This is the strangest life I've ever known

helencho:

Shooting @Reddit AmA top 10 questions with @NoReservations (Taken with Instagram at zero point zero)

I wanna be on you.

iamnotaniceperson:

Those of you who are lucky enough to have health care, through a good job, your parents, or just flat out paying for it, should not take it for granted. Don’t be a spoiled brat and be thankful you or your family can afford our fantastic privatized health care our wonderful country provides to its citizens. All men created equal…….

Some people who need medical care but can’t afford it go to the emergency room. Others just hope they’ll get better. James Richard Verone robbed a bank.

Earlier this month, Verone (pictured), a 59-year-old convenience store clerk, walked into a Gaston, N.C., bank and handed the cashier a note demanding $1 and medical attention. Then he waited calmly for police to show up.

He’s now in jail and has an appointment with a doctor this week.

 Verone’s problems started when he lost the job he’d held for 17 years as a Coca Cola deliveryman, amid the economic downturn. He found new work driving a truck, but it didn’t last. Eventually, he took a part-time position at the convenience store.

But Verone’s body wasn’t up to it. The bending and lifting made his back ache. He had problems with his left foot, making him limp. He also suffered from carpal tunnel syndrome and arthritis.

Then he noticed a protrusion on his chest. “The pain was beyond the tolerance that I could accept,” Verone told the Gaston Gazette. “I kind of hit a brick wall with everything.”

Verone knew he needed help—and he didn’t want to be a burden on his sister and brothers. He applied for food stamps, but they weren’t enough either.

So he hatched a plan. On June 9, he woke up, showered, ironed his shirt. He mailed a letter to the Gazette, listing the return address as the Gaston County Jail.

“When you receive this a bank robbery will have been committed by me,” Verone wrote in the letter. “This robbery is being committed by me for one dollar. I am of sound mind but not so much sound body.”

Then Verone hailed a cab to take him to the RBC Bank. Inside, he handed the teller his $1 robbery demand.

“I didn’t have any fears,” said Verone. “I told the teller that I would sit over here and wait for police.”

The teller was so frightened that she had to be taken to the hospital to be checked out. Verone, meanwhile, was taken to jail, just as he’d planned it.

Because he only asked for $1, Verone was charged with larceny, not bank robbery. But he said that if his punishment isn’t severe enough, he plans to tell the judge that he’ll do it again. His $100,000 bond has been reduced to $2,000, but he says he doesn’t plan to pay it.

In jail, Verone said he skips dinner to avoid too much contact with the other inmates. He’s already seen some nurses and is scheduled to see a doctor on Friday. He said he’s hoping to receive back and foot surgery, and get the protrusion on his chest treated. Then he plans to spend a few years in jail, before getting out in time to collect Social Security and move to the beach.

Verone also presented the view that if the United States had a health-care system which offered people more government support, he wouldn’t have had to make the choice he did.

“If you don’t have your health you don’t have anything,” Verone said.

The Affordable Care Act, President Obama’s health-care overhaul passed by Congress last year, was designed to make it easier for Americans in situations like Verone’s to get health insurance. But most of its provisions don’t go into effect until 2014.

As it is, Verone said he thinks he chose the best of a bunch of bad options. “I picked jail.”

READ THIS ENTIRE STORY NOW.

(via sayitinslugs)

“I grew up in South Carolina. I think growing up down there has made me always kind of fascinated by red state thinking. Like, I don’t have a problem with gay marriage, but I love reading arguments against gay marriage. I find them really fascinating. This is my favorite one of all time, it’s from this guy named Senator John Cornyn, from Texas. This is his argument against gay marriage, I’m not making this up. He goes, ‘Now, if your neighbor marries a box turtle, that doesn’t affect your everyday life. But that doesn’t mean it’s right.’ What? What an interesting nugget of wisdom that is. Now, I myself was not a psychology major, but I think it’s pretty safe to assume at one point or another, Senator John Cornyn’s thought about makin’ love to a box turtle. ‘Cause, uh, I’m sorry, but that’s not the first animal you jump to when you’re writing that analogy.” | AZIZ ANSARI

(via inothernews)

(Source: rach)