Its not technologically advanced, nor is it an ideal contraception due to its price. but its amazing when you think about it. You can use birth control AFTER sex.

Since 2009, Plan B is available without a prescription to women (and men) who are 17 years old or over — with ID. If you are 16 or younger, you need a prescription.

Last month, U.S. District Court Judge Edward Korman ordered the FDA to make emergency contraception available without a prescription to all ages.

Yesterday, the Department of Justice had the 2nd Circuit Court of Appeals to overturn Judge Korman’s order.

This is not what I expected from the Obama administration. There are a lot of reasons why its a good idea to make emergency contraceptives widely available.

• Plan B is a way to prevent unwanted pregnancies and abortions. Its an expensive and inconvience contraception, but its still contraception and ALL contraceptives should be easy to obtain.
• The hormones have been in use for years and have been proven to be safe.
• The ID requirement will prevent undocumented men and women from obtaining the medicine
• Even a 17 year old may not have age-related ID.

I understand that people don’t want teens to have sex. But its happening, and they are getting pregnant. The objection to emergency contraception is really kind of absurd. Its already legal for a teen of any age to see a doctor on her own and get a prescription for birth control; to buy condoms or other barrier methods; and in many places, its legal for them to have an abortion without their parent’s knowledge/consent or without legal ID. So why are we making it harder for teens to get Plan B? I just don’t get it.

There is a petition if you want to sign it.

The post Teens Need Plan B appeared first on Janey Lee.

Both sides agree that Obama’s campaign was more about what he did in the last 4 years rather than what he WILL do. That leaves us all guessing.

Here is what I hope to see happen in the next 4 years!

• Obama nominations to the supreme court. Especially if Alito and Thomas decide to retire!
• Let the Bush tax cuts expire. I think Obama would be far better off putting together his own tax cut package that favors the middle class. Let that be the first thing on his agenda to try to get the Republicans to work with him.
• We need to keep up the momentum/awareness of reproductive rights issues. The issue will still be fought on a state by state basis.
• Republicans will continue to block Obama’s efforts in the House. The Senate minority is not going to be cooperative.  Obama needs to find a away around the obstacles to keep his agenda moving.
• Lets bring the troops home. And lets close Guantanamo.
• Lets keep moving forward with Alternative energy.
• Lets complete the implementation of Obamacare .
• Infrastructure – lets do something about our power utilities to begin with!
• Continue work on bringing manufacturing jobs back to the USA.

What do YOU want to see happen in the next 4 years?

The post 4 more years appeared first on Janey Lee.

1. Go to settings
2. Choose Wireless and Network
3. Scroll down to find Tethering and portable hotspot
4. Click on portable Wi-fi hotspot setting
5. Click on the configure button
6. setup a network SSID and a password. press OK.
7. Click the check button next to portable wi-fi hotspot to turn the hotspot on.
8. Next, go to your computer. Find your wifi network that you just setup and login with your password.

Voila! Internet access!

Note, the tethering uses up a LOT of battery power. and you must have 4G connectivity.

There is no additional charge to use the tethering but you may want to call T-mobile to find out what your data plan limits are. My limit is 10GB. I can use up to 5GB of that for tethering.

Its pretty fast. I am a happy lady!

The post Tethering appeared first on Janey Lee.

After moving to the suburbs, we never made any new plans. Now that we have been hit with a major storm, we have started to give some thought to being better prepared for the next storm or blizzard.

Here are some possible scenarios:

• You could lose power for a long time. Our electricity might be out for 10 days.
• You could lose cable — you won’t be able to rely on TV for news.
• A tree could fall on your house — you would have to leave your house with very few belongings.
• A tree could fall in your driveway — you could be trapped.
• Flooding could compromise your water supply — you will need clean water.
• The sewage system could be damaged – you can’t flush or sewage comes up through your toilet.
• There could be a fire due to gas line or transformers exploding.
• You could be snowed in.

So here is my plan for residents of suburban areas that are not in a flood zone.

PICK A MEETING SPOT

Should you get separated from your family, pick a spot to meet. Your town’s community center might be a good spot.

MAKE A ‘GO’ BAG

The go bag should be located in a place that can be accessed even if your roof were to cave or stairs were blocked. In it:

1. Key phone numbers. If your cell phone runs out of batteries, you won’t have access to your address book.
2. Your con-ed account number.
3. Information for your insurance companies.
4. Batteries and a flashlight. This flashlight should be reserved for emergency use only. Don’t use it for other things. I HIGHLY recommend that you get a Flashlight that uses AA batteries. D and C batteries are hard to come by during a storm. Stanley 95-155 3-in-1 Tripod LED Flashlight is awesome. It forms a tripod and it can be separated into 3 separate flashlights.
5. A cell phone charger. If you update your phone, make sure you put an updated charger in your go bag. Also get a car cell phone charger.
6. Lots of socks and underwear.
7. Work gloves.
8. Extra jackets or blankets
9. They say that you should have a radio, but I just used my car radio.

