Living in a college town with a medical school and teaching hospitals, I must say something about the language issue.

It is beyond irritating, it is scary, and it is disrespectful when in the hospital, nurses of the same origin...say like at the nail saloon, sit there and talk in front of you...about you...in a language you cant understand. It is my biggiest issue with language problems. I found out about my heart surgery a few years ago when this brand new...brand new resident came in, held her chest, and kept saying selious...selious. I figured she meant serious, freaked out, and to say they still havent forgotten that at the hospital is probably true

I have been very lucky and very blessed to have great doctors when most needed. I would not be typing if that was not the case. Ive come across some great great nurses as well, dont know what I would have done without them.

Pam ...

I can understand your position, but here's another point of view.

My family sponsored an RN from India that Dad had met when he was head of a large corporation in India and he was hospitalized for appendicitis.

When S arrived in the US, she understood and spoke English quite well, but we couldn't understand her. She spoke with an British-Indian accent that made it almost impossible for our American ears to understand what she was saying. My brother sat her down in front of the telly with earphones so that she could learn to speak English with more of an American accent. (btw ... it was the first television she had seen in her life.)

She was one of the brightest people I had ever met. She ended up being the head of Standford University's cardiac intensive care unit. Had our family not taken the time and care to help her learn to speak English with an American accent, she may have never had that opportunity and her patients would have missed out on having an excellent nurse available for their care.

My current doc is the most competent doctor in town. He often has the bedside manner of an angry grizzly bear with a roar to match.

Looking back, I am glad I decided to choose competence over a nice bedside manner as my priority. Under that roar is a kind and caring competent doctor who is seriously overworked in this small mountain community. A man I admire greatly.

Edited because I was repeating myself .... oops

I couldn't agree more about competence over bedside manner, Lyn!

I've been quite fortunate to not have too many doctor encounters over the years, other than for routine physicals and such. My experience with the language issues comes largely from having done medical transcription for large hospital systems for about 18 years; when an experienced transcriptionist, who has a general idea of what the dictation is about to begin with and has a good comprehension of medical terms, can't make head or tail out of what the doc is saying, I KNOW that their patients have to be struggling to understand. If the patient would simply speak up and say "I don't understand what you are trying to tell me and would like to talk to someone else," then the problem could be solved; but most people just don't want to admit that they don't understand, whether it's because of a foreign accent or because the doctor just isn't using terms they can understand.

My previous Dr was in his own office - no other Drs to turn to, and the receptionists were just as bad - language barrier. I was foolish in getting one close to home - that should never be a priority.......... !!!

Back to just being grumpy ...

I am defrosting my freezer today ...

I think I spend more time procrastinating on that job than it takes to just do it ...

I'm doing a bit of procrastination myself - need to get my fabric out, now that my DH has put up my sewing table & machine - I need to sort my fabric and UFOs (UnFinished Objects - ie: quilting) so I can make use of the ability to sew again!! I haven't been able to, since April 2015!! Talk about withdrawal pangs!

I'm still very busy procrastinating on even starting to defrost my freezer!

RoseBlush1 said:Back to just being grumpy ...

I am defrosting my freezer today ...

I think I spend more time procrastinating on that job than it takes to just do it ...

This is a new freezer for me and I couldn't find the drain plug .. I got out the instruction manual and it doesn't have a schematic that shows me where to find it. Looked online and they have the same manual ..

I think I should have kept procrastinating ..

Oh, well. I've brought the cooler up from the garage and dumped a lot of stuff into the refrigerator freezer to get ready to defrost the freezer. I'll figure it out.

I need to go haul wood over to the patio and I'll decide about whether or not to go back to procrastinating on the freezer when I get that task done ... I may end up doing the freezer tomorrow ..

surely an appliance repair shop is open today, and they can tell you where the drain plug is? Just call 'em.........

Susan ...

I live in a small town in the mountains of northern California. We don't have an appliance repair shop up here.

I did put a call into Bill, a retired appliance repair guy, but haven't heard back from him yet. I sure hope it's not one of those things where I am looking right at it and can't see it ...

I know where the drain plug is in our freezer (in the very bottom), but never bother to use it -- I empty out all the food, use my hairdryer and a plastic ice scraper (LOL, Lyn -- do you even have a windshield ice scraper?) to get the ice off, scoop the chunks out into a bucket and mop up the water (which isn't that much) with a couple of towels or rags. Doesn't take long enough to necessitate moving the frozen food to another freezer, even in the summer.

Sandy ... that sounds like a plan ...

>>>do you even have a windshield ice scraper

Yup, I do have one ... , but I've never had to use it because my car is always parked in the garage.

I've always had a frost-free freezer until this one and never had to worry about it. But when my old freezer died, Bill told me that frost-free freezers can't be repaired because the coils are in the walls of the freezer.

I figured this was a good time of year to do it because the day temps are down into the 30s and I could just put most of the food on the table on the patio while I worked.

I'll do the hair dryer thingy tomorrow. Thanks for the tip.

"put most of the food on the table on the patio"......... I gather you don't have raccoons, or coyotes, or scavenger birds in your area?

Yes, I do, Susan ... We also have mountain lions, bears, eagles and more.

However, I didn't think I'd have things out there during the day long enough to attract the critters. I usually only have to worry about critters at night.

we have scavenger birds that come out during the day, when you're not looking

Weedwhacker said:I know where the drain plug is in our freezer (in the very bottom), but never bother to use it -- I empty out all the food, use my hairdryer and a plastic ice scraper (LOL, Lyn -- do you even have a windshield ice scraper?) to get the ice off, scoop the chunks out into a bucket and mop up the water (which isn't that much) with a couple of towels or rags. Doesn't take long enough to necessitate moving the frozen food to another freezer, even in the summer.

This is my method as well. My freezer came with an ice scraper tool which I am grateful for since I doubt I would find an ice scraper anywhere within 200 miles of here.

BTW, did you know that ordinary household rubbing alcohol doesn't freeze? At least not fast enough to worry about when using it on a rag in the freezer. Keeps your wet rag from sticking to the freezer as if it were a tongue. Also serves to disinfect & clean. I mix some with water in a pail & wash out the inside of the freezer with it. I don't bother to even turn off my freezer when I defrost it -- just scrape, scoop, wash & go.

I like the alcohol idea, Ann -- does that help keep the freezer from frosting up?

Ann, I like the alcohol idea, too.

Sandy, I've been researching how to easily defrost a freezer online since I had never done it before. One site suggested wiping down the coils that make up the shelves with oil .. I am guessing the author meant "cooking oil" ... to avoid frost building up. I'm not sure how I feel about that idea ...

Both of you make this chore sound a whole lot easier than what I have read online

Tallulah_B said:we have scavenger birds that come out during the day, when you're not looking

We have them, too, but they seem to concentrate on the meadow across the road. I haven't any problems with them ... yet.

I don't have anything resembling "coils" in my freezer -- do you have a chest-type, or is it an upright freezer, Lyn? (Mine is a chest.) Mine does have a couple of baskets that hang from the top edge, though, which seem like they would be comparable to shelves, and they have never gotten any kind of frost buildup on them. It does kind of seem like oiling anything on the inside might just be kind of messy.

I really do consider it an easy job; the worst part is taking all the food out, but I usually do it before I start harvesting very much from the garden, and every now and then I need to get rid of a few things that have been hanging around too long anyway! Probably takes me 20-30 minutes altogether.

Never trust stuff you read online