I mentioned privately last week that I'd been accepted for enrolment into the Canadian Dental Insurance Plan. The one that our federal government hired Sun Life to administer for everyone earning less than C$90K/year and not already covered by their employer or their province?

That one.

I finally got the card in the papermail from Sun Life today.

Orange and pink and white plastic.

It's just hitting me now that, after over three decades of paying out of pocket by instalments for my dental health basics - exams, fillings and repairs of same, that sort of thing - I no longer have to worry about that part of my life's financial juggling. It's already covered through my federal income tax from now on unless I land a sufficiently lucrative job with its own coverage.

Hoping it all works out.

I got the first dose on my shingles vaccinations yesterday.

Aside from the hopes of averting that disease itself, apparently there's some small degree of benevolent knock-on effect against dementia too.

https://med.stanford.edu/news/all-news/2025/03/shingles-vaccination-dementia.html

https://www.cbc.ca/news/health/shingles-vaccine-dementia-wales-1.7500368

You'll certainly want to do some additional digging into this on your own to be more certain.

Passing this along, as I have confirmation from multiple sources that it is for real. Peter's work sits in my comics storage boxes and on my bookshelves, and I've enjoyed much of it over the decades. If you can help and haven't already done so, please do.

https://www.gofundme.com/f/help-peter-david

I've been coping with another of those ear-nose-throat issues this past week. I have a theory about where I picked it up, which I'm not going to name here.

That said, at least it doesn't seem to be a COVID infection. I just tested again this morning and it reads as negative. Yes, I know about the reliability issues of RAT kits.

The logic of Stephen Harper and Donald Trump is at work here. If you make sure that you can't look for it, you won't find it. If you don't find it, it doesn't exist as a problem. If it doesn't exist as a problem, it doesn't have to be solved.

Linking to tweets by GP and occasional CBC News commentator Dr. Iris Gorfinkel:

https://x.com/DrGorfinkel/status/1841225759681364201

https://x.com/DrGorfinkel/status/1841285113486671877

Good news:

I don't have to be checked out at the Eye Institute again until next August. Probably.

I'm hoping to see my GP tonight about that issue at long last.

Also, maybe three to five other concerns of note and substance? Maybe?

If the weather allows, and the doctor doesn't cancel because of the weather?

I got back in the house about 40 minutes ago.

Good news: my eyesight remains stable. My next scheduled checkup is in February 2026. It's logged into my scheduleware.

So...the federal dental care programme continues to be brought into effect.

It's decades late. It's still needed. And I'm glad it's finally on its way.

The out-of-pocket costs have been dogging me ever since I aged out of my parents' work-derived medical coverage, I've never been able to hold a job long enough to get similar benefits of my own, and by this time next year, that financial-medical pain is going to finally end.

Good.