1/27 - Hospice, what hospice?

My father in law went into St. Francis Hospital in Roslyn for pneumonia just before Christmas. He was discharged on New Years Day. A week and a half later he went back in, only in worse condition. His health did not improve while there.

He stopped eating and drank only a few mouthfuls of liquid a day. He also has stage 4 melanoma that is taking it's toll.

When younger he worked outside in the sun and was subjected to the harmful rays from the sun. Little was known about skin protection in those days.

His health worsened while in the hospital.

On Friday the 25th we got a call that this could be it. So the entire family rushed to his bedside to be with him. Later in the day he was given the option should he code, that is have a cardiac arrest does he want to be resuscitated and most likely be put on a ventilator. He said no. So DNR orders were written.

He wanted to go home to die and so arrangements were made that night to bring him home.

The hospital made arrangements to have a bed, oxygen and medications delivered later that evening prior to his discharge. They also offered to have a hospice nurse come to the house later that evening to help take care of him.

A representative from Good Shepherd Hospice Services a division of the Catholic Health Services stopped by his room to make the final arrangements for the nurse.

He was discharged and an ambulance brought him home during a mild snow storm that produces only half an inch of snow. The EMS drivers brought him inside and put him into the bed that was setup in the front room for him.

The hospice nurse never came that evening but did call and said that she would be there early Saturday morning. Saturday morning she did not show up either so we called the main office in Melville and inquired about her. They had no record of a nurse being there at all.

They said that they will have someone here later in the afternoon. Afternoon became evening. Evening became night. 10 PM still no nurse.

We called again on Sunday and they said someone will be over in the morning. Again all though the day we waited for the nurse that never showed.

Finally today a nurse did show up, spent 10 minutes with my father in law, and 20 minutes sitting on the phone in her car. She told us that my father in law needs to be evaluated in a few days, then a social worker will come over on another day, then on another day the case manager to make up a nursing plan, then an RN is to come over to evaluate the medications and finally, a nurses aid will be assigned.

At the rate they are going he will be dead by the time the aid is assigned.

The Good Shepherd Hospice Services apparently does not care for a family in pain having a member, a Koren War Veteran who jumped at the chance to serve his country, slowly die in front of them. They promised that someone would come and help to give the family a break but do not keep their promises. So the burden of giving hospice care to a dying patient lies on the shoulders of the entire family who are grieving.

This is not the way things should be done. It is a shame that this is allowed to happen and it is a shame that nothing can be done to help the family.

I have to wonder if it is like this with other hospice services.

Shame on you Good Shepherd Hospice Services.

'till next time

1/09/13 - Visit to Key West looks like a go

First with my recent screw up when I was cleaning some typos in my blog, I have decided to add the date of the entry in the title.  This way should I ever go back and clean up my typo's you should still be able to follow along if the order gets out of wack.

I was talking with my wife who has been very hesitant in doing a trip to the Keys last night and she finally agreed to do a trip to there.  All I need to do is set it up.

Now to set a target date and how to get there.  She refuses to fly.  She has her reasons which to me are not valid but I have to go along with them.  I for one do not like the way the TSA operates. the electronic strip searches, or the groping of your body to me is an invasion of privacy.  All because of some nut jobs that want to bring down airplanes filled with innocent people.

So that leaves us with two, actually three ways of getting there.  By Amtrak to Miami and rent a car, take the auto train fron Va to Fla, or drive the entire distance.  I think I might have gone over this in an earlier blog.

Driving probably would be the cheapist way.  But it will take it's toll on the body.  We would need to make sevearl pit stops along the way to stretch.  And of course we should rent a car to go from NY all the way down to save wear and tear on ours.  But going out of state with a rental adds mileage charges.

So I figure best way to go is to take Amtrak all the way, rent a car in Miami and go from there.

Now when?  I could do it right now.  But it is peak tourist season there right now and I don't like dealing with that kind of crush.  It is good for the economy of the Keys.  But I want to go there not only to see the area as a tourist (gad I'd be a tourist...yuk) but to look into the real possibilty of moving and living there.  So maybe June when the peak season has died down and everything is more relaxed.

I've already crunched some numbers in how much this will cost.  They are rough right now but in a few days I should have a much better idea as to the final costs.

So far it has been 10 months since I was terminated.  Right now there are no job prospects on the horizon.  Newsday said in their recent Sunday edition that the outlook for information technology is non-existent.  They produced a guide to the best fields to go into and not one was computer related.

