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Beating High Drug Costs – OR – A Primer on Smuggling

Please assume that this post is fiction. I am in no way saying that I have broken the law or advocating that others do so.

First of all, I am actually a fan of expensive drug prices. Drug companies invest billions into research and development and have a relatively short window of time to recoup that cost before their patents expire. That means new drugs are funded through expensive medicines. Without that hefty price tag, we wouldn’t get ground-breaking medicine.

However, when my doctor gives me a prescription that costs $1000, it gives my a serious pause. Yes, that’s for what’s supposed to last 9 months(in reality, about 6), but that’s still a huge chunk of change.

But what are the alternatives?

Some people go to Mexico or Canada for medicine.

Me? I went to alldaychemist.com (Ed. This is not an ad. They don’t pay me anything. I pay them). For real. At least,a hypothetical, fictional for real. ADC is an Indian pharmacy. In India, an awful lot of non-narcotic medicines aren’t considered controlled substances, so they can be sold under different rules than in the US. For example, you can buy antibiotics over the counter or through the mail, legally. At least legally there.

I placed my fictional order using a credit card I don’t use for anything. It is an Indian company, after all. I also won’t give them my bank account information to do a wire transfer, like they would prefer. That would be stupid.

Once an order is placed, it is manually approved, usually within a few hours, depending on time differences and their office hours.

From there, your package is shipped within a could of days. As soon as it hits the New Delhi postal system, you can track the package.

The biggest time delay is customs in the US. That adds about 2 weeks to the shipping time. If, for some reason, customs rejects the package, ADC will ship another right away, but that’s pretty unlikely. Customs has better things to do than inspect every tiny box that comes through. Unless you set up a commercial distribution system (read: drug dealer), you really don’t have anything to worry about.

Are the drugs legit?

Yes. My imaginary order has been doing exactly what I was expecting it to do over the months I’ve been using it.

At 1/100th of the domestic price, it’s totally worth it, you just have to order the medicine about 3 weeks before you need it.

Selling Your Car

Finance

: English: Jalopy car in Joshua Tree National Park in Hidden Valley Campground (Photo credit: Wikipedia)

When it’s time to replace your car, most people focus on the new car, instead of the old, but that is ignoring real money. Your old car–unless it has disintegrated–still has value. Sometimes, it’s just time to ask yourself, “When should I sell my car?”

When you’re looking to sell your car (like with We Will Buy Your Car), you generally have several options:

Tow & crush. If your car has been wrecked, doesn’t run, or is just old and beat up, you may be stuck with calling a junkyard and accepting $50 for them to pick up your car and crush it for scrap.
Trade it in. This is probably the least hassle, but–other than #1–doesn’t pay well. Dealerships are willing to pay something under what they will get at a wholesale auction, which is quite a bit less than the blue book value.
Sell it yourself. Now you’re thinking, “He’s going to buy my car! Oh, bother.” It can be a pain, but it’s also the best way to get a decent price for your wheels.

When you sell your car, there are a few things to keep in mind, much like when you sell something on Craigslist.

Don’t be alone. There are bad people in the world, but they don’t like witnesses. Bad things are much less likely to happen if you have company.
Know your price. Specifically, know three price: your dream price, the price that would make you happy, and the absolute lowest price you are willing to accept. Make sure you figure these numbers out ahead of time. Know what you are comfortable with before it comes time to close the deal.
Check IDs. The buyer is going to want to test-drive your car. That’s fine, but you want to make sure you know who is driving off in your car. “Officer, Sumdood took my car. He was wearing jeans.” That won’t get your car back.
Clean it up. Get the car detailed before you show it to a potential buyer. A sparkling-clean car will almost always bring in a few hundred extra dollars. It’s well worth the expense.

Following this plan should make the sale go as smoothly as possible and bring you the most possible money.

Readers, what have you done to dispose of an old car?

This is a sponsored post written to provide some insight into the world of used car retail.

Twitter Weekly Updates for 2010-05-17

Misc

@Elle_CM Natalie's raid looked like it was filmed with a strobe light. Lame CGI in reply to Elle_CM #
I want to get a toto portable bidet and a roomba. Combine them and I'll have outsourced some of the least tasteful parts of my day. #
RT @freefrombroke: RT @moneybeagle: New Blog Post: Money Hacks Carnival #115 http://goo.gl/fb/AqhWf #
TED.com: The neurons that shaped civilization. http://su.pr/2Qv4Ay #
Last night, fell in the driveway: twisted ankle and skinned knee. Today, fell down the stairs: bruise makes sitting hurt. Bad morning. #
RT @FrugalDad: And to moms, please be more selective about the creeps you let around your child. Takes a special guy to be a dad to another' #
First Rule of Blogging: Don't let real life get in the way. Epic fail 2 Fridays in a row. But the garage sale is going well. #

Twitter Weekly Updates for 2010-06-05

Misc

Working on my day off and watching Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles. #
Sushi-coma time. #
To all the vets who have given their lives to make our way of life possible: Thank you. #
RT @jeffrosecfp: While you're grilling out tomorrow, REMEMBER what the day is really for http://bit.ly/abE4ms #neverforget #
Once again, taps and guns keep me from staying dry-eyed. #
RT @bargainr: Live in an urban area & still use a Back Porch Compost Tumbler to fertilize your garden (via @diyNatural) http://bit.ly/9sQFCC #
RT @Matt_SF: RT @thegoodhuman President Obama quietly lifted a brief ban on drilling in shallow water last week. http://bit.ly/caDELy #
Thundercats is coming back! #
In real life, vampires only sparkle when they are on fire. -Larry Correia #
Wife found a kitten abandoned in a taped-shut box. Welcome Cat #5 #

The Happy Butt

Life

Do you find the cloud in every silver lining? Is the glass not only half empty, but evaporating? Do you start every day thinking

Smiley head happy (Photo credit: Wikipedia)

about how the effects of entropy on the universe make everything you do ultimately pointless?

