US expat in Colombia

For the general population, if you’re sick you go to urgent care and maybe wait for several hours. If you need to see a specialist, those appointments can take a couple of weeks to a couple of months, depending on the type of specialty. Either way, the cost is about $3 (all prices are rough equivalents in USD) per visit to see a doctor.

My employer signed me up for private insurance that gives me “concierge service,” so I have access to a different network of doctors with shorter wait times. If I’m sick, I can get a same-day house call. If I need a specialist, I can usually get an appointment in a two-week time frame. I pay about $50 per month for that (in addition to my normal taxes, which are used to fund the public system). My copay per visit, regardless of the type of doctor or procedure (exams, MRIs, etc.) is about $10.

One time, I paid out of pocket for an ultrasound because I didn’t want to wait for the insurance company to approve it and go back for a separate appointment. It cost me about $25.

Same.

I’m no programmer by any means, but I’ve always been more tech-savvy than the average bear. I finally took the plunge and added a Linux partition to my computer because I read enough posts here that piqued my curiosity.

You jest, but I can assure you that alligator is delicious.

My cousin got acupuncture treatments for alpha gal a couple of months ago. She went out for a steak after her last session and wound up in the hospital.

I was raised in the Assemblies of God, and I’m fairly sure that I knew an age-appropriate definition of adultery by kindergarten. Something along the lines of “breaking your marriage vows by being in a romantic relationship with another person.”

I definitely knew the actual definition of abortion by kindergarten because my church had fucked-up priorities.

This is exactly as reasonable as any recipe review I’ve ever read. Which is why I stopped reading recipe reviews.

I don’t necessarily buy him as a serious actor. Mad Men was so well written that I think almost anyone could have been an effective Don Draper. My opinion is that he pulled off about 90% of that role based on his looks. (I think it worked overall because there were so many very talented actors surrounding him.)

That said, I love him as a comedic actor. His SNL appearances are delightful, and I’m always pleasantly surprised when he shows up in comedy shows and films.

I think a lot of comedians are this way, and it makes sense. Most of us have a “work persona” that is not exactly the same as what we would consider our “real” personality.

For a more genuine version Will Ferrell, and just a hell of a story of friendship and overcoming challenges, I heartily recommend the documentary Will & Harper.

Which honestly seems to be an overwhelming majority of people.

Tech companies took a pretty good predictive text mechanism and called it “intelligent” when it obviously isn’t. People believed the hype, so greedy capitalists went all in on a cheaper alternative to their human workers. They deserve to lose business over their stupid mistakes.

In Colombia I get a shocking number of voice messages via WhatsApp. I got a 4-minute message from my landlord last week that had 20 seconds of actual information.

The transcribe option in the app is reasonably good, but it’s not 100% accurate.

It was a bad three-day weekend.

I feel like The Satanic Temple would be willing to do this.

They did something similar with abortion rights, but I don’t think they have gained any legal traction with that argument. (That could also be because they’re waiting for a member who has standing to bring a case.)

404 Media doesn’t require payment for a subscription. Their content is behind a subscriber wall to keep AI bots from accessing their work.

I expect we’ll see more of this sort of thing as AI continues gobbling up everything on the internet so that it can write laughably bad term papers for high schoolers.

What’s your source for this? I find nothing that says therapists don’t have to report cases of child abuse.

I just responded to someone else with a long list of sources that indicate that therapists across the US are required to report child abuse.

I find zero sources that agree with your claim.

I find several sources that indicate that therapists in all US states are required to break confidentiality when child abuse has occurred.

https://psychcentral.com/health/what-do-therapists-have-to-report

https://www.remnantcounselorcollective.com/resources/86536/the-ultimate-guide-to-mandated-reporting-laws-in-all-50-us-states-child-adult-abuse-neglect

https://www.stopitnow.org/ohc-content/when-must-a-therapist-file-a-report

https://www.huffpost.com/entry/what-therapists-report-confidentiality_l_5d2cf063e4b0bca603641a62

https://www.mentalyc.com/blog/exceptions-to-confidentiality-in-counseling

So either you’re talking about another country’s laws (in which case I’d like to know which country), or you’re just incorrect.

I’m in Colombia, where psychologists are required to report “human rights violations, mistreatment or cruel, inhuman or degrading conditions of confinement of which any person is a victim and of which they become aware in the exercise of their profession.”

With Republicans in general, I think. It seems to be their best attempt at misdirection, and I think it works to keep their target audience from paying attention to their least savory activities.

They spent decades training the leopard, so they thought they had tamed it.

If you’re concerned about your anonymity, keep in mind that companies frequently put ID numbers on their return envelopes to help match the returned mail piece with your record in their database. Sometimes the number is invisible (UV ink) so it doesn’t look “mass produced” to the recipient.

Because back in the day none of that shit would fly especially around people who fought in the war, but it does now.

I think that we’d be better off if the dads, uncles, and grandpas who came back and refused to talk about their war experiences had made it clearer to the next generation exactly how horrible it was. It didn’t fly with them because they saw what it brought. It flies with younger people because we were sheltered from the true horrors of the war.

I think a trip to the Holocaust Museum should be required for all high school seniors. If it isn’t closed by the clown show currently running the country, at least.

Age isn’t really a factor in the way you’re perceiving it here.

There’s a very large population of US Christians who think it’s a sin to work on Sunday but who also go out to eat in restaurants when they leave church. That particular population of Christians is pretty demanding and on the whole are bad tippers.

I grew up going to several of those churches. If my mom had to work her retail job on a Sunday, the Church Ladies™ would tut about it and say what a shame it was for her to be working on The Lord’s Day™. But then they would turn right around and head out for lunch at the nearest buffet restaurant where they’d run the server ragged for two hours and leave a dollar or two as a tip on their entire bill. They never understood how hypocritical their actions were.