Not surprised - 30 Sept 2021

 I spent the day with Medicare.  Well, I started yesterday when I formally and officially applied for Medicare coverage.  I was following a guidebook, generally quite good and very useful, but it left a misimpression that has caused some grief.  Toward the end of the book, there is a checklist to enroll in Medicare.  It makes a blithe reference to the fact that it could take "10 minutes or less" to enroll.  Yeah, about that.  It may take as few as 10 minutes to enter the required information in the Medicare forms (on-line, of course), but then there is a delay while the application is processed (in Albequerque) and a Medicare number is issued.  I got an email to confirm that my applicaton had been recived, but it contains no Medicare number.  The email leaves a gentle impression that the process is quick - but there is no commitment.  

today, I went to register for the Medigap Plan and a corresponding Part D drug plan.  After you enter a bunch of information, it prompts for a Medicare number.  Not unreasonable, but I have none - yet - so I am stuck.   So much for the "10 minute" enrollment.  In a chat-conversation with Betty, a representative of the Medigap insurance company, I discover that it can take "weeks" to get the critical Medicare number.  So I left the Plan process partially completed and started the Plan D drug plan application.  The the surprise of precisely no one, that too needs a Medicare number.  Therefore, I am nominally left without insurance while Medicare proceeds.

Ah!  I hear a shout from the back of the room.  You should have started sooner!  Yes, it would have been prudent to do so.  However, I was awaiting inforation about COBRA benefits from the HR department, and that took a while to arrive.  I had been thinking that I might use COBRA for family coverage through the end of 2021, then pick up on Medicare.  Add in other, personal delays, and I simply did not have enough time with the information to make a decision.

A further complexity is that Medicare is *personal* insturance.  One gets coverage for the self -- and not for the spouse.  COBRA would have covered the spouse; this another factor in the decision process.  Finally, COBRA is expensive.  Surprisingly expensive.  If I were on Social Security, COBRA would consume nearly half of my monthly payment (assuming Social Security were not taxed - which is it, thank you Ronald Reagan).  So my wife spent several hours today to file for WA state health coverage under ACA.  I am glad it exists, but the bureaucracy is astounding.  We are trying to pay them money and the insurance companies make it hard.  SMH.

So, I am technically not covered by insurance.  The last time I made an insurance claim was... 2019?  Maybe?  Anyway, I have chosen to take the risk -- and I can document the fact that I tried to get coverage (tho that may not help in any future discussions, I did try).

Changes - September 3, 2021

As of 3 September 2021, I have retired from AMD.  My time managing a research group is now ended and I am learning to be an old retired guy.  One might think this is easy, that it comes naturally, but I after about three weeks, I still have a lingering compulsion that I have something to do, some meeting to attend, some HR or recruitig mishap to remedy, or a status report to write.  

No.

No such thing.  My days, my time, are mine to define.  I still have responsibilities, but no longer a manager who sets them or an employee that demands them.  For now, I have projects, mainly ones that have been postponed, some postponed for a long time.  I am also fighting a global pandemic (or, rather, doing my best to avoid it) and the seasons have started to change to be more inclement.  This severely limits the outdoors projects.  Horticulture is no fun in the rain and I simply do not want to run a chainsaw, lawn mower, or chipper-shredder in the rain.  

That said, the US-Canada border recently reopened and we have visited the cabin on Keats Island, once in August and once in September.  During this time, we have done a lot of pruning and other maintenance that sets the stage for a big burn in October.  The residents of Plumper Cove traditionally burn the year's pruning pile during the weekend of Canadian Thanksgiving (American Columbus Day or Indigeneous Peoples Day).  Once the fire completes, the rising tide extinguishes the flames and sweeps away the ashes.  I have spent hours in the trees wtih various saws, manual and chain, to produce a distinctively large burn-pile for 2021.  We will also use this event to get rid of some old stain (I much prefer water-based over oil-based, if nothing else for the cleanup).  After a two-year hiatus while the border was closed and the COVID-19 pandemic raged, there was a lot of growth to remove.  I removed a cedar tree near the deck, stripped another cedar tree near the deck, pruned some trees to the south of the cabin (for light), and pruned the cedars on the bank under the cabin.  And more.  I will not pretend I am done, but the season is over and so the work must pause.  the burn will come in Otober and pruning will resume in Spring 2022.

--agk 29 Sep 2021