Rite-Aid Again? Yep!

I dragged my hiney into Rite-Aid while I was up at the bank yesterday.
I had a $1 +UP burning a hole in my pocket so here is what I got.....

1 x Colgate toothpaste(on sale $3.50 but my 20% discount was lower)=$3.43

I used 1 x .75¢ IPQ
$3.43-.75¢=$2.68

I used my $1 +Ups.......
$2.68-$1+UP=$1.68 Out of Pocket

And I received a $3+UP Reward for buying the toothpaste.

Then I went back to Rite-Aid today while I was out gassing up my minivan and got this.....

1 x Colgate toothpaste(on sale $3.50 but my 20% discount was lower)=$3.43
2 x Dove deodorants(on sale $3.00)=$6.00
Subtotal.....$9.43

I used--
1 x .75¢ Colgate IPQ
1 x $3/2 Dove products ManQ
Coupon total......$3.75
Then a $1/2 Load2card Q for Dove came off too!
$3.75+$1=$4.75

$9.43-$4.75=$4.68

I used my $3 +Ups from yesterday--
$4.68-$3+Ups=$1.68 OOP

And I received $5 in +Ups for buying those 3 products($3 toothpaste, $2 wyb 2 Dove items).

I have spend $3.36 and have 2 tubes of toothpaste & 2 deodorant sticks with a retail value of $19.16 if not bought during this sale.
And I have $5 in +Ups to spend/roll in the next 2 weeks.

If we get the Speed Stick and Finesse Qs in our paper Sunday I know exactly how I am going to roll these +Ups.
Crossing my fingers..... ;-)

Sluggy

Medical Folderol & Wishes My Foot was Better so I Could Kick Some A$$

Well a bill came from Geisinger so I now know what my little excursion to the ER(then Urgent Card, then back to the ER)cost us.

We have an automatic $150 Copay every time we walk into an ER for treatment with our insurance plan.
And the bill for "Diagnostic Radiology"(2 ex-rays of my foot)was $548, "Pharmacy"(1 shot of Lovenox and 1 Coumadin pill)was $11.94 and "Emergency Services"(maybe the sonogram of my leg/ankle was included in this?..the ER staff's wages?.....the use of a gurney sitting in the hallway in the ER?...goodness only knows what this included!)was $1,420.

All totaled that bill came to $1,979.94 for my 9 ish hr. visit to the hospital.

Insurance paid $1,829.94 of the bill, leaving our payment at $150.
So with the copay we paid a total of $300 OOP for my ER/Urgent Care/ER Visit.

I thought our benefit was 90% for in hospital services but $150 isn't even 8% of the total charged on the bill.
Hhhmmmm.

Well the check is written and it's paid and done.  If they want an extra $50 +/- from me they can come after me.  lolz

And this all leads into talking about that this week and next are the "Open Enrollment" at Hubs works for next year's insurance plan.
I like to refer to it as "Open Season on Consumers" instead because I feel like Elmer Fudd when this time rolls around every year.




We've already started analyzing the costs/benefits of each of 5 plans we can choose from.
Oh what fun!! 8-))

Luckily for us, Hubs employer provides part of the cost of his healthcare so that is why we are limited to 5 choices.

I can't imagine having to pay the full shift of the coverage yourself and having to pick from all those supposed options on a state's mandated HealthCare Exchange.
That is, IF there are any options in your state, which doesn't seem to be the case in some states....not that anyone can get through the system yet because the websites are a clusterf*ck, but I digress......


We won't be going with our current plan, which is a local to this area of PA HMO, next year.
Mainly because we have a daughter in Louisiana who can't utilize any of the benefits where she lives as none of the practitioners or services are outside of Pennsylvania.  When she left home in May we had to purchase an additional insurance policy just to cover her.  It's an additional healthcare cost in our budget, and a bare bones policy and basically you can only use it if you are in dire medical need(and it has very high deductibles).  So luckily she has stayed relatively healthy the last 6 months, but she needs a policy that she can use for day to day problems or if she gets an infection and needs meds.

And thanks to our wonderful government and the ACA if we continue to keep her on the plan she is on(which her carrier WILL continue to provide for at least through 2014)she will be fined because it's not expensive/expansive enough.
Thank you Mr. Obama and those pinheads in Congress who passed this mess without reading it!!

I'd like to personally kick each and every one of you in the ass right now....but then again, I'd need medical again for my foot.

So now, even if the insurance we pay for currently is great for me(who is by far the largest consumer of healthcare presently in our family)we have to change our coverage, our doctors, and increase how much we pay out of pocket for our healthcare.  (If we were able to keep our same policy it would still go up a little bit but at least I wouldn't have to find all new healthcare providers.)

