Justin Germino Ramblings

Last weekend I was out at a birthday party for a friend over at AZCulture with my wife and it was at a Wine Bar in Scottsdale Arizona. While attending said event I was noting how much I find being in public crowds uncomfortable, I actually have a slight aversion to networking publicly and in person. Most of this comes from just simple phobia, I enjoy talking with people and socializing, I am just uncomfortable in public settings with crowds and lots of people around.

Online networking is so much easier, you can act naturally and you don’t have to be aware of your body language, how you dress, style of fashion…etc. You can just be recognized for your words and what you say instead of your overall appearance. This makes borderline recluse hermits like myself much more apt to talk to people on Twitter, Facebook or other social networks than meeting for drinks in a bar or club in the valley.

It isn’t that I don’t socialize fairly well, in my industry and when associating with people I am friendly, approachable, easy to talk to and often can add some value to just about any conversation without looking to steal focus or attention. It is just I am uncomfortable in my own skin in public, maybe its the nagging fear of always being judged or the self conscious way I analyze everything I say.

-Justin Germino

According to the American Journal of Clinical nutrition the following foods are ounce for ounce the most beneficial in warding off free radical damage. These foods can help protect your body from environmental pollutions, heart disease, premature aging and even help decrease chances of getting certain types of cancer.

The number one food is Blackberries, delicious and healthy to snack on for any meal of the day, the following nine in order are Walnuts, Strawberries, Artichokes (prepared), Cranberries, Coffee, Raspberries, Pecans, Blueberries, Cloves (ground).

Yes one was beverage and the other was a spice, but still these are the foods you need to increase more in your diet to enhance your health.

-Justin Germino

I have had a few dogs over the years and always thought that living in a home with hard tiled floor is better when living with dogs. Dogs have accidents occasionally, especially puppies. It is far easier to cleanup such messes on a hard surface than a carpet. My newest dog Porky has the occasional accident and my Senior dog Gouda who is nearly 9 years old is prone to having the occasional accident too now.

I spend at least a few days a week using various carpet cleaners, deodorizes, stain removers and scrubbing carpets with rags and towels. At what point do I need to start looking at steam cleaners to keep the carpets from being utterly ruined. The padding is most concerning because even though you clean the carpet, the padding underneath is often left in bad condition and mold and germs can fester.

We keep a clean house, but only because we are diligent about cleaning the floors and carpets constantly. Fairly soon I will have to either replace the carpets and stick tile the house, or put in real tile. Throw rugs are better since if they are soiled they are easier to clean and replace compared to entire floored carpeting.

-Justin Germino

My oldest son who is six enjoyed the last week off from school, but he was bored most of the day around the house. His mother and I both work from home and although we are around we are busy and our son still has trouble entertaining himself without asking for attention or always needing something. It is funny because our youngest son is able to play by himself and keep himself entertained without as much need for attention.

My favorite time is when I can take the boys to the playground after work and we play swords or knights and monsters, chasing each other around with foam blades pretending to defend castles. We do this every day or other day and it is a great way to just burn off energy and slip into a role playing fantasy world with the kids and just laugh and run around.

Though he may have been bored and I didn’t have as much time to play with him during his fall break as I would have liked, his school is doing so well for him now that we switched him to a new school and I am looking forward to him getting back to his academic studies. We have been having him do a few hours of school work each day on fall break. My wife is much better at keeping him focused and on this structured routine.

-Justin Germino

I have worked for a variety of companies over the years that have offered health plans, though I have never had to look for a private Health Insurance plan I still take the care and carefully review all the HealthCare options my companies have provided. I work for big companies so often there are 4 or more HealthPlan options as choices.

I have used or looked into a variety of Health Care providers including: United Healthcare, bcbsnc, Healthnet, Aetna and several other health plans for a period of time. The most important thing to consider when choosing a health plan is to find one that fits your budget (how much out of your paycheck) and keep in mind the copayment costs of medical services. HMO’s used to cover 100% cost except for a copay, but many of them now have the copays plus you will owe 10% – 20% out of pocket for hospital stays, surgeries and more.

