The pursuit of dreams provides meaning to life. Until I married Susan and moved to Costa Rica, dreams were nothing more than dreams. With my ex-wife, only her dreams counted, and I was to finance those dreams. After breaking my leg, I was no longer able to finance the dreams. My ex decides to divorce me, so that she could find someone who could finance her dreams.

» Continue reading “Pursuing Dreams“

Medicare  does not provide coverage in Costa Rica. Except for Mexico, this applies to all countries. Your Medicare Supplement or Advantage plan may cover vacations, but not for actual residence in another country.

» Continue reading “Medicare and Living in Costa Rica“

It has been a long time since my last post. My ex-wife asked for a received a divorce. My last post was just after I started working at Wal-Mart. A valiant attempt pass the Red Had Certified Engineer exam. Kept passing the System Administrator exam, but always just barely missed passing the Engineer exam. Met my new and beautiful wife on the Internet. We were married in August in Costa Rica, where I am now living.

Since I am  no longer working at Wal-Mart in Laurel, I need to find temporary work until the house sells. My goal is to retire to a life of writing, working with stained glass, and helping my wife in her chocolate business.

It started with the credit card companies and has spread to mortgage companies, drug companies, and insurance companies. The message is clear – “If you regulate us, we will raises our prices.” It is unmitigated rape of the consumer by large and powerful companies.

» Continue reading “Rape of the Consumer“

The hot news is that Facebook’s new social plugins constitute an invasion of privacy. In my opinion, those who make that statement fail to understand the Internet and the inner working of browsers. They are making a fool of themselves and are making a lot of noise about nothing. The real story is hidden beneath the flack.

» Continue reading “Facebook Social Plugins versus Privacy“

On Thursday, April 15, I received an e-mail from Monica about the possibility of creating a Web site for Bridger Fur Company, and that she had quoted them a special price. To build a Web site at that quoted price eliminated any traditional means for building a site. It was a job for Drupal, and open-source CMS. We met with Doug Judkins on Saturday to find out what he needed. He wanted a store front with a checkout that integrated to PayPal. He also wanted to be able to enter maintain the content himself.

» Continue reading “Web Site in a Week“

The technical term for the current status of the two breaks in my femur is nonunion. In translation, it means that bone growth appears to have ceased and the bridging of the fractures with new bone growth is not complete.

» Continue reading “New Complication to My Femur Fracture“

After sending out 114 resumes, and receiving only 4 responses, I had to work on a Plan B. The first step was to throw myself into a intense learning phase for Drupal (an Open Source Content Management System for Web design).  I chose Drupal over Joomla!, because the Drupal team takes Web accessibility seriously. I already know CSS, XHTML, CSS, MySQL, and WCAG, so the learning curve was strictly for Drupal.

» Continue reading “Changing Directions“

From my visit wit Dr. Wilson, on February 18, to my visit with Dr. Erpelding, on March 4, I struggled with excepting five to eight more surgeries on my leg. My life was upside down, and I struggled to find a way to both live with surgery and make money. Since Dr. Erpelding is my current Doctor, I had to talk to him.

» Continue reading “Yet Another Twist“

After the January 21 meeting with Dr. Erpelding, I thought I was on the road to recovery. I was finally to the “testing” stage to see if the breaks were healing. I was having telephone interviews for long term contracts. I was applying submitting applications for full-time or long-term contract work every day. Then, I had the appointment with Dr. Wilson on February 18.

» Continue reading “Twists and Turns – Facing Reality“