require me to pay her cobra. that would be even worse.

I think I'll go boil my bottom.

2 people got cancer, and somebody's kid has serious problems.

communism.

FTR - I do NOT work with Jim.
I has to buy my own when I lost my job. I've been paying $300 a month just for myself. Its almost 1/4 of my "income" right now.

My karaoke machine's not working. Grrrr. And it's Christmas karaoke night for my kids. >.<

The point of insurance is to spread the risk around so that local anomalies like this don't affect your premium. Sounds like your pool is way too small.

This isn't communism. It's the mongrel bastard offspring of a drunken one-night stand between dysfunctional corporocapitalism and half-arsed socialism.

or Insurance, for short.

This. Can you leave this scheme and join Clod's (or an independent one somewhere with a bigger pool)?

On the one hand, yeah. On the other, not if the changes to only 3 people's health have affected Jim's premium to this extent [/insurance nerd]

Mum has been hinting about changes in Dad's health for a while.
I've deliberately not pressed her as she's introduced them with downturned mouth and shaking head and "There's a lot you don't know."

It's not that I don't care - I do, enormously.
But I know she'll tell me at some point and I don't want to play games about it.

Yesterday, as we were out enjoying our family meal, Dad went to the toilet and Mum finally came out with the fact that he has been having prostate trouble. Serious operation style trouble. He has an appointment in the New Year.

Well, it's finally out.
At least I know.
His weight loss has been apparent for a while, so it could be worse.

Happy Christmas.

Hugs, Sundae, hugs.

The kitty snuff video.

I can't get that picture out of my mind, and I can visualize the cat in motion, though I didn't watch it.

I lost two cats in 2011. Cats I had for 17 and 16 years. I have no cats now. I cannot stand to see animals suffer. More so, even, when you imagine that the animal is in emotional distress. Maybe that's anthopomorphizing, but I don't think so.

And now all I can think about is that damn picture, posted for what purpose I do not know. Maybe it's a joke. Maybe the dead cat is made of rubber. I won't know. I won't watch it. But it's bummed my day out completely.

We talk about losing our pets. We know how much it hurts, even after a lot of time has passed. This posting was, at best, insensitive. At worst, cruel.

So I didn't put this in the thread because frankly I don't like to open it and look at that picture, and I don't want to draw any more attention to it.

You'll forgive me if it is a joke video. All I can imagine is what it says it is.

And it's heartbreaking.

That is all.

I think it's just a vid that Classic saw on facebook that he'd found very sad.

I know what you mean though. I keep seeing a flash of it. Horrible. Might be worth sticking a warning in the title, just so people know it's not a joke thread. I realise the title doesn't sound very jokey, but you never can tell with internet stuff.

I didn't watch it either. But here's how to think about it, IMO.

We imagine that our pets have human-level consciousness and emotion, and they just don't. Whatever the living cat is "thinking" in that video, s/he is not as horrified or worried as we would be, if we were in that situation.

Pearl lived with Bean for 5 years. Three days after Bean died, I had a moment and I asked Pearl, "Where's Bean?" -- and heartbreakingly, she looked at the door where he would be returning, if he could.

But then I tried it again three days after that, and she had no reaction at all. If she had any level of self-awareness, she must have thought, "New pack, new situation, this is what we have now, And I'm perfectly OK with that, because I have very little long-term memory, so I live in the 'now'."

It is weird to think of it because we humanize them; but if we die in a household with our cats/dogs, and they have no other food source, after a few days they will start to eat us.