The world I've been living in

I've been holding onto some information that I've been reluctant to share. I've been having difficulty writing for either of my current blogs due to some news that I received just before Thanksgiving. News that has made me angry and I don't like to write from a place of anger because nothing good can come from angry energy... except perhaps Public Image Limited's "Rise".

Officially three stories in my world have culminated into one big shit storm.... a sort of "perfect storm" if you will. And for me to tell these stories I need to go back to the day after the transplant while I was lying in my hospital bed dealing with some early issues related to my transplant. Now you might wonder why I'm writing a transplant related story in my Robots in the Paint blog. And the answer is that I want my Kevin's Kidney blog to remain as a positive story line and the stories I'm about to tell don't make me very happy. So lets get into it.

Story line one: A tale of two bosses.

It's the day after the transplant and people are texting and emailing me but I'm not much up to texting everyone back or replying to email so I mostly blow off everyone. I did feel the need to let my bosses know that the transplant went down and that they wouldn't be seeing me for a few weeks. One of my bosses had texted me before I sent my email. In his text he wanted to know when I thought I would be back to work. 

My bosses are brothers and this boss is the less talkative of the two. He's always short with words and very to the point. Sometimes you ask him a question of did you mean this or did you mean that and he answers "yes". The other brother is far more talkative and shares funny stories. This text was from the less talkative so it wasn't too surprising that his text was short and to the point. Still... there was no "hope you're doing ok" or "how did it go?" Furthermore in the weeks since I've been out there's never been a card, or a fruit basket or any indication that they wish me well or that they hope I'm doing well. All contact has been through this one brother and it's been all about the work and when do I think I'll be back. 

At one point I planned on stopping by to pick up my laptop so I could start working 20 hour weeks from home. I emailed them to let them know I was planning this... for a few days no response. Then I wrote to them again to mention that I was thinking of coming by the following Monday to pick up the laptop. Again no response. Monday morning came and I was on my way to have my labs done and I emailed them again to say that I was on my way to get my labs and to ask if on the way back I should stop by to get the laptop. The response finally came in... it was simply the word "NO" in caps. That was all that was said. 

A few days later I had sent them a status update, which I had been doing weekly to keep them informed on what was going on over in my world. They never replied to any of those updates. But a few days after I had sent that update the same brother replied telling me that they didn't need me to do any work for them until I was capable of doing a full 40 hours. He gave a few reasons for this, none of which seemed to be logical to me... but these guys are old school and their thoughts while ridiculous to me were valid to them and so what could I do or say? They made their decision and I wasn't going to be able to change their minds. 

All the while I've only ever heard from the one brother and the one who usually has less to say... the other brother hasn't been heard from in 6 weeks. There's a little bit more to tell regarding this story, but only after I tell you the other two stories.

Story line two: Monster

For the last 25 years I've had an account on Monster.com. At some point during those 25 years I had set up a search agent. Do you know what that is? It's just a daily search of jobs that meet certain keywords, and Monster.com sends you daily email of any of these jobs that have the keywords in their title or description. I'm always too lazy to shut them off when I'm working at a job that I'm happy at and so these email come in daily whether I'm looking or not.

About two weeks after the transplant I had noticed that the daily email coming in were no longer specific to my keywords. They were about all these random jobs that had nothing to do with what I do for a living. So after a week or so of these email I went into my Monster.com account and discovered that on the 6th of November someone had changed my search agent. The fields had all been emptied out but the search agent had been left in place and active. I thought this was odd, how could someone access my account? Unless of course they had access to a computer upon which I had opened my account previously and allowed that computer to "remember me" so I didn't have to log in every time I looked at a potential job. The only two places that would be the case would be here at home or on the laptop I used at work.

It's not a big jump to make to think its possible that someone in my office opened the Monster web site on my computer and could see my account all logged in. In fact I couldn't think of any other possibility except that I did it myself while in some kind of stupor since the transplant, but I don't recall any such thing happening and neither does Meg, who was my baby sitter in those early days.

Now, if I were them and I opened my Monster and saw the active search agent I might assume that I was looking to leave my job. So is that something that happened. Is there a connection there between the lack of hearing from the brothers and this odd happening on my Monster account? I just don't know, but it's certainly a possibility.

For the record while I was not currently looking there was a brief period last winter when I was considering it. Not because I was unhappy, but because I had just met with the transplant team and the financial coordinator had mentioned the expenses that would hit me during the first six months following the transplant and that made me suddenly aware that our company didn't offer Short Term or Long Term Disability coverage. I got nervous that the transplant would come any day, now that I knew I had no coverage. I started looking at potential jobs between mid January and mid March. Thinking the sooner I get a job with STD coverage the better off I would be. But mid March came and there was some hub bub around the company regarding new benefits packages on April first and there was an email asking us if we wanted STD and LTD options. So as of April first I now had STD and LTD. The company didn't offer to pick up any part of the cost, but at $13.00 dollars a week for STD and $22.00 per week for LTD, it seemed worth it to have coverage once the time came for the transplant. So once again I was perfectly happy at the company and felt good knowing that I had that security blanket.

