Tag: #pandemic

Fuck Insurance (Especially health insurance).

jamie

All insurance is a scam. Health Insurance is a fucking crime.
You have insurance, you think, ‘Cool I’m covered’. But nope…you still have to pay hundreds or thousands of dollars. How is that fair?

Insurance should be fucking insurance. I get sick. I’m insured. Insurance fucking pays, not me. It’s not really insurance if they get you coming and going. You pay all that money up front…every month…hundreds of dollars, maybe thousands per year. Sometimes they take it right out of your paycheck, before you ever see it.

Then you get sick. You give em the card, cross your fingers and pray. Deductible here. CoPay there. Deny this. Pro-rated that. You get out of the hospital, and before your recovery is even complete, they start coming: A bill from this doctor you don’t remember. A charge for this test and that screening. You haven’t even gotten back to work, and you’re buried in red ink.

What the fuck people. How is THIS the ‘best’ healthcare? If they save your life and then take your house to cover the cost…and that’s if you HAVE insurance. If you don’t, good luck even getting the services you need. When they know they aren’t getting paid, they somehow manage to do the barest minimum. Imagine that. For-Profit Hospitals putting profits above the best healthcare for all. WhoDaThunk?

Fuck Capitalism. Services like healthcare, police, fire, EMS, ambulance, military, prisons, education. These should NEVER be privatized. Everyone has the right to the best services we can provide when it comes to health and safety. People shouldn’t have to worry about paying the bills for these services. It should be included in our taxes, even if they are a little higher.

Separate but equal doesn’t work any more in healthcare than it does in education. Haves and have-nots alike should be protected from harm as citizens of an advanced and equitable society. Exploitation and greed have no place competing with the Hippocratic Oath for healthcare dollars. Those dollars are best spent on research, not drug commercials, dividends and CEO salaries.

The only way you do that is to get rid of the insurance companies and big pharma. Our universities, properly funded by tax dollars, could be an amazing core of medical research and medicine development…for the good of ALL, not just the shareholders and board of directors. No more price gouging on critical medicines. No more rationing of new medical treatments to the well-to-do and connected.

That’s what socialized medicine could be. It doesn’t have to be a poorly designed and inequitable system. There are plenty of examples of socialized medicine around the world that are models for a better standard of care than ours.

Healthcare is a human right, in a society that has advanced to the point where we CAN CHOOSE between profit and doing the right thing.

Do we really want to be THAT country? The one that chooses profits? Because WE have a choice. ~jg

New York writer and musician, Jamie Gray

Authors Note: All opinions expressed here are just that: opinions. If you don’t like mine, I probably won’t like yours either. Let’s just nod, and walk away. Maybe come back with solutions instead of opinions. Because of the two, only solutions actually matter.

Happy 2022*

jamie
Happy 2022*. Staying Home. Staying Stoned.

I truly thought 2020 was the worst year ever. I was optimistic when it ended. I thought things would be better in 2021. Here we are anyway.

Last Year’s New Year’s Message: Happy 2021 It Might Not Suck

2022. Pandemic year two. They say it will become endemic. That we will learn to live with COVID-19. Like the flu.

Fuck.

Some really great things have happened this year. Most of them have come with caveats and asterisks. Just like 2020. *Pandemic year. It’s easy to forget the little joys in the big hurt. Lots of hurt.

We moved to upstate NY this year. That was a good thing.

This overwhelming sadness is what I’ll remember most about these times. So much loss. My spirit feels beaten and bruised. PTSD seems the new norm, in a world where we must fear living among liars and idiots, who would profit or die by denial of the common sense measures to keep everyone well.

We lost Betty White on the last day of this piece of shit year, confirming it’s status as ‘worst year ever’. #RIPBetty

I don’t go anywhere that isn’t absolutely necessary anymore. Certainly not the crowded indoor areas where music and alcohol flow. The places we used to love to go. Where life stopped for a few short hours, and the only thing that mattered was how the music moved the crowd. Where we all came together, sometimes encroaching on each other’s personal space, if only because somebody lost their balance in the drunken, drug steeped swerve to a frenzied beat that infected the entire crowd. It was fun. It didn’t feel like a death threat, like now.

COVID killed businesses across the country in 2021.

If this is what ‘living with it’ will be like, I don’t think I’m ready for that. I’m not ready to go ANYWHERE without an N95 mask and a litre of hand sanitizer. I don’t see that changing because they start calling it an ENdemic instead of PANdemic. Call it whatever you want. I’m staying home.

So Happy 2022 from my house. Where I plan to spend the year, with the (vaccinated) ones I love most. ~jg

*Pandemic year three.

Jamie Gray | Musician and Writer. Pessimistic optimist.

