Zanna--referrals

[Guest guest]

Zanna,

My rheumy here has instituted the " referral required from doctor " rule, too.

It's to keep her

practice from being overwhelmed; thereby not being able to give quality, timely

(in everything from

immediate response to on-time appointments).

I too have a PPO and won't go to an HMO until there's a real gun put to my head.

We have a limited

choice of HMO's within our Public Employees Retirement Assn healthcare selection

and the one that's

available to us up here I hear from patient to doctor's offices alike is

terrible about getting

needed care.

I'll bet the PERA's of various states are chewing their nails over the latest

corporate

fiasco--WorldCom. A dear young friend of ours had her job terminated with them

on Friday--she's

about our son's age--and despite what you may have heard in the papers no

severance pay has been

forthcoming. She was not your everyday, run-of-the-mill employee but rather a

technical writer and

trainer. Such greed and fraud is rampant in the big corporate world.

I hope those of you battling " summer complaint " --not really that---but the

summer bugs will feel

better really soon!!!!

, what bravado, but.......we're sure glad we're not hearing about you on

the news as a

victim!!! Don't try that again, you hear!!! I hope you'll get your breath back

after a busy, hot

weekend.

Once we were asked by the sheriff to keep an eye on goings-on at a house just

south of us and to get

license numbers if we could (yeah, right, binoculars would have to be used by me

to get them if they

went right by me on the road) because they suspected drug selling--we did too.

Finally they

moved--can't remember if there were ever any charges or not. Anyway, later we

wanted to get rid of

an old 1966 Ford Falcon that wasn't being used anymore by either cat or peacock,

so called a number

that said they'd take " junk " cars. Guess who showed up!! The renter we were

watching!!!!!! He took

it and paid some small amount for the car.

Dawn, my sister in Maine (Skowhegan area) says they've been sweltering there in

her letter I

received today--mailed from there June 29--fast P.O. service,eh? Anyway, her

cure-all for heat and

sweating is.....swimming in a lake. Makes me drool--cause I grew up in

Massachusetts/Maine and have

very fond memories of where she said she went swimming and other afternoons

spent at wonderful, cool

lakes! Those were the days!

Annette, keep that chin up as high as you have it now!!!

Praying for all of you!

I'm down one more mg of prednisone as of yesterday and will stay at this 4 mg

til August barring the

unforeseen.

You all stay cool now. One thing about here is that when sun goes down it gets

much cooler, in the

east when the sun goes down it gets......dark. I'm quoting the weatherman here!

It's usually down

to 60 by morning.