“But the plans were on display…”
“On display? I eventually had to go down to the cellar to find them.”
“That’s the display department.”
“With a flashlight.”
“Ah, well, the lights had probably gone.”
“So had the stairs.”
“But look, you found the notice, didn’t you?”
“Yes,” said Arthur, “yes I did. It was on display in the bottom of a locked filing cabinet stuck in a disused lavatory with a sign on the door saying ‘Beware of the Leopard’.” – Douglas Adams
To my surprise, I found out my kids had married each other last week. For some reason, this caused our application to be held up by the state. Fortunately, we got that resolved, which allowed us to move on to:
Step Nine – Find Out You’re Not Your Daughter’s Father
My ex-wife was unfaithful several times. However, I’ve never really questioned the parentage of my children. There are just too many family resemblances. So, you can imagine my shock when I called back (at this point, just assume I called the insurance company who then placed me on hold while they waited on hold for the state. Each day I do this takes up 3-4 hours.) and found out that our application had been kicked up to the same mystery department because there was a problem with the information on it. Fortunately, I found The Competent Employee at the state who actually was able to pull the information and do something about it. I know what you’re thinking. Yes, there is a competent employee who works in the state health care system. Anyway, we found out that my step-son was actually my daughter’s father.
Me: “Excuse me?”
Rep: “It says here that he is her father. That’s why it got held up.”
Me: “Seriously, do you know how hard it is to be a 16 year old single father trying hard to raise your 16 year old daughter by yourself? They should receive special consideration for that. They shouldn’t be punished because of a tragic accident involving a condom and a time machine.*”
The rep got that fixed, so we just had to wait for the application to go through.
Step Ten – Discover Your Step-Son Makes More Money Than You
You’ll never guess, but when I called back, our application was once again in the PWAGTD (Place Where Applications Go To Die) Department. This time, it was because my step-son made too much money for us to qualify for insurance. Not bad for an unemployed 16 year old high school student.
Step Eleven – Really Get Approved… Sort of
It finally happened! Our application was completed and approved! The only problem now was the start date was a month later than it should have been!
Step Twelve – Give Up On Getting the Correct Start Date
When we started this process, we were within the deadline to have our insurance begin February 1st. Of course, by the time we got done with this, we were past that deadline and our insurance was set to begin on March 1st. I went back to the state and started the process of getting the starting date back-dated so anything that happened in February would be covered. We had a couple of doctor’s visits during February, but nothing major (thank the Lord!) so it ended up not being a big deal. I just gave up and let the insurance begin on March 1st.
There you have it, folks. And some people said government healthcare was a bad idea.
*I shamelessly stole that line from The Hitchhiker’s Guide to the Galaxy by Douglas Adams
Outside the Asylum 