What laws would you like a new president to enact, regardless of political party?

Posted on November 4, 2015 by admin (Royce)

I’m getting real tired of the dog and dead-horse show that’s passing for political “debate” nowadays.

How about pushing for a “I don’t care who is elected; this needs to be a law right now” political party.

Right off the top of my head, I’ve got two…

#1 – To stimulate the economy, grant immediate tax relief for all public school educators. No federal taxes while they hold that position and a 100% rebate of their 2014 tax filing.

#2 – No family member of any federally wanted felon in the US, Mexico, or Europe can attend any schooling of any kind in the US.

Thoughts?

Happy things like this make me think of my wife. From a stop in Harlingen.

Posted on November 4, 2015 by Royce

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A south Texas rainbow

Posted on November 2, 2015 by Royce

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A Niece, a Barbie and a Jedi

Posted on October 28, 2015 by admin (Royce)

Just a personal happening I wanted to share.

Today while visiting my 6 year old niece, I asked her what toy she wanted her Tio to bring her today – a Barbie or a lightsaber.

Without hesitation, she said “Barbie!”

Without hesitating myself, I pulled both out from my bag of goodies. A Halloween Barbie and a Star Wars SFX lightsaber.

She’s been a green blade swinging Jedi for hours. Excuse me. Let me add some completely unnecessary exaggeration for effect… hoooourrrssss!

She challenged her older brother to multiple lightsaber duels, expertly bounced a deadly purple balloon high through the air, explored pitch dark rooms by humming green light, and even managed a half cartwheel with the lightsaber in full twirl.

Barbie who?

Give the little baby girls in your life the best of both worlds, ya’ll. It’s absolutely glorious.

The CIA announced their DDI program: an in-house bureau focused on tech

Posted on October 26, 2015 by admin (Royce)

While going through my backlog of reading material, I found an article from FCW (The Business of Federal Technology) that pointed out the CIA has a “new” digital directorate that “brings together cyber, IT, and open source intel.”

Called the Directorate for Digital Innovation (DDI), it’s an in-house bureau “devoted to giving officers around the world better IT tools to do traditional cloak-and-dagger work.”

Bear in mind this is just the official announcement of the CIA’s DDI program. This little baby has been running around for some time now and is just now announcing they’re ready to go outside and play.

The CIA says their new info ops center is not “an alternative NSA” and is composed of three segments: “an open source center; a center for handling cyber threats and operations; and the agency’s IT enterprise”.

I’m sure the DDI is going to be an “active” bureau despite all the delicate phrasing in the article, but I really hope the inward-facing DDI is more than a glorified help desk and has some enforceable executive tech behind it. By enforceable executive tech, I mean getting agents up to date with modern security practices with the authority to make upgrades and training more than “suggestions” or optional “time-for-a-promotion” courses.

Exhibit A: Grand poo-bah CIA Director John Brennan was OK with using AOL for his AGENCY EMAILS and his AOL account got hacked by a script kiddie amateur.

Yeah, there’s obviously some BIG changes that need to be made internally. From waaaay up high at that.

Good luck DDI.

The article on FCW can be found here.

A gun rack filled with piñata sticks at a local El Pato restaurant. Brilliant.

Posted on October 22, 2015 by Royce

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Hospitals all over the US now have a medical code for Squirrel Bites! (86824 W5321)

Posted on October 18, 2015 by admin (Royce)

While sifting through my emails this weekend, I saw a new billing system hit all US medical offices “that classifies procedures and diseases in ways that could help public health researchers and physicians better evaluate and treat patients.”

Called the International Classification of Diseases (ICD-10), all US medical offices and everyone who bills Medicare and Medicaid had to switch to this format earlier this month. The new hotness added 70,000 medical codes to the existing tome that was in place already for “clarification purposes”.

Gone are the dark ages of the non-descriptive “idiot was bit by an animal” and “hold my beer redneck is wasting space in my OR” codes. The new system is very, VERY specific.

Here are a few of my favorites…

86824 W5321 Bitten by squirrel
86826 W5321XD Bitten by squirrel, subsequent encounter (HE’S BACK! RUN FOR YOUR LIFE!)
76925 T63013 Toxic effect of rattlesnake venom, assault (Aren’t all snakebites an assault?)
77486 T63821 Toxic effect of contact w venomous toad, accidental (I told ‘im not to lickem! I done told ‘im!)
77652 T65223 Toxic effect of tobacco cigarettes, assault (now THIS has some potential!)
80829 V0191XD Pedestrian on roller-skates injured in collision with pedal cycle, unspecified whether traffic or nontraffic accident, subsequent encounter (THAT’S a specific code!)
82165 V393 Occupant (driver) (passenger) of three-wheeled motor vehicle injured in unspecified nontraffic accident (the old “hold my beer” trick)

While I’m sure the codes have good intent behind them, having 91,737 line items to sift through is ridiculous. I feel bad for all the hospital staff that have to wade through this new muck “that classifies procedures and diseases in ways that could help public health researchers and physicians better evaluate and treat patients.”

What’s next? Specific goat codes? Multiple bear attack codes based on type and weight?

A link to the ICD and its’ impact is at International Business Times, the Smithsonian link, and there’s even a CDC link to download all the new codes.

Medline recalling Acetaminophen due to mislabeling with incorrect strength

Posted on October 15, 2015 by admin (Royce)

I’m posting this because a lot of retail stores and Texas public schools use Medline products as their go-to for medical supplies.

In a press release by the FDA, Medline is recalling lot # 45810 of Acetaminophen tablets because their acetaminophen packages labeled as 325 mg really have 500 mg instead.

That’s epically bad.

According to the press release, “The Acetaminophen 500mg, Tab 100/BT (OTC20101) has been found to be mislabeled displaying “Acetaminophen 325mg” (OTC10101) instead of “Acetaminophen 500mg”. The Acetaminophen tablets, 500mg is incorrectly labeled as 325 mg tablets. This error is not easily identifiable by the user or prescriber. If the product is taken at the maximum labeled dose, every four hours, five doses a day, or with other medications containing acetaminophen, it may lead to liver toxicity or liver failure.”

If you’ve got a Medline 325 mg acetaminophen tablets for dispensing, triple check to see if they’re part of this recall.

“Consumers with questions regarding this recall can contact Medline Industries, Inc. by phone 866-359-1704 or recalls@medline.com Monday through Friday between the hours of 8am and 5pm CST. ”

You can also read the press release here from the FDA.