Story line three: STD (not that STD... the other STD)

About ten days out from my transplant I was feeling pretty good. I had just spent another night in the hospital from having some kind of digestion related issue but was now feeling fine and was back home and started thinking about my Short Term Disability (STD). I personally hadn't done anything regarding the STD and was assuming that somehow the gal that handles all of our personal related issues and benefit related issues would have triggered the STD, but I wasn't certain. So on a Friday morning almost two weeks out from the transplant I texted the gal and asked her if she had done anything for me regarding this. She hadn't and wasn't even sure what was supposed to be done. She gave me their number and a web address and left it up to me.

My first thought was "wow... my company sucks sometimes". I called up the number she gave me and told the woman on the other end that I need to file my STD claim. She said it would be easier if my company filed it for me. Alas I knew the gal at the office wasn't too keen on having to do it, nor did I trust her to do it right, so I did it myself. when I was done doing it I had texted the gal from our company back and told her that they told me it was easier if she had done it. She replied telling me that it was illegal for her to do it. Sounds like bullshit to me... but whatever.

The woman I had spoke with when I filed the claim told me it would take at least seven days before they would know if I would get my STD approved. In my mind it was a no brainer... of course I would be approved. Seventeen days later I finally heard back from them. Thirty-one days after I had last worked I finally got the news that I was denied Short Term Disability. Shwew, what a relief to know... wait! What? I was denied? What the fuck? I just had a life saving organ transplant and I can't be around people right now because my immune system is being compromised by the anti-rejection meds. Not to mention that I had spent several days following the transplant in the hospital, sometimes in pain and vomiting a dozen times in a single day.  And even when I got home from all of that it took another week or two before I could even consider taking on some workload and when I asked my bosses if I could grab my computer so I could do some work they told me NO, not until I could give them 40 hours. She replied "yes, but yours is a pre-existing condition that you received treatment for within the three months prior to signing up for STD so that disqualifies you".

The culmination of stories: Hostage

My doctors would say that I shouldn't go back to work until late January. My pockets and my bank account say I should have gone back to work two or three weeks ago. My bosses didn't want me back to work unless I could give them 40 hours a week. And I feel like a hostage because it's not like my bosses have laid me off so I could at least attempt to collect unemployment, but meanwhile they'll only take me back if I give them 40 hours a week and I don't even know if I can handle 40 hours. But I have no choice, I have to go back in and this Monday will be my first day back. I'll have doctor's appointments every other week and lab draws every week that will make it harder to do 40 than it might otherwise be.

I could repeal the STD decision but they'll have 45 to 90 days to make a new decision and by that time I'll have fallen too far behind on rent & bills and how will we eat, and Annie's birthday is this month as well as Christmas. So I have no choice but to go back. This will put my life and my new organ at risk, but this is the world I'm living in right now and it's had me very angry.

Then there's the whole Monster.com thing. Am I going to walk into work and discover that my bosses think I'm trying to jump ship? And what's worse is that the way I've been treated by them and the fact their STD that they contracted with is so crappy it almost makes me want to jump ship. But finding a company on the North Shore that does what we do can be difficult and I don't want to get back into the business of driving into Cambridge or Boston for work, but that's where 80% of the companies that do what we do are located.

Truth is, I've had it pretty good at this company despite their lack of concern for my health. They've given me plenty of breathing room. They're never standing over me and pushing me to get something done on some unrealistic schedule and when any job we've been on has tried to push me to meet unrealistic deadlines these brothers have always had my back and pushed back on these companies, which is more than some of the other companies I've worked for seemed willing to do.

So I'm stressed, angry, broke and disappointed and its impacting my ability to try and write. On the other hand we have some neighbors who have been very involved with keeping up with us since the transplant and they were very aware of all that was going on and they helped me to pay my December rent and while that makes me feel a bit uncomfortable, I'm simultaneously so very thankful for their kindness. 

Its certainly strange to be in this position. To be allowing others to help us out. And I'm experiencing anxiety about going to work Monday on two fronts. One being how I'll be treated, the other how well I'll handle working for 40 hours or as close to 40 as I can handle. And what if I can't handle more than 20? Will they tell me to not come back until I can handle 40? STD was supposed to give me the ability to not worry about these things, instead it's pissed me off that I've paid over $450 for a STD plan that didn't even help me out and I see that my LTD has the same disqualifier so there's another $770 I've spent that if I needed it for reasons related to my transplant it wouldn't help. These things keep me up at night.