Authors Note: All opinions expressed here are just that: opinions. If you don’t like mine, I probably won’t like yours either. Let’s just nod, and walk away. Maybe come back with solutions instead of opinions. Because of the two, only solutions actually matter.

Dear Anti-Maskers

jamie

If I drive down your street at 70mph, the residential street your kids play on, you’d probably be in favor of the State forcing me to slow down, wouldn’t you? For your kids safety? Because the Government has the right, and DUTY to protect the people. From reckless speeders and other dangerous people, such as anti-mask propagandists like you.

I don’t have the right to drive without regard for others safety. Likewise, I have the duty to protect others around me, including my children and yours. I listen to the science that says, driving slowly in densely populated areas with children playing is safer than speeding.

But you don’t listen to science. You disregard safety precautions that nearly all medical professionals agree are important, and claim the right to do so is ‘freedom’. Most horrifically, you’re willing to risk your children’s lives to prove your point, one that science says you’re completely wrong about.

If you think your children have the right to attend school without vaccine or mask during a global pandemic, you’re dead wrong. Children shouldn’t have to pay the ultimate price for your stupidity and your partisan, QAnon, MAGA, political propaganda. America’s children certainly don’t deserve to become victims of this deadly disease, because of the lies you promote and defend. Their Deaths Are Your fault. On your head. 99.9% Preventable.

Please Drink (and Drive) Responsibly

You may as well drink a fifth of vodka and drive 100mph through a school zone at 3:05pm, because that’s probably LESS dangerous than preventing schools from masking up during this pandemic. The Delta Variant is NOT your mama’s COVID…it’s much, MUCH worse. ~jg

The Shark – Jamie’s 2010 Challenger

Authors Note: All opinions expressed here are just that: opinions. If you don’t like mine, I probably won’t like yours either. Let’s just nod, and walk away. Maybe come back with solutions instead of opinions. Because of the two, only solutions actually matter.

Happy Summer 2021

jamie
“…Summers fade and roses die.”

OK…I know Summer technically started a couple days ago on the Solstice, but late is better than never. You know…Except when it isn’t.
In this case, does it really matter?!?

Seriously though…Have yourself a great Summer, because Summer only lasts a few weeks…and This One means something because the CoronaGrinch stole Christmas AND Summer last year.

Be Well. Be Grateful. #BeKind
#onelove. ~jg

#Summer2021 #N0H8

Jamie Gray – musician and occasional deadhead

Second Shot – Countdown to Immunity

jamie

Quarantine has been tough. I basically haven’t left the house for a year and a half. I’ve had a lot of time to think.
That’s not usually a good thing for me.
But I’ve also had a chance for reflection. Introspection is an art, and looking inward isn’t always easy to do. It’s necessary. Sure. But enough is e-fucking-nough.

COVID-19 Vaccines – Countdown to Immunity

I got my 2nd shot last week, and I am completely looking forward to freedom.

But it’s got me wondering…
What happens after you’re immune, and you get exposed to the Coronavirus? Say you breath in a big batch of spikey deathblobs. Do they stay inside you? Lurking. Waiting for your body to let your defenses down? Or does your body attack. Send out the hungry phagocytes and macrophages to gobble up all those yummy virus nuggets… or whatever.
I think it might be the last one. But don’t believe me. I’m a musician, not a damn Doctor.

10 Things Dr. McCoy is NOT
https://youtu.be/1OnfPJ37Myo
#StarTrek #Bones

Star Trek – Dr. McCoy “I’m a Doctor”

Flashback 2018 – Did I Say That?

jamie
It’s about the future, not the fear.

‘Life’s unexpected turns and twists are what make being human interesting. Don’t fear the unknown…plan for the future the best you can, and then run forward into it, with open eyes, mind and heart.’ ~jg

I don’t remember sharing this thought two years ago, but according to Facebook I did. It sounds like something I’d say, so I guess I believe it. I’m also a little too lazy to actually scroll back to check.

Anyway, it seems even more appropriate now, as we’re trying to vaccinate our way out of The 2020 Pandemic. COVID-19 has proven to be an unexpected twist like no other, an abrupt turn of events that literally brought our lives to a standstill. You can’t plan for these things. Or live in fear of the next one. You can only hope to survive. To stay safe and healthy. So you can run forward into another new day after this one, with hope for the future, however unexpected it may become.

I hope everyone stays safe and well. Wear a mask, even if you’ve gotten the shots. Wash your hands. Be kind. ~jg

#NoFear #WearAMask #COVID19

I #GotTheShot

jamie
First shot…looking forward to invincibility.

I got the first shot today. Looking forward to going out in the world and doing things again without fear of impending death lurking around each corner. The countdown to immunity begins…NOW.
#COVID19 #pandemic #vaccine #Moderna #GotTheShot