Things I Love Thursday

Paper Source . I was buying paper to make retirement cards, and also found animal menu stamps. They will be helpful when I make my next set of wedding invitations! I've seen them all over the internet on bridal blogs, but never knew where I could get my own. I will probably use them now in one of my journals, just because I can.

Skinny Pants . I was finally brave enough to take the plunge, and I'm glad I did. They're super cute.

The weather . I rode my bike to Paper Source today, which is something I never thought I'd say in November. I wore a jacket, but not gloves, and by the time I came back, I'm not sure I really needed the jacket.

TWLOHA Day

"Two out of three people who struggle with depression never seek help...and untreated depression is the leading cause of suicide. In America alone, it’s estimated that 19 million people live with depression."

Untreated depression can lead to addiction, ruin relationships, and leave you unable to face everyday situations. Work suffers. Sleep suffers. Depression affects the way you eat, the way you feel about yourself, the way you treat other people. People who suffer from depression can't "just pull themselves together" and get over it. Clinical depression is not just "feeling blue." Left untreated, depression can last for years, and some people choose to deal with it by adopting addictions, turning to self-injury, or worse.

The good news is that depression is very treatable. Talk therapy, antidepressants, even diet and exercise can all be paths that lead away from clinical depression.

The Numbers

• 121 million people worldwide suffer from depression. (The World Health Organization)
• 18 million of these cases are happening in the United States. (The National Institute of Mental Health)
• Between 20% and 50% of children and teens struggling with depression have a family history of this struggle and the offspring of depressed parents are more than three times as likely to suffer from depression. (U.S. Surgeon General's Survey, 1999)
• Depression often co-occurs with anxiety disorders and substance abuse, with 30 percent of teens with depression also developing a substance abuse problem. (NIMH)
• 2/3 of those suffering from depression never seek treatment.
• Untreated depression is the number one cause of suicide, and suicide is the third leading cause of death among teenagers. (NIMH)
  
  *statistics all from TWLOHA site
  

How You Can Help

If you know anyone who suffers from depression, you might have faced the feelings of helplessness or fear that you might lose someone you love. While there are many things you can do, talking to them—reaching out, picking up the phone, sending an email—is the best thing you can do.

If you suffer from depression, make an appointment with a counselor. Find treatment. Call a hotline. Not only are you not alone, you don't have to go through this by yourself—you can find someone to guide you.

Some good places to start:

National Hopeline Network (U.S.A.) - www.hopeline.com – 1-800-SUICIDE

S.A.F.E. Alternatives - www.selfinjury.com – Self Abuse Finally Ends

Childhelp – www.childhelp.org – 1-800-4-A-CHILD – National Child Abuse Hotline

National Domestic Violence Helpline - www.ndvh.org – 1-800-799-SAFE

Rape, Abuse & Incest National Network - www.rainn.org – 1-800-656-HOPE National Sexual Assault Hotline

National Eating Disorders Association – www.nationaleatingdisorders.org – 1-800-931-2237

Today is To Write Love On Her Arms Day. To Write Love On Her Arms Day is a day when anyone can write the word love on their arms to support those who are suffering from depression and recovering from depression. So write love on your arms today and show it off. When people ask, you can tell them about To Write Love On Her Arms, and what they are doing for people with depression, addiction and pain. Buy a T-shirt. Make love the movement.

Things I Love Thursday

I didn't update last week because I had a craptastic week and was not loving anything very much. My nails are mostly gone (bitten away), but after a few conversations with Jason, I mostly worked through it. He had a craptastic week, too. It was really emotionally toxic in our apartment. Bleh.

Anyway, this week is looking a little better, but I think this will still be a short list:

Figuring Out Why Illustrator Hates Me . My option (alt) and my shift keys—my most used keyboard shortcuts—stop working All The Time. This has been an ongoing problem for months, and I couldn't figure out what was causing Illustrator to deny me my most precious shortcuts. I was literally banging my head on the desk at one point this week, due to excessive use of Illustrator. Anyway, turns out you can't run the Hulu desktop app and Illustrator at the same time. All this time I was trashing my preferences every time I shut down my computer, and yesterday I restarted it three times! I figured it out when someone on a forum mentioned that he has this problem when boxee is running in the background, so I immediately exited Hulu, and voilà! Keyboard shortcuts working, again! It was downright religious moment. I suppose I will have to listen to music in the background from now on, instead, which will probably improve my workflow. Bonus.