I created a professional page on FB and invited several people to click 'like' on it.  It has tips, hints and recommendations on it.  So far no one has clicked 'like' on it.  What is disturbing is that I clicked 'like' on some of their pages.  I'll give it a few days.

Right now it is a warm 40 degrees with clear skies in East Egg.  While in Key West it is a glorious 77   with clear skies.

'till next time

Friday I had an interview and finally a job offer.  Not in Key West I'm afraid but here on Long Island.  My duties were pretty much identical with what I was doing at my last job only without being the CTO.  So far so good.

The offer was for 19 hours a week at $15 and hour with no benefits at all and I was to use my own car at my expense going to the various locations here in Nassau County.  After taxes I would be bringing home a whole $190 a week.  With the re-reinstatement of unemployment which already is at poverty level, I get more money that way.  So obviously I passed on the offer.  If they made it worthwhile then maybe, buy for $190, not a chance.

I woke up at 5 AM to snow on the ground this morning.  I said some fitting words that do not need to be repeated here and went back to bed.  It was only a dusting but even that is too much for me.  We got up finally at 8AM and the snow was all gone thankfully.  My wife yells at me that I should sit back and enjoy the beauty of the snow.  Like I keep telling here, only in a painting or photograph.  I have had more than my fill of it for my life.

I was cleaning up my blogs recently, correcting a few typos and found that they are now out of order.  So I apologize for that.  I wish Google had a better blogging system.

In the next few weeks I am going to add some more minor features to this blog.  Like links to other pages, blogs and places that deal with the Keys.

Other than that it is quiet here and it is time to take down the tree.

It is 43 degrees here and partly cloudy while looking at Sunset Pier I see it is partly cloudy there too and by Conch TV.Com, it is a wonderful 79 outside.

'till next time

Wicked storms hit the NY metro area in the beginning of July. A woman was hit by lightning and survived, in another area lightning hit a tree and it exploded sending shrapnel out killing 2 people. Glen Cove Road was flooded by rain and had to be closed off.


A bolt of lightning hit about 50 feet from our house. It took out our phone and internet connection from Verizon, fried the ONT, router, and a network switch . We didn't loose any computers thankfully. When a storm rolls in we shut the computers off for surge protectors really cannot handle the power from a lightning strike. So why risk it?


I was talking with one of the guys from my former company and he was telling me how bad things have gotten. My 26 year old replacement does not have the technical skills to do what I did so he and my former nasty raciest boss are outsourcing the actual technical service. Now the end user has to log onto a website and submit a job ticket provided they can go on line. Now it takes anywhere from a few days to a week to get service and when they get service the company has things so screwed up it is pathetic. As an example it takes my friends computer about an hour to boot up after these jerks have worked on it.


When I was there the user called me and got instant service, no waiting. Plus when I fixed the system, it stayed fixed first time out.


Now here is the real kicker to show you how stupid they are, I saved them $3 million by not outsourcing technical support. I did 12,000 hours of service in 6 years, multiply that by 250 which is the hourly rate for tech support around here and you get 3 million. And after they fired me they outsource tech support. Where is the savings? They could have doubled my salary and I would still save them money.  As of this date since March that firm charged them half a million already.

And here is a good laugh, that punk now has to answer to the outsource company.  Shows you if you screw around you will get bit.

Too bad  the Board of Directors is blind to the fact that the company is now getting screwed over.  If they contact me and offered me my job back, I'd go but there would be some concessions.  Like that nasty boss that fired me is terminated as well as that punk.  They never let me empty my office so they should do the same for them.

 The job search is still going no where. No interviews, no inquiries, nothing. With unemployment over 8% and that is based on those that are still collecting unemployment and not those not collecting that are still out of work, it is not a good sign.

In a posting of one of the blogs that I follow here, "Key West Diary" by ConchScooter(1) showed the other and darker side of Key West that no one speaks about.  Like most places in the United States Key West has a homeless population. 

In his entry he makes mention of the high rents there which can attribute to part of the problem.  He quoted $1,000 per month as an average price.  We average $2,100 and up plus utilities for rents on East Egg.  And we pay some of the highest utility bills in the nation.  And the taxes here are among the highest as well.  We pay close to $40K here for a building on 100' x 50' lot and have nothing to show for it.

 2BR apartment in a Condo for $2,300 next to 'Shits Creek' in Port Washington

In his entry, and I am going to refer to him as "CS" instead of typing ConchScooter all the time, he mentioned about the shelters setup in Key West for the homeless.  A lot like in NYC.  And these are in serious trouble and might close down.