FORM A DISASTER CLUB

Pick some local friends and neighbors. If something happens, make a pact to check on each other and to shelter each other if necessary.

PRE-STORM

1. Get some ice. If power is lost, fill a cooler with ice. Don’t do it beforehand.
2. Make sure you have your medicines.
3. Fill your tub(s) with water
4. Get cash. Credit card terminals may not work.
5. Fill some pitchers or bottles with tap water. (Its really not necessary to go raid the store for water).
6. Make sure you have non perishable foods. I think soup in the paper aseptic package is better than canned. I also stock ramen and Parmalat milk. Make sure you have lots of portable snacks like chips, granola bars etc..
7. If you have a pet, get pet food.
8. Extra propane. If your stove doesn’t work, you can grill.
9. Firewood if you have a storm.
10. Make sure your gas tank is full in your car. The gas stations ran out of gas during this storm.
11. Secure anything in your yard that could be picked up by wind during the storm.
12. Take a shower. It might be a while before your next one.
13. Make sure you have paper plates and cups. You don’t want to be washing dishes.
14. Back up your important data onto a portable hard drive.
15. Gather passports and medical records, just in case.
16. Charge EVERYTHING. I have one of these Battery Packs that work for multiple devices. It’s pretty cool. Energizer XP18000 Universal AC Adapter with External Battery for Laptops, Netbooks, and More

THE LUXURIES

You will be stuck with your kids and they are not likely to understand the situation. They will whine and distract you.

1. Get candy. Give it to them bit by bit to reward for good behavior. Candy is lightweight and has lots of calories.
2. Lip balm.
3. Lotion. (My hands are SO dry.)
4. Find your DVDs. If you have a portable DVD player or laptop, you can quiet them down for a little bit.
5. Make sure you have booze. I supposed you don’t want to be intoxicated when a disaster hits, but alcohol can go a long way if you are bored and have nothing to do. Also, if the shit REALLY hits the fan, its makes for good barter
6. Instant coffee. No need to say more.

• If you think you will need to flee, put on some good shoes. You dont want to be trapped outside in slippers or bare feet.
• As soon as things settle down, I will be getting a generator. I have lost power 3 times in 3 years. Its time that I face the music. I will be getting a propane powered generator so that I don’t need to worry about getting gas. I will also have my electrician come and wire my house so that my boiler can be hooked up to the generator (hot water and heat).
• I have been considering restoring my land line phone. The cell phone networks have been terrible.
• I think that if you don’t have a chainsaw, you should find out who near you has one. A tree could block your exit and trap you in your home.
• A friend of mine could not figure out how to get her garage door open w/o power. If you have an electric garage door, you should figure that out now.
• Don’t get pregnant (unless you want to). Make sure you use protection.
• Other good things, dusk masks, hard hats, reflective vests.
• My kids are too young, but if your kids can operate a phone you should teach them how to call 911 in case you are not able to do so.
• Don’t forget your Tactical Bacon

The post Disaster Preparations in the Suburbs appeared first on Janey Lee.

For those of you who may not be aware.. this is what happens afterwards, billing wise. The hospital’s billing department assigns billing codes to all of the things that were done and sends the bill to my insurance company. Each billed amount has the amount the hospital asks for and then the amount that the insurance company agrees to pay. The insurance company pays the hospital the agreed amount (heavily discounted) and then everything is settled after I pay the co-pay and co-insurance.

Of course, the bill was rejected by my health insurance because the paperwork wasn’t filed correctly. But that is not what this rant is about.

For my visit to the emergency room, the hospital billed my insurance company in 2 parts:

• Part 1 - $631.00 to cover the observation (cost of the bed, the nurse to observe me etc…)
  The discounted amount is $357.34.
• Part 2 – $8,365.87 to cover the various tests, cat scans etc..
  The discounted amount was $866.08 . WTF!!!

WHY is the discounted amount so much lower than the cost billed? If I did not have insurance, I would be on the hook for over $9,000 for a simple medical concern.

So someone explain to me. Why do doctors/hospitals charge what they charge if they are not gong to be actually PAID that amount?

The post Cost of emergency room care appeared first on Janey Lee.

When I hear people talk about it, they keep saying that 47% of people don’t pay taxes. Which is false. Romney stated that 47% of people do not pay INCOME TAX. Its an important distinction. The 47% that Romney disparages as “entitled” do pay taxes. 60% of them pay payroll taxes, also know as Social Security (FICA) and Medicare (FUTA). They pay local and state income taxes. The pay property tax and school taxes either directly or indirectly through their rents. They pay sales tax on their purchases. And there are lots of other little taxes like gas tax, liquor tax, luxury tax, license taxes etc..

