Bloody Danes top world happiness league If you're feel a bit glum, then get yourself off to Denmark, which has secured top spot in the 2016 World Happiness Report. Based on responses to the Gallup World Poll, in which people were asked to rate their existence on a scale of one to 10, the Danes scored a heart-warming 7.526. Switzerland was only marginally less happy …
The yanks aren’t happy. They're all just abusing benzodiazepine.
Merkins are just plain weird. They don't just abuse benzodiazepene. Went into my usual pharmacy recently and the delightfully pretty young pharmacist was being abused by a Merkin tourist because she was charging too little for the penicillin he was there to purchase. Quite why charging too little was "ripping him off" isn't clear to me unless you hold the peculiar belief that the more expensive a drug is, the more effective.
The americans firmly believe, when they are anywhere but home, that if it's cheap it's shite.
The fellow firmly believed that since it was so cheap the stuff wouldn't work and was likely after the 'good stuff', thus giving the pharmacist a hard time was a requirement.
I told a coworker in the US (... job iteration -1 ) what we were paying for off the shelf naproxen here. He was utterly shocked.
The fellow firmly believed that since it was so cheap the stuff wouldn't work and was likely after the 'good stuff', thus giving the pharmacist a hard time was a requirement.
As it happens, the doctor had prescribed the exact same brand he had been taking back in the US. When she tried to explain the Pharmaceutical Benefits Scheme to him, he just yelled at her.
Naproxen isn't available off the shelf here in Oz, it's prescription only. I pay $AU31.40 for 28 tablets.
Re the American and his penicillin scrip...
As a tourist, i suspect he wouldn.t be eligible for Pharmaceutical Benefit Scheme (PBS). Perhaps his complaint was that the pharmacist was (wrongly) charging him the subsidised rate rather than the full retail rate. In the way some some seppos come across.
OTOH, if his rant was about PBS drugs being too cheap, he might have been having a rant about the evils of socialised medicine.
@ Glen Waverley
It's the drug that's eligible to be on the PBS and subsidised, not the consumer of the drug. Likely he would have had to pay the doctor the full quid and certainly wouldn't have been bulk billed.
The Septic (an apt term when in need of antibiotics) was accusing young Ashlee of "ripping him off" by dint what was in the box was not what the label said. Quite why making live-saving medicines affordable is evil escapes me. Communicable diseases strike down the rich and poor alike
"Which country are you in where you can purchase penicillin over the counter?"
I didn't realise I needed to wear a dirty mac and talk in code just to get an antibiotic prescription filled. More seriously, I have seen people furious at the pharmacist for doing what what's called in Australia "brand substitution". Even suggesting that they might want to save a significant amount of money can be taken as a mortal insult.
I've seen one or two customers go off on one because the pharmacist has suggested the generic at half the price, too.
It's got to the point where the pharmacy girls ask if it's OK to substitute the generic in fearful tones, as though they're offering you a leech as an alternative to Warfarin
@jzl "Which country are you in where you can purchase penicillin over the counter?"
I would say any country where you had a prescription for penicillin. Our friend the Pompous Git has only mentioned the attempt to purchase. He didn't say anything about a prescription, or a lack thereof. The country in question is, I believe, Australia. If I remember correctly, the Git hails from Tasmania.
It is important for all of us to remember that many times the same words will have very different meanings from one country to the next. "Over the counter" in the US pharmacological usage, means a non-prescription drug. I couldn't say whether or not it means the same in other countries.
I hope that helps.
No jzl it's not anti-Americanism. It's deep concern. We have seen how you, the American people, are being ripped off, and now when some of you seem to understand it some of you turn to people like Trump and Cruz. One is a thug with a hugely inflated ego and the other a religious psychopath who believes that God speaks to him. The so-called "American exceptionalism" has led to a situation where any criticism, even internal, is countered as anti-American. I am deeply concerned, like, as I believe, so many other people, but I would call that concern pro-American.
Tough choice for us. One who's a megalomaniac and the other talks and listens to his invisible friend. And let's not even get into the two on the other side. Are the choices any better where you are?
I suppose that one doesn't have to be nuts to be in politics but it apparently helps.
Yes. But that could change if we introduced "citizens united" or ended up with just two political parties or vent for education for profit and/or for just the few, or we were run over by climate change skeptics. But even if I said no and lived in (157) Burundi don't fool your self with the so popular "kindergarten logic" - you did it first. Look at China look at Russia how can you critizice us. A logic so popular and dumb among all of us.
or we were run over by climate change skeptics.
The only running over the Git is likely to suffer from is people riding bicycles. There has been one pedestrian death in Tasmania already and the Git has had several close calls. It seems to me that these bicycle riders are not just very assiduously avoiding riding on the roads and in the exclusive-for-bicycle-rider lanes created on those roads, are also the very sort that "believe in climate change" (as if climate needed belief to exist).
The Köppen climate classification for Tasmania for example is maritime temperate, just the same as it was 100 years ago and 200 years ago. Believing that because a climate is the same as it was in the past is due to "unprecedented" change seems almost as irrational as the twats attempting to run me down on the footpath. Not to put too fine a point on this, I am using less embodied energy by walking than they are on their bicycles and frankly ludicrous lycra, testicle-emphasising, expensive cycling clothes.