Why does a person become homeless?  Many reasons and none of them is that they want to be.  It is documented that some have serious problems like drinking, drugs and or mental issues where they cannot hold down a job.  As such no job, no money for rent, no place to stay.

Others can become homeless very easily in these economic times.  The loss if a job with no jobs around on the horizon can quickly put someone on the streets.  Something we are facing ourselves.  Thankfully we have some money put away and there is or was unemployment (at this writing I don't know if I am getting extended benefits of not) to help stave off the need to find a cardboard box to live in. At least for now.


Some go out on the limb and try to setup a business, invest all of their savings only to lose the shirts on their backs trying to make a go of it.  They find as soon as they lock the doors on their dream they can face the cold hard streets with no place to go.

Like in one news article I read about the homeless in Key West, one person lost everything in Wilma and is now homeless.  I am certain that he was not alone.

In his entry CS posted photos from inside one of the shelters.  Not a pretty site to be sure.  Just rows of army cots all crammed together.  And this was just one of the shelters.

Inside a shelter, Photo from Key West Diary

I found a photo from the NY Times of the entrance of one of the shelters(2).  I looks like a combination of jail and junk yard.  I am not impressed at all.

I did some more research on the homeless in Key West, and yes it does to appear to be a large community.  According to the NY Times the feds gave Key West $813,000 to hire four more police officers to patrol (read remove) the homeless from the streets.  This is in part for a quality of life issue for the residents and since tourism is the primary source of income, to keep the homeless out of the site of tourists and to help prevent panhandling and crimes.

We have our own homeless here on Long Island as well.  In my town the police cram down on them to keep them out.  This way the property values don't drop.  But we still have a few around that you can see.  They live in cars and will park in the local supermarkets or some obscure town parking lot.  There is a section that is famous as a small box town and the police go in from time to time to remove them.

But you do have to look hard around my area to find a homeless person.

In places like Hempstead, Glen Cove, Wyndanch, Westbury, Central Islip and what have you it really is not hard to find someone that is homeless.  There are 11 shelters here on Long Island but not really accessible for most people.  Mass transit here is horrible and if you do not have a car, then you are up the creek.

But we do have a lot of soup kitchens and food outreach programs around.  And all of them handle more people than they have resources for.  Again it is not a good sign of the times.  My own church has a food pantry and they are hurting for food in the worst way.

We would not have such a homeless problem in this country if Washington was able to help create jobs and keep them from going overseas.   During the Bush administration more American jobs left for places like India than flies headed for honey.  The Obama administration has done nothing to bring any of these back to put Americans to work.  Everywhere I look there are no jobs.  Romney down right scares the crap out of me and I am certain he would send the country into a death spiral.  We need good leadership to stimulate the creation of jobs and to bring those that left back to the United States.

Then there would be a marked decrease in the homeless rates.

 But my research did not stop with the homeless of Key West.  What I found really put a damper on my ideas.

Looking at the posting from the website "Virtual Tourist" puts Key West into a whole new light for me.  There are numerous posts on how bad things are and how much corruption exists in the commercial sector.  And this is not from one poster but from several.(3)

OK there are a few things posted to yawn about.  Like for instance there is a mention about the Gay community there.  Hey no one is getting hurt and we have our own Gay areas here as well, like Fire Island is notorious for being a homosexual area.  But from a good deal of what I read is make me wonder do I really want to move or visit there?

Using Google Earth I did notice that there is no parking to be found so that brings about problems.  And if there are places the rip you off to park your car makes you want to use a bicycle.

In the article mentions about the private towing firms that snatch your car and rob you blind.  Not much different than what we have here.  My car broke down one evening, overheated to be exact, and I pulled into a bank parking lot to let it cool down.  And this was after hours so there was no banking business going on at all.  The bank was closed..  So instead of standing there with my thumb planted I went for a cold drink.  Next thing you know my car was on the back of a flat bed headed out of town.

In the same lot was an elderly man facing the same situation only the driver wanted $150 cash to drop the car.  Needless to say the man did not have the cash and the truck driver pushed the guy out of the away and drove off with his car.

Calling the local police was a waste of time.  They didn't do a thing.  All they did was point to some obscure sign that you had to really search for warning you not to park.  The officer did admit the sign was illegal in the way it was posted but there was nothing the police could do about it.

In order to get my car back I had to cough up $250 in cash plus an additional $50 as a tip for the driver.  Talk about extortion.