So no matter what state you live in and which company you look for you should compare your health insurance costs, copays, rates and what services are covered.

-Justin Germino

I was actually shocked when reading the paper last week to find out that the Mafia is running so many scam rackets against Medicare that involve stealing Social Security numbers from the elderly and the homeless and using them to purchase medical equipment and bill Medicare. There have been a reported 50 fraudulent Medicare storefronts in Miami alone and 50 suspects in California have been arrested in the last three years alone. We are talking about hundreds of millions of dollars, billions perhaps over a decade that is robbed out of our infrastructure which only hurts the health care system overall for everyone.

Part of the problem is that there is more profit, less risk and lower prison sentences for medicare fraud than for Drug Trafficking so the organized crime syndicates are willing to take the risk and adapt into this system of white collar crime and fraud. The stakes however are getting higher now as people are being murdered and threatened over these frauds and schemes with the elderly being threatened to comply or risk physical injury.

The laws and law enforcement agencies need to be adapted to handle these criminal activities as quickly as the criminals themselves can adapt and find new ways to exploit the systems.

-Dragon Blogger

I will be taking the family to the AZ State Fair next week as it is a great way to just get out and have a good time with the kids and family. Though I am terrified of heights and fast moving objects, this is one of the rare occasions I grit my teeth, close my eyes and get on the rides with my kids just so they can have fun.

The Arizona State Fair thought it can be costly is worth it if you have the money, there are dozens of rides, carnival games and foods to sample and regret later. It is simply carnival fun and I have attended nearly every year of the last 14 years I have lived in Arizona. It is even more fun when you have children, but I remember when my wife and I were dating and we were teenagers and I had won one of those prize gifts for her, it was a wizard from one of the fair carnival games. She still has that little stuffed animal wizard to this day fourteen years later. This is one of the memories that makes the fair so fond for me.

-Justin Germino

Okay there was a debacle with Cox it would seem, they told me all I needed was the Docsis 3.0 modem and they can flip on the super high speed, but it turns out they mislead me. They have to send a technician to “configure” my cable modem professionally. There is a 99% chance I could do it over the phone, but they won’t help me configure it myself. My guess is that there is a way to configure the modem to channel bond and use too much bandwidth so they need to send a professional to configure it so you can’t get more than your paying for. Either way my broadband should increase from 15mbps / 1 mbps to 25mpbs / 1.5 mbps sometime this morning after the installation technician comes out.

In my residential area we can’t yet get the D3 speeds that you can see in some cities with download speeds 50mbps and above, some cities boasting 100+ mbps now with certain D3 services. I would like to see uploads higher than 1.5 mbps, preferably the 50/5mbps service would be ideal if it were offered here.

-Justin Germino

I learned yesterday that Today is Blog Action Day, where bloggers register and blog about causes around the word. This years cause is Climate Change and is meant to bring awareness to the ever growing problem of the shifting climate. We know that industrialized Nations are pumping CFC’s and Ozone damaging wastes into the atmosphere at alarming rates, and we know that mean temperatures around the world have been increasing steadily over the last fifty years.

Like it or not the climate is changing and human society is a factor in that change, it is a good opportunity for everyone to take their part by trying to reduce their energy usage and be a little more green. Less waste and energy usage means less pollution to create and generate that energy and products. Though I don’t forsee any end of the world disasters as a result of the climate change, there will definitely be extinction of many animal and plant species as a result.

-Justin Germino

Having some Internet troubles the last few weeks and Cox suggesting that my nearly three year old modem might be becoming crusty, I have decided to upgrade to a Motorola Surfboard 6120 Docsys 3.0 modem that is required to upgrade my Cox to the Premier Plus which has 25mbps download and 1.5 mbps upload speeds.  My current premiere service has 15mbps downstream and 1mbps upstream.  If you have many computers in your household connecting to the Internet at the same time like I do, then you are better off increasing your bandwidth to accommodate.

mb, I am hoping to see another major boost in performance.

-Justin Germino