This Is Seriously Creepy!

So tonight I am sitting here at my desk, 5:45 p.m., and I get a call from Blue Cross/Blue Shield of Michigan. It's not a real person on the phone, it's a disembodied questionnaire from my health-care provider, wanting to know if I have access to a computer, where I can sign on to BCBSM.com, which will tell me all kinds of ways to feel great about how they are treating me as a health-care recipient.

Will I sign onto BCBSM.com today? I am asked. No, I say. Well, when you sign on to BCBSM.com you will learn about all the ways you can feel good, or somesuch strangeness that so help me God and I am not paranoid FEELS like BIG BRO is watching me.

It even asked me on a scale of one to five how good I feel today. Then I was asked by the robo female voice whether I had a cat or a dog, because, as she told me, pets make you FEEL better. I kept saying, yes, a cat, but it would not let me say CAT. I had to say YES.

So the conversation concluded with a tip: If there is a TV in my bedroom, I should get rid of it asap and put a radio in my room instead because studies show that people sleep better after listening to a half hour of radio rather than TV. IN THEIR BEDROOMS. BCBSM is in our bedrooms now, making sure that we sleep well.

A week or so ago I got a mailing from BCBSM about how I should manage my asthma. Well, guess what? I have been doing that ever since I found out I have asthma. Like for 20-some years. I take REALLY good care of my seasonally twitchy airways! Totally under control.

I have been getting emails all year wanting me to register to get "perks" from local Detroit corporate entities via BCBSM.com.

A few weeks ago my husband received a note asking him to confirm that we have no additional health insurance. We don't.

But I had eye surgery 10 days ago and wonder if all of this is leading up to a denial of claim. I had my eyelids excised so I could see better. I was literally bruising myself, running into walls and people's shopping carts with my compromised field of vision.

I definitely am seeing better, though I would not wish these swollen lids and down-to-the-cheekbone bruises on anybody.

Here's what I know, and it is disturbing: BCBSM is spending huge amounts of money on a giant PR campaign that is attempting to camouflage the continuing screwing of Michigan's working poor -- and I'm talking many, many disenfranchised journalists.

To wit, from Crain's Detroit Business:

• Attorney General Mike Cox has filed a lawsuit against Blue Cross Blue Shield of Michigan and the Michigan Office of Financial and Insurance Regulation over a 66 percent premium increase on some Blues customers who purchase Medigap insurance.

The lawsuit charges that OFIR violated the Nonprofit Health Care Corporation Reform Act by approving the increase without providing 60-day notice.

All I can say is: Stop the robo-femme calls. I'm on top of my chronic crap, and doing quite nicely, thanks. I just want to make sure that if a real emergency arrives, BCBSM will rise to the moment.