And if I went there the next day I would have to pay another $250 on top of that.  Calling the NCPD was also a waste.  I wonder how much commission is being handed out.

When I got my car back I noticed that someone broke into my trunk and took over $1,000 in hand tools that I keep in there.  But there is nothing that can be done for the signs all say 'at your own risk' which gives the towing firms a free license to ransack your car.

So at the end of the day, a stuck thermostat cost me $1,300 and that is before I could even replace the  defective part of the engine.

So looking at the posts about the towing, give me a break.

What bothers me is that someone posted that had their car towed by the Key West Police and the PD denied it until after the weekend thereby increasing the storage fees.  Now how much is true and how much is fiction I cannot say.

Reading one of the other blogs I subscribe to, "Monroe County Sheriff's Office - Florida Keys" (4) is keeping me abreast of major crimes.  So far from what I have read it seems pretty quiet.  Nothing too outlandish.  A few burglaries, a few thefts, domestics, and some other items.  Nothing that would stop me from coming down.  All in all not too bad.

Here on Long Island there is much greater crime going on.  In fact Newsday reported on how several members of the gang MS-13 have been indited.  Some are even facing the death penalty.  And these are kids with some as young as 19.  I know that there are areas here on Long Island where you simply do not stop your car in the daytime and forget about going near there at night.

Brentwood is a good example.  Don't stop there in the daytime and avoid at night.  Wyndanch has always been that way and so has many areas of Hempstead.  I went to Freeport not too long ago and it went down hill so bad we could not get out of there fast enough.

So as far as crime the Monroe County Sheriff's Office is not posting anything that  raises an eyebrow.  Is the information true or not?  I don't know but would gather it is.

In the Virtual Tourist webpage it was mentioned about the amount of bars that are in Key West.  More than normal.  Using 411.com I entered "bar" as the search criteria and came up with 55 different bars.  Trying liquor stores I came up with 18 of them.   Now none of this counts regular restaurants that serve liquor, delis or food stores which most likely sell some form of alcohol like we have around here.

Is there some truth to the saying, 'Key West is a drinking town with a tourist problem'?

Just for the heck of it I wanted to do a comparison between Key West and a town/city here on Long Island.

Going to City-Data.Com (5) I found that the population in 2010 was  24,649.  I then looked at Bayshore (6) with a population of 26,337 in 2010 and ran the same query as before. This time only 13 bars came up.  But only after I had to go through the list which originally had over 400 and that was because 411.com pulled bars from other towns like Islip.  And again with the liquor stores only 10 were found after I had to eliminate places like Hauppauge, Islip, Babylon.

Just for the heck of it I decided to run the very same query on the City of Glen Cove with a population of 26,964 in 2010 (7) to compare city vs. city.  Glen Cove comes up with 11 liquor stores and only 4 bars after I had to eliminate places like Manhasset, Great Neck, Williston Park.

Now to push the envelope a bit, I wanted to see what the stats where for Hempstead, and area you don't want to be found walking alone in at night.  Hempstead has a population of 53,891 in 2010 (8) which dwarfs that of Key West.  Back to 411.com.  Amazingly only 14 bars came up and 4 liquor stores after removing towns like Garden City, West Hempstead, etc.

OK I can say that Key West is a drinking town.  But that does not mean I have to partake in it.  I am certain that there is some form of reserve in place to prevent too many people from getting too sloshed.



(1) "Key West Diary", Homeless in Key West, by ConchScooter,  http://conchscooter.blogspot.com/2012/09/homeless-in-key-west.html

(2) "At Key West Beach, Wondering Who's a Vagrant", NY Times, March 30, 2010,  http://www.nytimes.com/2010/03/31/us/31keywest.html

(3)  "Key West Warnings Or Dangers", Virtual Tourist,  http://www.virtualtourist.com/travel/North_America/United_States_of_America/Florida/Key_West-763140/Warnings_or_Dangers-Key_West-TG-C-1.html

(4) "Monroe County Sheriff's Office - Florida Keys", http://floridakeyssheriff.blogspot.com/

(5)  "Key West, Florida Profile, City-Data.com, http://www.city-data.com/city/Key-West-Florida.html

(6) "Bayshore, New York Profile, City-Data.com, http://www.city-data.com/city/Bay-Shore-New-York.html

(7)  "Glen Cove, New York Profile, City-Data.com, http://www.city-data.com/city/Glen-Cove-New-York.html

(8)  "Hempstead, New York Profile, City-Data.com, http://www.city-data.com/city/Hempstead-New-York.html

My search for a new job and life in the Keys has been very frustrating at best. So far it has been going no place fast. During this time I have been doing some reserch on the area as you know from an earlier post. What I am finding real is not very encouraging at all.

