About Painful Joints, Red-suited Invaders, and Obamacare
Happy New Year, everyone! This is Boomer back with you again at the start of the new year of 2014. While I’m still not certain as to just exactly what a “year” is, and what happened to the year 2013, which I was enjoying just a few days ago, I suppose I’ll have to agree with my Grampa and Gramma (the two humans I try to take care of), when I heard them say that, “The older we get the faster the years seem to fly by.” I didn’t realize that “years” had wings with which they can fly, but I think I understood what they meant, for at almost 11 years old I can remember my humans talking a lot about “flying years” all during my lifetime. I’ll have to watch carefully this New Year to try to spot a “year” flying by me. I know that those stupid crow bird things that I dislike have wings, and keep flying away when I try to catch one of them; perhaps a “year” is some kind of bird. Perhaps ... There I go, digressing again. It’s a bad habit of mine.
All my life I’ve enjoyed riding in my Grampa’s car, with my head out of the window and the wind blowing through my whiskers and flapping my ears. But in the last few weeks I’ve been having a bit of trouble getting into his car because my back legs didn’t seem to be pushing me up onto the seat like they used to do. My Grampa has even had to help me up into his car at times. It’s so embarrassing. But I still enjoy riding in it and barking at other dogs and people. A few days ago I awoke and my right shoulder was hurting badly, causing me to limp around. My Grampa began giving me some pain medicine, and massaging my hips and shoulders, and this seems to help. He’s tried to explain to me that his back and shoulders also give him lots of pain, and that this is a part of “growing old,” whatever that means. Well, I may be growing old along with him, but I don’t have to like it! And I don’t!
A short time ago something happened to me that really surprised me. It was in the middle of the night (you know, that dark time when the bright thing in the sky is sleeping), and I had just aroused myself to get a drink of water. Just as I was heading back to my comfortable sleep spot, I heard a noise in the fireplace. As I looked I saw an intruder crawling out of the fireplace and pulling a small bag with him. I was so surprised I was unable to move at first, because how often does a dog like me see another human popping out of his den’s fireplace? Probably never!
Anyway, this human had a red suit on, trimmed in white fur (which looked a bit dingy), and was taking pieces of black rock out of his sack and putting them into those long tube things that my humans wear on their feet, and which they had hung on the fireplace mantel. This red-suited guy was looking in a little book, and I heard him say: “Hmmm, these people are conservatives and have spoken out against President Obama many times. They’ll get nothing but pieces of “coal” from me this year!”
Well, this got me quite disturbed, so I growled at this red- suited intruder, then gave him a few of my fierce barks and lunged right at him. He looked at me—wide eyed— and tried to escape from my justice back up the chimney. I gave him a good hard Pit Lab bite right on his backside. I heard him yell and exclaim, as he disappeared from my sight, “Merry Washington to all, and to all liberals, a good night.” I had no idea what he meant, and I was just about to give him a few more fierce barks when I awoke, stretched out on my personal couch. It was another of the pleasant dreams that I often have---- at least—I think it was a dream.
I’ve been hearing my two humans talking about something called “Obamacare” quite a bit, of late. Apparently it has something to do with wasting lots of money that my humans value, causing a decreased level of medical care by their doctors (don’t tell me about doctors, because my doctors keep sticking sharp things into me). I heard them yelling at their picture box recently at one of the talking picture heads about how bad this Obamacare law was for our country. What I can’t understand is if this Obamacare is so bad for all of them, then why don’t they just get rid of it, along with all of those RINOS and Dumbocrats (words my humans use) who foisted this on them? Why don’t they get all of their packs together and go to this Washington place where this Obama fellow lives and let him know that they are really disappointed with him because of all the bad things he has done? Humans are so mysterious!
Well, I hope all of you will have a good New Year in 2014, and will concentrate on what is really important— like loving each other, and worshipping our Heavenly Father. I think that the world would be a much better place if all humans would do this. But what do I know? I’m only an old dog!
Jane M. Orient, M.D. obtained her under-graduate degrees in chemistry and mathematics from the University of Arizona in Tucson, and her M.D. from Columbia University College of Physicians and Surgeons in 1974. She completed an internal medicine residency at Parkland Memorial Hospital and University of Arizona Affiliated Hospitals and then became an Instructor at the University of Arizona College of Medicine and a staff physician at the Tucson Veterans Administration Hospital. She has been in solo private practice since 1981 and has served as Executive Director of the Association of American Physicians and Surgeons (AAPS) since 1989. She is currently president of Doctors for Disaster Preparedness. Since 1988, she has been chairman of the Public Health Committee of the Pima County (Arizona) Medical Society. She is the author of 