So option 5(our current policy)is out and we are left with 3 Consumer Directed plans offered by the same company(Cigna)and 1 HMO offered by Aetna.
I like the idea of going from our HMO to another HMO(this one is nationwide so daughter can actually use it!)but upon closer inspection it doesn't seem to be the best fit for us.

We'll run the numbers(benefits vs. OOP costs, co-pays, co-insurance and premiums)later this week using what we have spent this year on health issues to test which is the best financial option for us.

The 3 other choices, the Consumer Directeds, have in-network and out-of-network benefits, with the in-network benefits being higher of course.  So we have to sit down and list all the doctors, drugs and services I/we use and see what costs would be in-network and what is out-of-network.....then weight the possible costs against the costs to us in the national HMO for the same services and goods.

I swear you have to be an Einstein to get the best deal for yourself......

Sluggy


 

The Good & Bad About Sharing Genealogy

If you don't remember my post HERE about my purported 10 x Great Grandparents, you may want to refresh yourself on that, as it comes into play during this multipart saga I am beginning here.  8-)

Being an amateur genealogist is akin to being a masochist at times.
You work and work and work and finally find a connection to someone or some line and just when you are all happy and excited, you hit a brick wall.
Which makes you work and work and work and hope to make another connection, which in turn gets your face slammed into yet another brick wall.

This is how genealogy works for the most part for most people.
Unless you had nerdy ancestors who loved doing genealogy before you and left you a clear, documented paper trail of all your generations of family.
That my folks is a genealogist's wet dream.  8-)
But that is very rarely the case in the genealogical life. 

As I have said before most amateurs at this will use Ancestry dotcom at some point as it's an easy source for finding records without leaving the comfort of your home.
It's great this age of technology!

But all the sharing on Ancestry dotcom also has it's ugly side.
Being able to share and see other family trees can aid you in your own search but it's a double edged sword.

Mainly because you don't know how or where the other people have gotten their information from to assemble their tree.  Other trees can be riddled with mistakes and down right lies. 

Sluggy's axiom of wisdom--"If the tree you are copying leads to famous, notorious or royal people in history, view it with an extra dose of suspicion.  Everyone wants to be related to famous/infamous and royalty and will baldface LIE to make it appear that they do."

It is never good to just blindly copy information off of someone else's family tree and then leave it at that and walk away.  But sometimes a less than professional genealogist may resort to this, lacking their own resources or knowledge or time or money to do the job.

I am guilty of having "lifted" family members info. from other family trees.  Given my resources and level of skill, plus add in the fact that frankly I don't have 20-30 years to hunt down clues at this age in my life, I do use information off of other family trees at times. 

Usually I will use them as a last resort or take the information and then try to document it, so it's using that information/person in the tree as a "hint" around which I try to substantiate their place in MY tree.
What I don't do is blindly just lift a person and cut & paste them into my family puzzle, even when the corners aren't even close to fitting.

If I am not within my core at least 50% sure that a particular person finds into my puzzle I will keep them there for the time being, with a notation that this person could possibly be a mistake so that other's looking at my tree(and I can't keep others on the site from seeing my tree unless I make it private)know that I know that some links I have forged in the family chain aren't 100% accurate to the best of my knowledge.

Sharing information in this way can be a good thing as it may give another genealogist an idea or a hint, but it can also be very damaging as it can lead to people spreading around erroneous information or innocent mistakes in the recording of facts.
So I am on the fence over this practice.

Now this sharing information comes into play in regard to my Packer/Isgar line.
I initially used other family tree's information to build parts of this line. 
I started at the known end.....the generations closest to me and worked via documents I could find online back.

I got to a point where I could find no public documents readily(as I don't have access to any European records at this point...too much $$$ to access) so I made some "leaps of faith" by following the people trail via other's family trees that jived up to that point with mine.  That brought me back to England and Ireland and Phillip Packer and his parents and Sarah Isgar and her parents.

Then I went about digging up documentation to substantiate the claims of dates and people which I had lifted from other trees.

And I hit an obvious error.
And it's an error that every public tree on ancestry dotcom seems to have, so I am thinking either someone made an honest mistake at one point with a date and then everyone else has lifted that erroneous information into their trees OR worse, that the person in question does not fit into this tree at this juncture and someone just lied about it.

Here is how the Packer Line I am on, descends from Phillip Packer/Sarah Isgar as is purported on hundreds of family trees on Ancestry dotcom.........see if you can find the error.......

Phillip Packer 1618-1686
Sarah Isgar   1625/26-1677
who begat--

Phillip Packer immigrant 1656-1739
who married--
Hannah Sessions  1665-1689
who begat--

James Phillip Packer  1686-1764
who married--
Ann Coates  1699-?
who begat--

Susannah Packer  1664-1728
who married--
Robert James Baker  1660-1728
who begat--

Douglas Baker  1688-1764
who married--
Jean Jane Thompson  1717-1762
who begat--

Douglas Baker, Jr.  1743-1778
who married--
Mary Elliot  1743-
who begat--

Elliot Baker  1775-1836
At which point I could find written records.