One of my earlier contacts from Facebook wrote to me and said that there is no industry there except tourism. And in order to survive most people have to work two jobs. In the 2011 edition of Island Life printed by the Keys Citizen echos the same story that in ordr to survive you need two jobs.

As far as industry goes, there really is none. But then again who wants to work for a large company anyway? I sure don't. The office politics. bag stabbing, being nothing more than a number in a cube farm really does not or has it ever appealed to me. I prefer to work in Small to Medium size Business (or what is known as SMB) instead. Here you are more than a number and your contrbutions to the company are easy to recognize.

My former company has about 100 people working for them (80 on the Active Directory )when I was replaced by a 26 year old. So that size company would classify as a SMB.

Looking around Key West from here I see that there are are some SMB's there that could utilize my skills. Ok maybe a few with a staff level that my last place had give or take a few people. I feel that there has got to be an opportunity there.

In several articles that I've read stated how expensive it is to live there starting with housing [cite]. I have seen some fairly nice places advertised on real estate sites in Key West for under $300K. Of course I saw plenty at over a million as well.

Winter is here

Winter has begun to raise it's ugly head here on Long Island. Not including the freak snow storm right after Sandy which was a freak also, we had some snow on Christmas eve.
It was not much snow, only a light dusting that covered the tops of the cars. For me it was way too much snow. By morning it was all gone. The only sad thing, is that the kids did not have a white Christmas. I think that one day out of the year we should have snow everywhere just for the kids. After the sun goes down then the snow can vanish.

Last Thursday a winter storm barelled through the area. By 1Pm the snow was coming down so hard we could not see up the street. Looking at a webcam at one of the yacht clubs you had under a mile of visibility. The winds picked up with gusts to 50mph by me. It got real cold real fast. Then it started to rain and thankfuly it washed the snow away. But that brought about another fear, ice. It felt so cold we had fears that the roads would ice over and we would get hit with an ice storm.

 I checked the weather from LGA and saw that the temp was 40 degrees, that means no ice. But the wind chill was 28 so no wonder we were freezing. The wind was howling so bad it was sucking the heat right out pf the house. We had to bump the thermostat up just to try and stay warm. It was not until 3am that the winds died down and we were able to get some sleep. But it was not a restful sleep.  

I was already chilled to the bone and thinking about the oil bill did not help. We just got a load of 250 gallons of oil and that ran over $1,000. It wouldn't be so bad if we didn't need a fill up every two weeks. And with the wind sucking the heat out of the building and the bitter cold ahead, 250 gallons will not last very long. 

 In an earlier post, I stated that the oil prices here were going to skyrocket and they just took off. Last winter was mild as far as winters go so the oil companies did not sell that much oil. Since the volume was down, so was the prifits. Now we have to pay for it with higher oil bills to make up the difference.

Yesterday another oil delivery which cost $850.  At this rate we will go bankrupt real fast.

Yesterday it was cold and it is colder today.  It is about 26 right now.  Thankfully there is no real wind to suck out more heat.  Just a few puffs of air, that is all.  In anycase it is way too cold for me.  Every inch of my body is in pain from the cold.  But not much can be done about it right now.

Finally a job interview this afternoon.  I am keeping my fingers crossed.  

I see the the Hog's Breath Saloon has a new website.  I tried to access the webcam from my bookmarks and couldn't connect so I entered the URL.  When I got to the site the thermometer was gone.  Andcit took quite a while for the site to load.  Th old site loaded much faster and was cleaner.  There are too many graphical elements on the new site which takes a while to load.

The site that I goto with the remote control cameras under went a bit of a change as well.  The got rid of the cam outside of the Lazy Geecko.   And now have one at Fort Zachary Taylor that is facing the sun.  You cannot see much.  And they added one for Miami.  What does Miami have to do with Key West?  Especially if the website says "Key West" on it?

The Cowboy Bill's famous 'bullcam' is still off line.  I have to wonder if they are going to fix it.

Anyway I see by NOAA is is 77 in Key West with partly cloudy skies.  Looking at the webcam at Mallory Square, it looks fantastic.  While here in East egg we are at 26 degrees with crystal clear skies.

'till next time