No, this isn’t a report on my Google Adsense earnings especially since I don’t advertise here. It’s just a saying that we had in the Sub Force and most likely the entire US armed forces which was a spoof on how much someone supposedly calculated the typical pay per hour of an E-6 was based upon a 24 hour day at 365 days a year. And it came out to approximately $1.50 an hour. This, of course, did not include the paid days off (liberty) or the paid 30 day vacation (leave) or the free health care (100% everything) etc, etc. But still…
These days it basically amounts to how I feel about things when the day has been rather rough around the edges. On this particular day it has not only been rough around the edges but soft and mushy in the middle as well. Especially where my head was concerned. It never fails that just when I become adjusted to the prescription medication the VA has me taking, they change the line up. This time they dropped one that I no longer needed (yay!) and upped the dosage on yet another (boo!). And of course the one they increased the dosage on makes me feel dizzy and light headed (more than usual that is) until I get used to it. This usually takes about two weeks.
Wonderful. But that’s not all folks…
This medication that supposedly controls my rather high blood pressure also negates the effects somewhat of the pain medication I’m taking for a rather bothersome service connected type disability. But here’s the best part of all–increasing the dosage of that pain med to offset the effects of the increased dosage of the BP med might make me dizzy and light headed until I get used to it and guess how long that is?
Get it?
Why does the title Catch 22 keep coming to mind? Or perhaps “Damned if you do and damned if you don’t” is a more accurate phrase?
Meanwhile, I was bumbling around work without managing to break everything in site and had to made an intense effort not to sit done under any circumstance. I was afraid that I wouldn’t get up again and I’d still be stuck there now.
Ooog, what a horrible thought.
So I’m afraid the boss is going to have to do without me at the other store this week since I’m barely adequate to work my own shop as it is. Good thing I’m hidden behind my very own wall, huh?
Ah phooey, I say…this too shall pass and I shall again become used to this increase in uselessness (since it doesn’t really lower my BP any). And then…I can increase that pain med and spend the following two weeks doing it all over again…Bah!
Maybe I should just get used to feeling dizzy and light headed. Might just solve the whole problem that way. At the very least it should make my posts a bit more interesting to read. 
I know what you mean about the pay being sad! I just read your about page and saw you were a submariner…my fathers was a submariner and is in his late 50s. Most of the time my family was stationed in Charleston.
But I also know first-hand the great salary you get. I was also in the Navy for 4 years and I recently got a copy of my social Security statement that said in 1993 I made $8k. I asked my husband how in the world we lived on that.
Hi Sara,
And welcome! Feel free to grab a seat and I’ll see about coffee.
You know, now that you mention it, It was kind of skimpy but as time went on and I moved up a rank or two it was…well…still a bit under the standard but it seemed I did okay. An apartment 2 miles away from VA beach, a Harley and a very unique job that took me to some amazing places.
I know how you lived on it…sheer tenacity!. It’s one of the requirements upon being excepted into the Navy. You have to be stubborn as a bull and independent as all get out.
By the way, I took a swing by your site. Intriguing! I like it right off the bat. I’ll have to spend some more time there this weekend for sure.