I have since substantiated up to Robert James Baker on the Baker line and their wive's line and the Sessions and Coate's lines as well.  Plus I have been able to document the Packer line down to James Phillip Packer.

Which leaves us at James Packer and Ann Coates' daughter-Susannah Packer.....the square peg in my round hole as it were. ;-)

You will notice that this line, as does EVERY single family tree on Ancestry dotcom has Susannah Packer being born the YEAR BEFORE HER GRANDMOTHER!
Go look, I'll wait.......

The few folks I have contacted who have this family tree with this obvious error have either ignored my email or said they just copied the information from another tree but then they never did any research or questioned the obvious error here.
Argh.

As Susannah's supposed mother, Ann Coates was not born until 1699, this Susannah couldn't possibly have been born in 1664.
Upon further research I have found that Susannah's father had a sister named Susannah as well, which means there could be confusion between the Susannahs here.  My Susannah Packer may be in reality the Aunt of the Susannah that has been place in my direct line.
This would change the line of descent from James Packer to Susannah Packer-his sister and down to my generation.

This would change my line of descent to this.....

Phillip Packer 1618-1686
Sarah Isgar   1625/26-1677
who begat--

Phillip Packer immigrant 1656-1739
who married--
Hannah Sessions  1665-1689
who begat--

Susannah Packer(sister of James Pillip Packer rather than his daughter)  1664-1728
who married--
Robert James Baker  1660-1728
who begat--

Douglas Baker  1688-1764
who married--
Jean Jane Thompson  1717-1762
who begat--

Douglas Baker, Jr.  1743-1778
who married--
Mary Elliot  1743-
who begat--

Elliot Baker  1775-1836


This change basically takes out one of the generations but the birth date for Susannah is still incorrect if Hannah Sessions is now her mother rather than her grandmother.

Then I found 1 tree with Susannah being born in 1728 rather than dying in that year, which is impossible because the marriage to Robert Baker is documented as occurring in 1709!

And then I found another tree with Susannah Packer with dates of 1688-1764 and this Susannah being James Phillip's sister.  It is looking at the moment like THIS is MY Susannah Packer but there are still questions and inconsistencies.

I tell you my head is about to explode sometimes from all this! lol

So this line, as laid out, is still not "firm" with factual documentable evidence that my line goes back to Phillip Packer/Sarah Isgar in this descent.
There are still questions(and it's possible My Susannah Packer may not even be blood related to this Packer line now) and until I find the missing links, or the right person to ask or someone comes forward to connect with me on this issue, the voracity of this family tree will have concerns for me.

And then this week another window opened in this brick wall.
To Be Continued.....

Sluggy

 

Yah, We are Now Covered All Right.....But In What?

If this wasn't so close to the truth it would be funnier rather than frightening......

 

Sluggy

Giveaway is Now Open.....Week One, Come Enter!

What time is it?!

Well it's time for another BORING BLOG BOX GIVEAWAY!!

Here's how it works if you are new here.......

 

I put things in the box(mostly what I have gotten for free or almost free)each week and when the box is filled we draw a winner from all the entries received.

Here is what went into the Box today............

 

1.  1 bottle of Dove Shampoo 

2.  1 bottle of Olay Body Wash

3.  1 Tube of Dove Deodorant

4.  1 Computer shaped Trinket Box

 

Here's a close up of the trinket box.....

 

 

When you open up the box, there is a tiny computer mouse with a tail inside....too cute!
Keep it for yourself or gift it to that computer crazy friend in your life.

 

 

This week's prizes have a value of about $20.
 

If this is your first time, please go read all the rules for these Giveaways HERE.  *As always, if you are located outside the US, you CAN enter and win but weight restrictions/shipping costs may mean your prize box will contain less items.*

***Time to enter.....You can enter on this Giveaway post until I close this post to entries.

1 entry per person per day on THIS POST.
Leave your name/email address and a COMMENT on this post.  

This week I want to hear about any good recipes you have for using pumpkin.  Please no pumpkin bread or plain old pumpkin pie.  I REALLY need a good pumpkin doughnut recipe....well, my waistline doesn't need it, but my mouth does. lolz
Give me your unusual pumpkin or savory pumpkin recipes.
 

You can come directly to this blog post or find it through the link on the right side bar to leave 1 comment per day.  The current Giveaway Post will be linked right at the top of the side bar.

Please NOTE--You MUST be a follower to enter the Giveaway.  If you aren't one, just click on the "Follow" button on the right hand side of my blog to become a follower.

Any questions?  Just email me.

Happy Entering!! 

Sluggy