Conspiracy theory 101

I'm not usually a conspiracy theory guy. I like real evidence. I like science and facts. I don't want to follow the innuendo to an end result and assume its true, but I've created a conspiracy theory of my own and its a whopper. To tell you about it I have to go back to the time when Candidate 45 fired James Comey.

Part 1 of my conspiracy theory assumes that when Candidate 45 fired James Comey, he learned a little life lesson from the heat he took. Not that I usually give 45 the credit to learn anything new, but it's an assumption that must be made in order for the rest to fall into place.

Part 2 is based on the fact that 45 was pretty darn upset at Jeff Sessions recusing himself from all things having to do with the Russian investigation. It almost seemed like at one point he would like to have replaced Sessions as well, but he didn't go straight for the jugular with Sessions like he did with Comey. This appears to be the first sign that he learned a little lesson.

Part 3 the Bannon exit. While Steve Bannon was apparently ousted from his position as chief strategist, I'm not convinced this wasn't actually part of a plan between 45 & Bannon to allow Bannon to be more effective at manipulating things and throwing certain politicians under the bus without putting pressure on the white house.

Now, there's suddenly a run off between the two republicans in Alabama for Jeff Sessions vacated Senate seat. On one hand you have the already appointed Luther Strange and on the other a somewhat dark horse candidate, Roy Moore, not in the sense that he was an unknown but in the sense that he leans towards what I call the dark side of conservatism. His opinions after all are a little scary.

Candidate 45 backed the incumbent Luther Starnge, but Bannon backed Roy Moore. A lot of 45's base are very much aligned with the opinions of Bannon. It almost seemed to me that 45 chose Strange to give the appearance of choosing someone safe and sane, while Bannon backed someone a little crazy (imnsho). In the end crazy won. So now the race moved on between the Crazy guy and the democrat.

Suddenly all of these women start making accusations of sexual harassment against Roy Moore. Moore denies it. Moore's wife meanwhile makes claims that she has some kind of proof that someone is paying these women to come forward. This is proof I haven't seen, but if it exists and if it's true... who might be willing to pay to have these women come forward, stories true or otherwise?

Now there's talk of a write in candidate to try to beat Moore, but who? Jeff Sessions name is floated out there. Sessions is very popular in Alabama and a lot of republicans don't want to vote for the democrat, but also don't want to vote for Moore if these accusations are true. So maybe Candidate 45 asks Sessions to vacate his AG seat and run as a write in for the Alabama seat for the good of the party.

Even if Sessions doesn't do this, if Moore wins there's already talk of the senate voting him out. In which case a new Senator would be named and that would also be an opportunity for 45 to suggest Sessions for the job. $5 gets rid of Sessions without firing him and gets to name a new AG, who will now get to limit the power of the special investigator Robert Meuller.

So A. is Bannon just doing his job to help set up a scenario where Sessions could legitimately be asked to fill a senate seat for the good of the party? And B. is 45 playing us all by first supporting Strange, almost knowing he wouldn't beat Moore and then setting up Moore for a hard fall from grace so he could move Sessions into the senate?

There's a lot of moving parts to all of this and to assume they could all have been orchestrated by the biggest buffoon I can think of (Candidate 45) is a little hard to believe, but with Bannon the master manipulator, it becomes a little more believable. And Bannon also has the resources to find these accusers and probably to even pay them, if in fact they were paid and didn't come out simply because they felt it was their duty.

I know it all sounds too crazy to be true, but sometimes crazy is exactly what is going on in front of our very eyes. Let me know what you think.

The Court of Public Opinion

So... now what of all of these accusations of sexual misbehavior among the powerful and elite or even the average Joe from Hollywood, Government, Professional Sports and the Military? It used to be that you were innocent until proven guilty, but something has changed. If a man or woman or if several come forward and accuse someone (usually a man) of sexual misconduct it seems they are immediately judged by the court of public opinion. I'm not defending any of these men and their behavior, but I am concerned at how quickly a career can be ruined without any due process.

In most of the cases we're currently hearing about, the accused have taken at least some ownership of their transgressions so I suppose that gives us the right to judge them without due process. But what happens if and when someone makes a false accusation and the accused denies it but its too late, we've all decided that it's probably true so lets hang him out to dry.

Have you ever found yourself in that kind of a scenario? I have. My second wife, as she decided she was pissed enough at me, filed a report with the police saying she feared for her life that I might physically hurt her. I was so apathetic that if she wanted to leave I was pretty much fine with it and I was ready for that change. It was a relationship going nowhere fast and I was only sticking around myself because of our 8 month old son. When she told me that she wasn't coming home and was staying at her aunt and uncle's place I told her fine.. I'll pack your clothes for you. You can come by and get them when you want them. We didn't have luggage or boxes to put them in so I used garbage bags. When the police showed up at my door to tell me I needed to move out of my parents duplex, (they lived on the other side) because she filed a restraining order against me and I wasn't allowed to be within 500 feet of her, they saw the garbage bags and that confirmed for them what  she told them... which was that I was going to throw out all of her clothes.

