anonemouse

Thanks, Faith! I would really like to do it tomorrow if I can, because my PCP is a 3 1/2 hour drive from me. I'd rather not have to make that drive more often than what's necessary.

Another Atheist weighing in! I have to say that while I was raised in the Christian faith (Disciples of Christ, to be exact) for eighteen years, I never considered myself a Christian, per se. Even as a child, the faith and spirituality never resonated with me. It was nothing more than a sometimes violent, always unbelievable story. To top it off, I was completely turned off of it by the people I saw that used their Christianity to excuse their own bigotry and prejudices.

There is a difference between someone sticking a hot curling iron where it doesn't belong and someone simply holding a cup between their legs. Personal responsibility is great, but companies should also take responsibility when their products become dangerous when used in forseeable ways. Someone sticking a hot curling iron up their hooha isn't exactly foreseeable. Someone holding a cup between their legs is foreseeable, and I would imagine that every single one of us has done that a time or two in the past. Was McDonald's 100% at fault for her getting burned? No, they weren't. But the fact remains that the liquid that was spilled was meant to be consumed, and if it was hot enough to cause severe injuries to the woman, it was heated past the point of consumption. Think of it this way: if a car wrecks due to driver negligence, and the airbag goes off with far more force than necessary to save the driver's life, and actually injures the driver (and it was proven that the driver would have not been injured, if not for the airbag), is the manufacturer of the car liable for the injury? I think most of us would answer that they are. While the airbag performed the way it was meant to (by going off in a collision, I mean), the manufacturer made the mistake that resulted in the actual injury of the driver. I view the McDonald's case the same way. While the woman made the mistake that resulted in the actual tipping of the cup, the coffee would not have injured her severely if it had not been super-heated.

Yes, please! Just the thought of it makes me think "OWIE!"

I personally feel that if a bartender serves someone that is obviously intoxicated, then they should be held at least partially reliable for whatever the person does afterward. If the person isn't obviously intoxicated, then I don't see how the bartender could be held responsible, since they can't read minds. While I think the McDonald's lady didn't have the smartest idea when she was holding the coffee between her legs, I don't think anyone would have thought that coffee would be hot enough to cause severe injury. Mild burns, yes. But severe injury? I doubt it. If it was proven that the coffee was way too hot, then the company was negligent, IMO. To me, heating the coffee to the temperatures necessary to cause severe injury is a clearly negligent act. What if the woman had been sitting at a table in the restaurant and had knocked over her cup of coffee and it had run into her lap and burned her that way? Would that still be her fault for getting burned? I doubt most of us would see it that way. While McDonald's didn't spill the coffee on her, they caused her injuries by heating the coffee to a dangerously high temperature.

I just got a call from the surgeon's office, and they said that my insurance company called them and said that all I needed to get done before I was approved was an upper GI and a drug/alcohol screening test! From what they said, I will be getting a denial letter from them, but that they'll approve the surgery once they get proof that I passed these two tests! :welldoneclap::clap2: To be honest, I'm kind of stunned at the moment. I was having so many delays that I thought I would never get approved. It's still going to be a while until I can have surgery, but it's still just hitting me that this might actually be happening.

Still, so cute!

Leatha_g, I think that's great. But I can't help but feel that your experience is the exception to the rule. Judging from my own personal experiences and from my observation of the churches and people around me, your experience is an exceptional one. Like BJean said, many church congregations focus on making bigger and better houses of worship. Many members are willing to give money to those in need, but are not willing to give their time or assistance to them. To me, that's being concerned with how they look to other people, instead of being concerned with the people they should be helping.

Actually, this was in Thailand. And it was the tiger that was fed by the mother pig. http://www.animalliberationfront.com/News/AnimalPhotos/Animals_1-10/Tiger_piglets.htm http://www.snopes.com/photos/animals/tigerpig.asp

Aww! Gimme!

With so little to lose, I would be incredibly surprised if you find a doctor that would be willing to band you in the US. If you are serious about getting the lap-band, you'll probably have to go to Mexico to be banded.

What I was attempting to say (not very well, but still), is that most organized religion today is not about faith or spirituality. In most cases, it isn't about worshiping a higher power, helping the less fortunate, and being the best person you can be. It's about money, public standing, and doing what you were trained to do. And I doubt anyone can deny that that isn't what the original founders planned on.