Thanks Mark 85. No intention to offend you. Some politicians suck more than others in any country no doubt. We get what we elect but with citizens united "higher powers" choose what we can elect from. I also wonder if people who vote for Trump really believe that those trade agreements were written by all those nasty countries and forced upon dumb American politicians who did not understand his book and thus cannot make huge deals, poor bastards. What does that guy actually believe him self. Bernie Sanders on the other hand has from the beginning known who is behind those agreements and why. Enough about that.
As for this "happiness" topic, the word has amused me from the very beginning but there is of course a background to it too. Some seem to think (joking perhaps) that people around the world are asked on the phone to define their happiness on a scale from one to ten. Some other word would be more appropriate, ease of mind or something better.
Those not so bloody Danes know their kids are able to get an education if they try regardless of how poor or stupid they are themselves. They know they will not have to sell their house and move in with their kids if they get sic. They know nothing about preconditioned anything. They know they will have their pension according to what they have earned no matter how often they have been sacked. They know their risk of being shot at home or on the street is small or by the police even with the wrong colour of the face. So I do understand the USA is not among the top ten in this respect either.
As for how bloody the Vikings were and compared to who, a topic for some rainy day.
Regards Lars
Also, what's with all the anti-Americanism? It's petty and says more about you and your insecurities than it does about America or Americans.
No, there's a certain type of American who visits other parts of the planet seemingly for the sake of behaving like a complete arsehole. Live with it. If you don't like it, please shoot the fuckers before they leave.
FWIW Hobart is a port that has been visited by many ships of the USN and we have billeted a sailor from most such visiting ships. Usually young men from the the mid-west and they have been the exact opposite of the idiot I earlier described. My best friend was a Merkin until 1972 when he became an Australian citizen. At least he was my best friend until he died on me a few years ago. My youngest son's best friend is a US citizen. One of my nephews is married to delightfully eccentric girl from Des Moines. So no, not anti-American at all.
If these American arseholes dislike being away from America so much and have to yell at people who have no interest in living there, or sharing their rather odd beliefs, why the fuck don't they stay there? We like Bill Bryson, Richard Gilewitz, Amanda Palmer and ever so many other Americans who know how to behave in a civilised manner.
And while we're talking of Hobart, can we add Brian Ritchie (from Violent Femmes) to the list of Yanks we like? Tho i think he might be an Aussie now.
Sorry I consigned him to et cetera. Yes, Brian is very much a local these days insofar as parochial a place as Hobart will allow ;-) He curates excellent music festivals which ever so many of us appreciate.
This post has been deleted by its author
The trump supporters are happy because they're retarded suburban bible bashers..
No, that would be Cruz supporters.
Judging from the polls, Trump's support is a lot more universal than that and hence calling them all retarded, as the mainstream media and political establishment has a habit of doing, is a dangerous game.
Does *anyone* have a sane wife?
Excellent question. Mrs Git is a very keen rower of skiffs and this week is away doing just that. She won a week's accommodation in a luxury apartment on the Queensland Gold Coast. It's a prize neither of us have the slightest interest in.
Nope. Individuality is just one extreme ideology on a continuity. The extreme, that you bear no responsibility is equally ridiculous.
The danger of individuality is that it's easily hijacked by corporations. Since everything is your fault, yet the solution to all your problems is buying some commodity or other.
The rat in the cramped unstimulating cage will become a cocaine addict, while the rat in the spacious stimulating environment will choose not to take drugs even when offered on-demand.
I know it sounds weird to question it because individuality has become such a key social norm, but sometimes collective action is required to improve the environment for all of us, and to allow people to strive for a better life.
-- A reformed individualist.
A collective action is fine, but be careful who you add to your collective.
Indeed. There seem to be two sorts of people: those who are obsessed by their Rights and those who, like Aristotle, believe we are born into a world with certain Obligations. What we see around us is the legacy of many preceding people's efforts. Therefore, if we are virtuous, will in turn endeavour to make our part of the world an even better place also.
An illustration of the former sort is a local woman who campaigned vigorously against forestry. The forest workers were continually harassed by greenies and prevented from earning their living when their machines were occupied by protesters. Finally the government colluded with the protesters and the forest workers were (nearly) all put out of business.
Local woman has built her house and planted a lovely orchard adjacent to the forest she claims to love. When informed it would all be for naught, she asked why.
Because when the February Dragon (bushfires) come, it will all be destroyed. She says: "I'll just call the fire brigade".
But she has put the fire brigade out of business because the forest workers and their machinery was the fire brigade. No amount of demanding her rights will create a fire brigade out of thin air. And the collective (population of the country) are now paying for the forest workers' dole, there being no suitable other employment for them. And of course small business suffers because the dole is ever so much less than the income they earned when usefully employed.
So it goes... Rights or Obligations?
But having a sane wife definitely helps.
Not sure about the sanity. Mrs Git and I have been together since 1980 and I have often enough been asked for the secret to the success of our marriage. I always respond that all you need to do is find a woman who's worth obeying. Which is why Mrs Git is SWMBO.
If you look at the tables you see a trend that smaller countries tend to be happier ones. That's why the UK should break up. People prefer to have a government they can identify with. At the moment that doesn't happen. All countries should be < 10 million population and the world would be happier.
Agreed - For Britain to hit the top spot is like divide by zero - it ain't happening. We have so many opportunities to moan about stuff (weather/politics/traffic/food/cyclists....), and this makes us happy - all very illogical and yet very British.
Certainly enough to turn to alcohol.
The Register 
Biting the hand that feeds IT
Copyright. All rights reserved © 1998–2024