You may be a pessimist.

Pessimism gets a bad rap. Without pessimists, we wouldn’t have insurance plans, missile defense systems, or Eeyore, and what would the world be without those things?

The thing you have to ask yourself is “Does the negativity make you happy?”

The next thing you have to ask yourself is whether or not you were lying with your previous answer.

If you have a negative outlook on everything, I have good news for you: it’s possible to defeat it. No matter how long you’ve been looking at the world through coffin-colored glasses, no matter how ingrained your negative slant is, it’s possible to change it.

You have to want to change it, because, as the saying goes, old habits die hard. Yippee kai yay.

You need a happy butt.

Little known fact: language shapes the way you think. If your language has no words for a concept, you will have a difficult time thinking about that concept, or even understanding it. Statistically, Asians are better at math than their western-world counterparts. Why? It’s not genetic. When a family moves to the US, the edge is lost within 2 generations. It’s not the amount of school they get. Even in backwaters with limited school access demonstrate the same abilities.

It’s the language. Euro-based languages are horrible. They are a clumsy mish-mash of crap from around the world, and the numbering system makes no sense. 11, 12, 13, huh? Spoken, that’s not a progression, it’s something we have to learn by rote. Why is 13 pronounce “thirteen”, with the ones place first, but 23 is pronounced with the tens place first, the way it is written? Where did the word “twenty” even come from? It’s obviously a horrible bastardization of “two” and “ten”, but is it self-evident? Does the progression through the decades follow some kind of rule? Twenty, thirty, forty, fifty. Nope.

The Asian languages (most of them) differ. The numeric progression is spoken in a rules-based progression that makes sense. 23 is literally “two tens three”, making learning math less about rote memorization and more about masters some simple rules.

In the western world, we are handicapped by our language, at least when it comes to math.

The rest of our thoughts are formed by language, too. Learn a language with different roots than the one your were born with and see how your perceptions change.

One of the signs of negative thinking is qualifying everything you say negatively. For example, one person might say “It’s a beautiful day, today” while Mr. Negativebritches would say “It’s a beautiful day, but it’s probably going to rain.” That’s a sad butt, err, but. Every time you qualify a sentence with a sad butt, you are reinforcing your negative view of the world.

The solution? Drop your drawers and paint on a smiley face. You need a happy but(t). You can rephrase the sentence into a happy thought without changing the sentiment or meaning in any way. Try this: “It’s probably going to rain, but it’s a beautiful day, now.” That’s a happy butt, and it reinforces the positive in your mind.

It sounds stupid, but it works. Your language shapes your life. Put a positive spin on what you say, and you will eventually start to think about life in a positive way.

Give it a shot. For the next week, every time you say something negative, qualify it with a happy butt. At the end of the week, come back here and tell me how it’s working and if you can sense a change in your mindset.

Deathbed Relationships

Life, Parenting, Relationships

My great-uncle has been depressed lately.

He lives in the same apartment building and my grandmother, his sister. They are just down the hall from each other.

Over the holidays, he’s seen a steady stream of people visiting my grandma, bringing cards and pictures, or taking her out to eat. Over Christmas weekend, she spent far more time away from home, celebrating with her kids, grandkids, and great-grandkids than she did at home.

He’s never met his great-grandchildren. He’s in his 70s, living in a retirement home attached to the nursing home he will most likely die in, and he’d like to see his descendants.

It’s too late.

He didn’t lose his relationship with his kids and grandkids in a fight. Instead, he spent his entire life doing his best to avoid all forms of responsibility. He spent 50 years avoiding supporting his family. He wasn’t there for them.

Of course they won’t be there for him.

There is a simple way to get your kids and your grandkids to dote on you in your old age: You spend your entire life being there when you’re needed.

Simple.

Building a relationship that can survive–or even thrive–in the times when you’ve got very little left to give takes a lifetime of commitment.

It starts the day your children are born, when you hold that precious little high-maintenance paperweight and swear that nothing bad will ever be allowed to happen to them. Then you teach them to walk, and teach them to talk, and kiss their booboos when they fall. And they will.

Day in, day out, you be there. You feed them, clothe them, punish them when necessary, and love them unconditionally even when they make it hard to like them. Every blessed day.

You soothe their pains, manage their fears, help them grow and turn into useful adults. Every flipping year.

When they are adults, you lend an ear, you lend a hand, you help with their babies, you offer advice, you listen and talk and you are there. Decade after decade.

Then, when you are old and broke and broken down, you’ve got people who love you, who cherish their memories with you. These are the people who will drive an hour out of their way to pick you up for dinner. They’ll carry you up the stairs you have trouble with. They’ll sit at your feet and listen to you tell stories. They’ll be there for you because you’ve always been there for them.

That’s how you get your kids and grandkids to visit you in the nursing home. Simple, not easy.

If you’ve missed their childhood–for whatever reason–it’s still possible to build that relationship, but it’s so much harder. You start by taking time out of your life to do spend time and be there. Help when you can with what you can. Be there.

If you wait until you are old and broke and broken down to start your relationship, it’s too late. Your kids will know that it’s just another example of your selfishness. If you’ve never made an effort to give, you’ve got know business expecting to get. You’ll be lucky to get an occasional phone call and a greeting card for the holidays.

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