I envy you folks who have some height on them. I'm about 5'3". I joke that it's the revenge of my mother's genes, along with being fat. My dad's side of the family are all fairly tall, my dad is 6"' and my brother is 6'1". My family are all very dark, for the most part, with very dark hair and eyes and tanning easily. Again, I'm an exception, at least to the tanning part. I manages to get the Scotch/Irish skin. When my cousin got married, my mom and I joked that it looked like a meeting of the Mob, because all the guys in my family were wearing dark suits, sunglasses, and had dark hair, eyes, and skin. To be honest, I'm not sure where the coloring comes from, because both sides of my family are supposed to be Scotch/Irish, and I don't know of any other ethnicities other than a Cherokkee several generations back on my mom's side. What I consider a consolation to my skin is that I'm the only person in my family to get my grandmother's eyes and hair. They're very, very dark brown. When I was a kid, the people in my classes would say that I had black eyes.

Do you have to have the upper GI test done on an empty stomach? I have scheduled my drug/alcohol screening (required by insurance) for late Friday afternoon, and I would like to be able to get the upper GI test done at the same time, if possible. My surgeon's office didn't tell me anything about it, just that I had to get my PCP to order it and have the results sent to the surgeon's office.

No kidding. Yesterday I made a thread about how stressed out I was getting because of my thesis work and waiting on insurance. Now it's like "holy CRAP," my stress level has gone through the roof in the past half hour, since I got the call. You know how you can get kind of shaky (well, not physically shaking, but feeling like you are shaking on the inside) when you get really, really stressed? Well, I'm there.

I can't speak for TOM, but what I thought he was referring to was the actual organized religion, not the faith or spirituality itself. I agree that faith and spirituality are founded with the best of intentions, in most cases, but I feel that the organized religion part of "religion" acts, like TOM said, as a method of "crowd control", for lack of better words.

That's horrible. At least she's in peace now, though.

You look great!

I don't have that much luck. My presentation is to the entire biology department of my university, including all the professors (well, those that bother to come) and all the graduate students. I wish I had the luck to have a committee that isn't knowledgeable about my topic, but my advisor basically handed the topic to me and told me that was what I was doing. He's the type of advisor that listens to what you would like to do your thesis on and then says, "Well that sounds good, but let's have you do this instead." To add to all the stress, my advisor is worse than I am about procrastinating. He's one of the better ornithologists in the nation and he's the editor of a major ornithological journal. This adds to the problem because between his editorship, the classes he's teaching, and his own research, he has more things to do than he has time for, so his grad students (he has about 15, by the way) suffer.

Anyone else feel like they just want to run around screaming or tear their hair out? I do. Seriously, that's what I feel like. There's just SO much to do! I have less than 4 weeks to create a 45-50 minute long seminar presentation on my thesis material, and I haven't even started it. I know that doesn't sound like a whole lot, but it's a lot more complicated. For my thesis, I have to watch about 75 videos get data off of them, analyze the data, and present my results with my conclusions, plus have a pretty long review of the current scientific literature that's pertinent to my project. I've only watched about a dozen of the tapes, I've not got enough data to analyze, the literature review section of my thesis is painfully thin, and I'm still waiting on my library to get me some articles. On top of all that, I'm waiting to hear back from my insurance! I figure I have a few more days of "eat everything in sight" stress before the "completely forget to eat" stress hits.

She doesn't have a partner. The only other surgeon in Tennessee that my insurance will pay for isn't nearly as experienced as she is, either. My new insurance policy is still going to be with the same company.

I meant to call insurance today and check on my approval. :straight I know it probably hasn't been approved yet, but I learned from my experience with the last surgeon to check and make sure the insurance company actually got the material.

Nope. I forgot to call them again today. I was really tired when I got back from class and took a nap.

Because at the time he was asked, he was a representative of the United States Government. When he is wearing his uniform, he isn't Mr. Pace anymore, he's GENERAL Pace.

You bring up a very good point. Obesity during pregnancy can have all sorts of dangerous effects, including birth defects, fetal death, and delivering large-for-gestational-age infants. Should we get paid to be sterilized?