Pictures of Sleeping Puppies . The Dreaming of Puppies stream merged with the Daily Squee recently, and I was not amused. It's not that I don't think other animals are cute, just that I usually have over 1000 unread feeds in google reader on any given day, and this is why lolcats exist. If I had wanted to subscribe to all of the Daily Squee's content, I would have. Anyway, you can subscribe to just the dreaming of puppies stream here: http://dailysquee.com/category/dreaming-of-puppies/ And then all was right with the world. SLEEPING PUPPIES!

Sonic . Jason and I drove 15 miles out to the 'burbs so that we could eat at the first Sonic in MA (okay, I'm not sure if that's a fact, but it's certainly the first one within reasonable driving distance from us!). I had forgotten how wonderful cherry limeade slushes are. Sure, we both felt kind of gross after gorging ourselves on over 1000 calories of fast food that night, but tater tots! Also some teenagers let us go ahead of them, then showed us how to use the credit card machine. Teenagers? Nice? Sonic is a magical place.

Financial Freedom . I paid off my credit card today! I had a 0% APR offer from Capital One, which I took advantage of in order to buy my Mac on credit to pad some of my initial unemployment expenses (I had been saving for the computer, already, when I was let go). The offer lasted for one year, and after paying for school, textbooks, groceries, the balance was never $0. One month after the 9% APR kicked in, I paid off the whole thing. I knew that it was coming, but it still feels pretty damn good.

NextRX is the Suck—A Dissatisfied Customer

I got a phone call from my doctor's office yesterday, concerned about the "amount of asthma medication I've been using lately." I needed to set up an appointment ASAP to the tune of a $30 copay, so I could explain myself to my doctor.

My doctor knew about the "amount of asthma medication I've been using lately" because my pharmacy called her. The pharmacy I am obligated to use if I want to pay $50 instead of $75 every three months for my inhaler(s). I get one inhaler a month, twelve a year, three at a time. Enter NextRX.


For starters, they are a bitch to deal with. I can't find a list of medications they cover anywhere on their website, even though they point out their handy, easy to see link to print out covered medication. I go to their site through my health insurance provider's proprietary link, not to the NextRX website, so there should be a list of covered meds, but they refer me back to my insurance provider's website. Useless.

My second complaint is that they call. All the goddamn time. Any time a prescription is up for renewal, they call. And they call and they call. And they don't leave messages, because it is a moronic automatic system that can't even leave a voice mail. You can't opt for email, you can't opt out of the calls. Your only option is to get the phone calls. They always call at the worst time, i.e. during the week wasting my daytime minutes, every two hours until I answer and go through their automated routine. It's a machine. It can't work on weekends?

So because it's easier than writing a lengthy email to the company, I just refill the stupid prescriptions. It's better than having my phone ring incessantly. I guess I could say no, but then I have to remember to do it myself. It's not a big deal, but then I'd have to refill them even sooner than the machine calls, and the machine calls roughly halfway between the pre-order time and the refill time.

So they "snitched" on me to my doctor because I was refilling so "frequently." I don't know what they said to her, but my doctor was concerned even though my prescription hasn't changed in the four years I've been seeing her.

Am I using more medication than they want me to? I'm not using more than I've been prescribed. Do they not want to have to pay for it? I don't really think that's their call. What if I needed more than what I currently take? PS, my asthma is stress induced. THANKS, NEXTRX.

I called my doctor's office and told them I'm not paying $30 to let her listen to my chest for no reason and sort this out. Because even if I could afford it, it's a hassle to go out to Arlington, MA to see my doctor, and I only like to do it when I'm sick or need my yearly violation and prescription party.

I don't know what NextRX's problem is, but I'm not the only one who hopes that they all go to hell. Here's a webpage with some stories of really shitty things they've done across the country:
http://www.ripoffreport.com/Pharmacies/NextRx/nextrx-wellpoint-wellpoint-n-ayw29.htm

Things I Love Thursday

My polarizing filter, which I finally figured out how to use • H&M for making such fabulous clothes • employee discounts at Macys (I will not abuse. I will not abuse. I will not abuse) • scarves, mittens and leg warmers • new business cards that say what I do! And were designed by me! • being a regular at trivia night - and now being applauded, hugged, or wolf whistled at by the bartender whenever I arrive • spinach quiche • this video of Sleepyhead by Passion Pit:

