Good insurance news, bad connectivity news.

First, many thanks for all of the encouraging comments after my last post–especially perchancetodream, who suggested a clinic that actually does take Aetna. I am still working up the nerve to call them, but I might do so as early as tomorrow! We’ll see.

On a related note, all of this RE drama/confusion inspired me to call Aetna about what exactly is covered for me under infertility–and it turns out, they cover IVF, a few cycles per year! From what I understand, this wasn’t true until fairly recently, so I was completely surprised to hear the customer service rep say those fateful words, “Yes, in vitro fertilization is covered.” Now, the big caveat to this is that injectable meds are not covered, and as Kim just pointed out, those things are not cheap! Still, I am relieved to know that if IVF becomes necessary for us, we can try it without having to pay out of pocket for the procedures themselves. BIG sigh of relief on that score. Believe me, I know how lucky this makes us.

Other random news: I got a flu shot on campus today. The consent questionnaire asked, “Are you, or could you be, pregnant?” I was surprised how sad it made me to check no. No, there is absolutely no chance in hell that I am pregnant right at this moment. Go ahead and shoot me full of mercury and influenza. If you have any sushi, soft cheese, deli meat, or hard liquor around that you’d like to inject me with, that’s probably perfectly safe too.

I was also surprised by how old the rest of the flu-shot crowd seemed to skew–I’m used to being a youngish faculty member, but not used to being the only person in a room on this side of 55. Maybe people in their 30s and 40s don’t typically get flu shots? Yeah, I know that’s too huge of a generalization. Maybe younger academics on our campus are too busy keeping their heads above water to bother with things like flu shots? This seems a bit more likely. But since G is a health care professional (not that he really deals with physically sick people, of course, but still, he is regularly in both a clinic and a hospital), and I commute to work on the New York City subway system, also known as Fast-Moving Chambers of Human Infection (TM), I figured it was a good idea–I haven’t had a flu shot in a while, but I don’t have any philosophical reasons not to get one.

On another note, I am bummed to report that our cable is out–not just ours, but everyone’s in our (small) building, and the connected building next door. There is some major construction happening behind us, and I think they may have knocked out one of our lines. We were clever stupid enough to do both phone and internet through the cable company too, so all three are out! “How is she writing this blog post without internet access?” some of you may be asking. Well, kind reader, this is why you should always password-protect your network, because otherwise one of your across-the-street neighbors might poach your internet access with her wireless-enabled laptop computer, and use it to blog, read message boards, and otherwise stay connected and sane while she is cruelly barred from watching new episodes of The Office and 30Rock.

I’m just sayin’.