Obamacare is the law of the land

Yeah I have a book all about the first dietary guidelines and how they were always political and lobby driven.

LOL

Sometimes I just have to make it myself, but luckily Florida != Louisiana

Pfft. Walk into Cracker Barrel and tell them you want iced tea. They will respond with “sweet or unsweet?”

I wish I could drink sweet tea. It’s so much better than the stevia-laced sadness I make myself to stave off my inevitable obesity-related demise by a few months at the end.

Isn’t ChickFilA’s claim to fame that they put pickle juice in the batter? Big whoop.

I see your Pfft and raise you a Pshaw - there are no Cracker Barrels in the PNW. You aren’t going to pull one over on me that easily.

Yes, but you lived in the south until you were thirty. And I know we prefer not to claim them, but Oregon is PNW too.

I did, and I love Cracker Barrel. My wife not so much, so even when I visit I don’t get to eat there. And are you telling me there are Cracker Barrels in Oregon? Where, man?

I just put it in a google search and one in Oregon came up.

Sweet, right outside Portland! I got to plan my next getaway. Uh, you guys can resume talking about healthcare, I’m trying to figure out how much deep fried crap I can shove down my gullet.

North Carolina is one of the states suing due to a Dem AG.

I’ve lived in Texas for too long and bear witness to the scourge of sweet tea moving west. For a long time there was never such a thing as sweet tea. The world was right and pulley bones still existed. Then the sweet tea moved west, and … happens, and then Trump is president. Coincidence?

I’m fairly ignorant when it comes to food - I always read the labels and buy low-fat, low-calorie stuff (which is difficult) but even so I kinda regret linking that piece. The one before it - the Frontline piece - shows how the food industry packages “low fat” but high calorie foods such as Snackwell cookies that have more calories than Oreo cookies. Things like that have gotten me in the past. I can’t find the piece I read some time ago and the details are fuzzy - so I probably should find it first before I mangle it badly. :D

Yeah, a lot of low-fat foods end up equal or higher in calories because of all the other stuff they add to try and improve the taste and texture. When I was a kid, my mom used to buy what they called “ice milk” back in those days, which was terribad low-fat ice cream. I used to drench that stuff in syrup, etc. to try and cover up the nasty taste. Would have been much better off with a controlled portion of the real thing.

I have no idea why anyone would do that.

West is generally bluer, so I propose that sweet tea is a civilizing force for good.

the problem with all this Urgent Care / ER stuff is that’s fine if you’re in an area you’re semi-familiar with. I was at a Scout Camp last summer and my Son sliced his finger deep. Needed stitches. I cell service sucked, even if it was better I doubt I would have spent 30min or so looking for where the closest Urgent Care center was vs. the ER that the camp told me to go to. on the EoB — Cost of ER stitches (4 of them) was around $1k, Agreed price from BCBS $600, I paid my $150 copay, the Insurance paid the other $450.

If I had my previous high deductible shit plan (which is what the GOP want people on) I doubt United Health Care would have a lower agreed upon price like that… those shit High deductible plans, are purely for critical emergency care only.

High Deductible plans still get the negotiated rates. In the industry it’s the contracted rate or also known as anything above the allowable you don’t pass on to the patient, aka patient responsibility.

So in this case you would pay the 600, the contracted price, and not the 1k. The problem is, it takes a lot of money to reach your deductible in a high deductible scenario, and even when you do it’s usually a worse split when the insurance company does begin to pay like 60/40 instead of 80/20 or 85/15. The nice thing about ACA though is that is not the case for preventable services so your annual exam, for example, should still be nothing out of pocket, 100% covered.

That was seriously weird.

AND he put sugar in it.

I am pretty serious about my tea and I follow the Alton Brown good eats instructions pretty much. Season 4 episode 4.