That's the short version of that story and I tell it as an example of someone lying to manipulate the system to her advantage. It happens. It will happen. And someone's career will be destroyed... at least for the short term and many will never believe that person didn't do whatever they are accused of, even if they are exonerated.

None of this is meant to excuse the behaviors of the many men who have in fact crossed certain lines that shouldn't be crossed. But I do wonder if this is just a unique moment in history where the tipping point of something so rampant requires us to take this more immediate action of shaming these men. Or is it the beginning of the end of the justice system as we know it? I certainly hope for the former.

If you haven't been watching the new Seth MacFarlane series, The Orville, then you've missed an episode that touches on this very topic of being judged by the court of public opinion. Season 1, Episode 7, Majority Rule. I highly recommend the series as each episode seems to involve some kind of social message despite the typical Seth MacFarlane humor. It's like Star Trek with a sense of humor.

UPDATE 11/17/17

I felt the need to add this updated comment here with a link to a post that touches on the very same concerns that I have as well as other similar concers and this is written much better than I write. I hope you'll take a moment to read it. You'll find it here on the Daily Beast, it's written by Erin Gloria Ryan.

What The Literal Eff?

There's so much going on in the world today it's hard to imagine that I don't have some topic that I want to talk about. Between candidate 45's trip to Asia, his ridiculous tweets, his unwillingness to believe our intelligence agencies on Russia's attempt to influence our election and that he believes Putin when he says they didn't. It seems to me like just more evidence that something stinks in Washington and Moscow. Not to mention the Mueller investigation seems to be picking up.

Then there are all these accusations of sexual misconduct throughout Hollywood and among our other institutions from which the powerful, rich and famous tend to cluster. Funny thing is, a single person can come forward and claim they were in some way sexually mistreated by an actor and that actor's career suddenly goes into a spiraling nose dive. But when candidate 45 was running for president 12 women came forward and there was the release of the infamous access Hollywood tape, where he admitted to treating women this way and said things I've never heard in a typical locker room, but no one came after him and it was all brushed off as locker room talk.

What the literal fuck is going on here? Is candidate 45 oozing some kind of pheromones that make 50% plus of the country swoon in his wonderfulness? Am I just immune to whatever it is he's spewing because of some kind of mental deficiency on my part? Are all of the people who voted for him still feeling that they elected the right guy? And how is it that we are all so disgusted with these actors and directors but we seem to have no contempt for candidate 45?

I'm not even getting into the weeds of how corrupt this administration seems to be to me, for the simple reason that I just can't stomach it. I'm sticking to the peripheral obvious stuff that would have been the end to any other candidacy prior.

And what of our conservative wing of government? The Mitch McConnells and Paul Ryans and the Lindsey Grahams and all their ilk. Are they so swollen with joy over finally being the party in charge that they would rather ignore the obvious blunders of candidate 45 than to call him out on them? I'm really only seeing the Maverick John McCain stay true to his conservative nature and hold the man to a higher standard as we all should.

I'm just plain stupefied at all of it and it's hard to write about... so that's why I haven't just jumped into it and written a blog post about it. Oh wait... I guess I sorta just did. Okay, so.. new blog post. Yeah!

What are all of your thoughts on the matter? I'd love to hear from you.

An invitation for potential disaster

As many of you already know, I started a new blog recently specific to my recent kidney transplant. What you may not have been aware of is this other blog that I had originally created a few years back, intended to be a catch all for the myriad thoughts I have, wacky ideas I like to discuss and general goings on of my world. I had sorta dropped it because it was too hard to keep up with due to the many challenges in my day to day. But now I'm reviving it if for no other reason than sometimes I just feel like talking about stuff.I'm not saying that I'll be posting daily or even weekly, but when I have something to say that's too much for facebook, this is where you'll find it.

If you want to be an active participant in this, feel free to ask me my thoughts on any topic and I'll do my best to give you an honest answer. On the other hand if you just want to be a passive voyeur... well welcome, I hope you enjoy whatever it is that ends up on these pages.

As far as I'm concerned nothing is taboo, the only thing I would ask is that you leave the kidney stuff for the other blog and try to have a sense of humor as most things I talk about, even when they're serious, I usually try to keep it light. That doesn't mean I won't occasionally fly off the handle in a passionate diatribe over something that pisses me off, but hopefully those times will be fewer than the fun topics.

Sadly I have no specific topics in mind for my first real blog post, so this is an invitation for you all to suggest a topic before I start landing on a few of my own.

Thanks... and welcome to Robots in the Paint. Don't forget to read the "about" page and the "image" page. And if you ever don't understand something I'm saying... double check the "glossary", I might have added a reference there for you.

Bil