Clumsy Oaf

So, I hurt myself at work today. I was fortunate, it could have been much worse... hey, I can still type, sorta.

But what really irks me. What really, really, really irks me, is that it took nearly three hours for the staff to attend to me. All told, they spent 15 minutes with me, spread out over two hours. The rest was waiting.

And waiting.

And waiting.

And I came out with a bandage around my leg, some advice on how to keep down the swelling in my wrist, and a doctor's note giving me a few days off work.

I am more than willing to shell out fifty or a hundred bucks to get immediate attention from a private clinic. I could have been in and out of there in fifteen minutes, X-rays, bandage, advice, note and all.

My time is important. So is the time of the obviously over-worked staff at Bulkley Valley District Hospital. So is the time of the other patients, two of which were in a whole HECK of a lot more discomfort than I was in, and two of which left the hospital and said they would come back later.

I am not a heartless bastard. I am not adverse to letting emergency patients ahead of me (especially when it is a life or death thing). I am certainly not adverse to waiting my turn, either.

But why, oh why is it a capital crime to want something different? Why can't Canadians have their say over their own health. It doesnt make sense.

We aren't talking about the scary "dark days", Ujjal! We are talking about choice.

''I don't see a great rush to set up private health care, because we have a very recent experience," he said of the Canadian public. "Forty-five years is not a long time in the life of a nation. There are people who still remember the dark days of private health care, where people had to sell their farms and sell their homes to care for their loved ones.''

Well, my priorities must be wrong. I should enjoy the prospect of wasting my time (or for some, risking their lives) on a waiting list, rather than the doubleplusungood option of paying for immediate attention.

Silly me. And silly CMA for even suggesting such a thing. I mean, what do they know, really?

Ohhhhh, but now I can rely on Compo to pull through for me! And Medical Employment Insurace! Fan-freaking-tastic.

This Utopian Paradise isn't so bad after all. I don't care what Darcey is linking to. He obviously doesn't know any better.