A few weeks ago, I went to see the doctor about this nagging cough I had. It turned out to be Bronchitis, but the doctor seemed far more concerned about something else that came up when she checked my vitals: My blood pressure.

That day, the reading was 144/94, which is fairly high. She told me to come back for 2 more readings over the next few weeks, which I've tried to do but haven't had the time for thanks to some drastic changes at the office. Today though, I was able to break away from my work for a few minutes, and had the reading taken again.

Today, the reading was 148/96, which is quite a bit higher than normal. The nurse who took the reading made note of it and said that I needed to come back at the end of the week for another check, at which point I would most likely be placed on blood pressure medicine.

This is where I hate medicine. Not so much the fact that they found this problem and are able to treat it, but the whole bit of them saying "you're blood pressure is high, so stress over it for a few days and come in for us to tell you it's even higher." Fun. I had a very tough time focusing on my work for the rest of the day, and even tonight I'm feeling pretty "out of it" with everything.

I'm wondering though, if the ringing I've had in my ears for a fairly long time, or if the headaches I've been having are related to this. We shall most certainly see!

This post is kinda twofold. The first point is based on the previous car troubles I've mentioned.

I received my federal tax refund last week and decided I would go get a quote for the necessary repair, which turned out to be about what I would have expected to pay for doing it on my own. I had a feeling the actual price would be a bit higher when the work was done, so I went ahead and left the car at the shop last evening. They claimed they would be able to finish the job in about 2 hours, so I told them that was fine. About an hour and a half later, I got a call from the service manager, who informed me of what I had feared to be the case; that more work needed done, which would push the cost up about 250% of what they had previously quoted. Knowing that the guy wasn't just trying to make a sale, I told him to go ahead and take care of the rest of the work. Today, I went to pick up the car and pay my tab, and it turned out to be almost 300% of what I was quoted. When I looked at the invoice, I spotted no inconsistencies, so I just paid the dues. The price I paid was about 75% of my tax refund check, which made me sad, but here's to helping the economy.

Speaking of the pit we're in, today was an amazing day on the stock market. So amazing that I'm going to be one of the people who causes economic turmoil in the coming weeks. That turmoil being any shareholders waiting to break even, then dumping their investments. I don't know that I'll be doing that for everything; In fact, I may re-invest. However, the transportation and finance markets are not where I want my money to hang out. Yeah, I'm the one jerk who bought some FNM and FRE shares when they were on the way down, and I'm waiting for them to rebound to make a (relatively) quick buck. All they need to do is break $10/share.

I remain doubtful, but I really hope this economic stimulus package will cause enough of a jolt to get things back to normal.