But he is correct in that they do not pay income tax. Why is that? Because after perfectly legal deductions, exemptions and tax credits, they don’t have any taxable income.

Some examples:

• A family of four with an income less than $23,050 is considered to be in poverty. So you would not be surprised to know that such a family does not pay any income tax.
• An elderly person who’s main income comes from Social security does not pay any income tax.
• There are people who have jobs and pay Social Security and Medicare tax but do not pay income tax. For instance, a married couple with 2 children with an income of $40,000 is not obligated to pay tax under the current tax law. (see the first chart below)
• There were  78,000 people with incomes over $200,000 who paid no income taxes last year, for various reasons (see IRS chart below).
• There are reportedly 3,000 people with incomes over $2,178,866 who did not pay any taxes last year.

Is it fair?

The post 47% of people don’t pay taxes? appeared first on Janey Lee.

I have heard both Democrats and Republicans pander to small business owners. They both speak about things that they would to do help small businesses and thus, create jobs. Here is my wishlist of policies that would help me hire new people:

• Universal healthcare – Health insurance costs us around $700/mo per employee. Ideally, there would be a universal single-payer health care system in the USA so that I did not have to provide insurance to my employees. Since that is clearly a pipe dream, I am looking forward to health care exchanges that will allow me to purchase health care at a lower rate. Also, it would be nice if the cost of health care didn’t spike yearly.
• Simpler taxes – I am not talking about a flat tax. I am talking fewer taxes. I would be happy to pay a higher income tax to get rid of the annoying MTA tax. Filing paperwork for such taxes costs me time and money.
• Educated employee pool – We work in tech and there are still not a lot of Americans in our field. Most talented computer programmers that I know are not American. Our country needs to do better in teach math and sciences.
• Reformed immigration rules – Since there aren’t enough American developers, make it easier for us to hire foreign workers.

The post I am a job creator appeared first on Janey Lee.

Recipe:

1 load of white sliced bread
smoked salmon
4 boiled eggs
sour cream
cream cheese
capers
honey dijon mustard
mayonaise
carrots
cucumber
parsely

Make stacks of 5 slices of bread and trim off crusts. Ideally, all of the bread will be the same size.
Put 3 slices of bread in a row. Put some mayo on the bread.
Put a layer of smoked salmon and then top with honey mustard.
Add a layer of bread with some mayo.
Add a layer of sliced/mashed boiled egg and capers.
Add another layer of bread slices with mayo.
Put a layer of sliced cucumbers (I cut mine into semi-circles)
Put mayo on both slides of the next layer (to protect bread from cucumber moisture).
Add another layer of smoked salmon and honey mustard.
Top off with final layer of bread.

Get an electric mixer and mix and equal quantity of sour cream and cream cheese. Beat till smooth.
“Ice” the “cake” with the “frosting”.

Decorate with capers, carrots, cucumbers, eggs cut into shapes. You can also use radish, boiled shrimp, more smoked salmon. Be creative!

Slice and serve!

The post Savory Cake appeared first on Janey Lee.

I highly recommend the book Cinderella Ate My Daughter by Peggy Orenstein. In it, she explains why manufacturers of toy and baby gear make stuff in pink and blue. And the answer (no surprise) is that it causes us to buy more stuff.

For instance, my daughter got a gift of blocks in pink. The regular, multicolor set, has a picture of a boy on the package. This is cearly a ploy to get you to buy one set of blocks for boys and another for girls.

If you must buy things in pink, do it for things that are for use by one kid only, like pacifiers. Otherwise, do yourself a favor and buy things in neutral colors that work for boys AND girls. If the package is too girly, remove the toy from the box and repackage it in a neutral box.

The post Why you should not buy pink baby gear appeared first on Janey Lee.

Both kids found this to be fascinating, especially Matilda. She started pointing out places on her body that had hair and needed to be waxed. I explained to her that the wax was hot and she would not like it — which prompted her to ask me why I put hot wax on myself if it hurts. Oy.

A friend of mine told me about how her mother hauled her into a salon to be waxed when she was 12. When I expressed my horror at this she replied that its easy for me to be against it because I am relatively hairless. To me, hair removal is a vain and unnecessary act. To her, hair removal is an important part of grooming — like showering.

A similar debate is happening right now around the book Maggie Goes on A Diet. Its about a girl who is overweight and she goes on a diet and becomes fit and athletic. To me, the book is awful because girls have enough problems trying to keep up with the photoshopped models in magazines and advertisements. But others point out that we have a childhood obesity epidemic on our hands and that the book focuses on health and not appearance.

My final conclusion is to try to keep kids focused on how a body functions and not on how it looks — and that I should keep my waxing to myself.

PS. I am sure we can all agree that this book is a horrible piece of crap. My Beautiful Mommy – Written by a plastic surgeon to explain to kids about their mom’s cosmetic surgery.

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