How I've Tried To Save Money

I've been talking about saving money a lot recently, and I figured I'd share some of the ways I have managed to do that. The biggest savings I have seen in recent months has been in school supplies. I searched high and low for an inexpensive binder for all of the materials my professor has been giving us, but ended up going with something at Target that was functional—I was looking at the start of the school year, of course, so I was left with the bare bones. A day later, while we were at the recycling center, Jason pointed me towards a whole box full of binders! They were basically brand new, and after cleaning them off, they were even better than the cheapo one I'd picked up at Target for nearly $4 (after taxes)! So here are some of the ways I've been saving:

• Getting binder from recycling center ($4)
• Finding my T-square at Goodwill. They usually run around $20, and the wood ones can be even more expensive, but we'll just say that after paying $7 for this barely used wood T-Square at Goodwill, I saved ($13)
  
• Getting my textbook from the library. I did end up purchasing it after reading it, deciding I'd use it long after the class was over, and getting a 25% off coupon from Borders.com. I also had it shipped to the store to save on shipping costs (they were out of stock at all of my local stores and amazon, so shipping was necessary). I ended up getting a $21 (at brick and mortar stores) $17 (online) book for $13 ($8 if for some reason I had needed to buy it Right Now at the store, $4 if I could have waited for shipping, but not a coupon).
  
• I use cereal boxes to ship things that I sell on half.com and ebay. They're sturdy, and we're going to recycle them, anyway. If I cut them correctly, I don't use that much tape, so the cost of supplies I might have to buy is negligible. To pad them, I use newspaper or packing materials from things we've had shipped. I doubt I've saved much (since you can usually get packing materials on the cheap with very little effort), but it also saves me a trip to the post office/store, and thins our recycling pile, which brings me to the next item:
  
• Buying my postage online. You can get free priority boxes delivered to your address (I usually only use cereal boxes when my stuff doesn't fit in these boxes). If you purchase priority shipping on usps.com and print it out yourself, you save 10¢, and you get free delivery confirmation, which is a savings of about 85¢ per box shipped. I still have to go to the post office if the package is too big for a mailbox drop, but it's a faster trip. (I've saved $4.25 in the past month)
  
• I downgraded my cell phone plan. I'm lucky enough not to be under contract, so I have some options that I can easily change on a month-to-month basis. I'm contemplating a change in carrier in the near future, but for now I determined I could save $5/month by downgrading my daytime minutes. I rarely use my phone at the moment, anyway. ($10 so far)
• Taking reusable bags to the grocery store. I usually need two bags, which gets us a 10¢ discount (5¢/bag). Since we've started cooking more, I've gone to this store about once a week, sometimes less sometimes more, but I'd say it averages once a week. It's kind of insignificant at 5¢ a bag, but over a year we end up getting $5 for doing something we are already doing. Our local Target has now implemented the same policy, which I think is a great reward for a habit we already have. (~$5 this year)
• Buying generic milk. We both drink different kinds of milk, but I buy half-gallons for us every week. The generic is not only 50¢ cheaper, it's equally sustainable as the name brand we used to buy. This will save us up to $52 in a year. ($4 so far)
  

So, $50 later, I thought it was worth documenting. There are lots of little things I do these days that don't take much of my time, but because I do have the time (and not the money) it's worth the extra effort to save a few dollars. I could further calculate things like making our own pizza, which I know for a fact saves a ton of money (as often as we eat pizza!), but I thought I'd stick to things I've consciously done in the last two months.

Even though I can't fathom the time when I can start markedly saving up again, I have some significant financial goals I'd like to reach sometime in the next five years. If I can learn to live like this when I have a more appreciable income, it will be so much easier.

Things I Love Thursday

This video from Improv Everywhere:

People breaking out into spontaneous song and dance? Count me in! I wish my life were a musical.

Getting great news . Good news is one thing, but getting news that makes me jump up and down and want to dance...well, it made my week is what.

The Tightwad Gazette . I got this book from the library and the lessons inside were pretty inspiring. It came into my life in a time when we really need to start cutting back, and while some of the methods she employs in the book are a bit extreme (read: "cheap" rather than "frugal"), the overarching lesson is great. It made me sit down and evaluate how to reach some bigger financial goals, even now that times are tight. You can get it here at Amazon, or pick it up at your library (funnily enough, buying the book goes against the whole purpose of the book :)

Glee . Glee is the best new show on TV. If you're not already watching it you should be. If you are, well, then you already know.