I did pharmacy billing for a while and this is a kind of innocent take that people are just being lazy. The training was terrible (I was taught the basics of the software and then given a photocopy of various employees hand written notes for common rejection solutions over the years …most of which didn’t still apply and those employees had long left; when I left in sure my notes were copied to the pile). There were metrics that kept being increased meaning spending more than 30 seconds on a claim was going to put you behind (I did night shift and my boss was talked to about me once or twice because I sometimes had an hour or two where I’d cleared everything I could and had nothing to do because the rest of the world was asleep). And, finally:

The software was designed to actively fight us. My most common reject was insurance won’t pay for anything $X or more with X being stupidly low. For many insurances you could not put in a recurring override for monthly maintenance meds. Your options were either give the patient a 2/3/whatever day supply to get the cost down and they’d just have to visit the pharmacy for pickup so much they might as well work there. Or do a one time special override every. Single. Time. Which involved me doing a special code on my end (which wasn’t the same for every insurer and sometimes they’d just randomly change it for shits and giggles with no communication, I had a list of codes that were often used I’d try guessing with). Calling their help desk whose employee retention and training were also in the toilet. If the insurance end person knew the process for a one time special override, great. If not I started specifically keeping notes by insurer to teach new people because otherwise I’d be subjected to an hour of phone hockey while they tried to find someone who both knew how to do it and could cram my call into their metrics. Then we’d have to go through generating specific rejects just because we needed it in our logs we tried shit we knew wasn’t going to work. Doctor note saying md knows med is expensive and that pt needs it to live regardless attached? Okay run it through as cost doctor approved to get the “fuck the doctor we don’t want to pay” reject. Insurance doctor/nurse team reviewed that yes the doctor is correct the patient needs this med to live code put in? Okay run it again to get the fuck our own doctors we still won’t pay reject. Now insurance help desk has to message their next level support to get authorization for a one time override for medical necessity. Okay now it’ll go through on the insurer end (as long as they didn’t fatfinger anything because the override only works for one single attempt). Great, we did it one try team! Now my turn to do it on my end which involves me removing all my codes because the software no longer recognizes the reject so will reject me for needless codes which will make us have to get the One Single Try Authorization again…

You don’t have to die to visit hell just work in medical billing.

It’s actually on spotify, but you can also find some of them on YouTube, meat fulton’s site and audible/general audiobook retailers!

Going to add some suggestions here for people who might not like the radio personalities setup a lot of podcasts have, but don’t have a place to start. Would appreciate anyone with suggestions adding on as I listen to audiobooks more than podcasts!

• Parcast Network podcasts — they have several presenters covering a variety of topics (mainly true crime, disasters, cults, myths/legends/fairytales). This is the blandest, no shooting the shit, no radio personalities, formulaic as you can get. Their presenters are all mild mannered toned and the shows generally follow a format with a few variations (ie some of them give some random bullshit pulled out medical diagnosises to criminals, some are more sensationalized “could the killer have possibly been thinking this?”, etc). If you don’t like how one set of narrators present an event you can absolutely find a presenter you prefer on the network as the shows cannibalize the same stories between each other. Not the most factual podcasts and in-depth is anathema to them, but if you’re just looking for something inoffensive on in the background while you do the dishes they work.
• The Other Half — one presenter, short episodes, well-researched women through the ages. This is a sort of sequel to the Queens of England podcast by the same podcaster. Each season focuses on a specific type of historical woman (current season is royal/political mistresses). The episodes are short, focus on the history, there is some modern contextualizing (in the vein of now that it’s not 1304 we can recognize getting up three days after giving birth to go tell an invading army to fuck off was a lot of work lol). Mostly though it’s just the history.
• Dan Carlin’s Hardcore History — another good history podcast that covers a large variety of topics, but the episodes are long. Doesn’t make it a bad podcast, but six hours in length isn’t rare. Lot of straight history, but also modern contextualizing (like the Romans didn’t see executing criminals in the colliseum for entertainment as bad, but in modern times we would view that as very fucked up) and philosophizing (not sure I’d say getting up on a soapbox so much as this was the Roman’s philosophy about this, let’s follow their schools of thought).
• The Magnus Archives — horror anthology with an overarching story. Very good production values and even if you’re not interested in the broader story there’s a ton of great creepypasta type stories.
• Tales from the Stinky Dragon — DND play podcast with great production values and relatively short episodes (think they’re like 30min?). This is heavily edited to cut out a lot of the parts of DND that drag as a listener (multiple rounds of that’s a nat1, going back and forth on plans, etc) so though there’s some discussion between the players/DM it’s generally pretty snappy and most of the run time is just straight story. That said sometimes they do include tangents where the players meta joke with each other (this is probably the least offender I’ve heard for this though, if a tangent happens it’s usually five minutes at worst).
• We’re Alive — zombie apocalypse story podcast. Has multiple shows, several completed, with great production values (probably one of the best I’ve heard for sound production). This is a radio play style podcast so cliffhangers abound. Being a zombie “story of survivors” many of the characters are probably going to ping obnoxious at first as part of the genre is survivors learning to work together.
• Ruby the Galactic Gumshoe — so this actually was a radio play back in the day, the company has just updated to the present. These are trippy whimsical stories about Ruby, the interstellar detective. It started in the 80s iirc so expect to hear a ton of synth. The stories themselves run on a ton of puns, a quirky crew of heist characters, abstract philosophizing (in a what do robots dream of and colors taste like way) and trippy music to listen to when you’re high.
• Myths and Legends — myths and Legends to lofi beats. Super chill, nothing more going on here, does have a lot of ads read by the narrator hard coded into the podcast so even if you pay for your podcasting service you do have to sit through them (not usually an issue since you can fast forward unless you’re driving ime).
• Myths Your Teacher Hated — myths and legends, but told in a Badass of the Week style. Episodes are usually one myth/legend and one legendary/folktale creature. Unlike everything else on this list the narrator isn’t really a mellow soothing tone type so if you don’t like loud voices not a fit.
• Let’s Talk About Myths, Baby! — in-depth podcast on myths with a lot of research and modern contextualizing, big feminist bent. The host does soapbox. Mainly listing this because it’s the only “I want opinion discussion, but I don’t want to hear five people discussing it between talking about what they ordered from Wendy’s” podcast I listen to. That said she talks a lot about her research and goes into the various sources she’s drawing from and their differences, so if you’re looking for in-depth she’s a great stop.
• Batman: The Audio Adventures — honestly way better than it has any right to be, kind of an offshoot of 60s Batman and 90s animated Batman. Does the radio play style intentionally and very well. Even if you’re not into Batman you might enjoy it as a noir comedy.

There are podcasts out there that are more to the point. Honestly it’s like old radio. Talk shows are just going to be more popular cause like said it feels more like hanging out with friends.

If you don’t like that format though look for podcasts with only one person on the cast (or if they have another person it’s someone they’re interviewing). There’s a lot of great history podcasts that are one person presenting, they have a script, they get through it in 20 minutes. You don’t have to listen to ten minutes of shooting the shit and “personalities” first, they just get straight to it and edit to keep it tight. Fiction story and play podcasts (ttrpg) also have a good representation in this category too (though they also have plenty of round table discussion ones so you’ll have to vet).

Oof I feel bad for his partner had no idea he was in pairs from the way he’s been talked/meme’d about…

Most Olympic athletes are young and wear fashion athletic clothes donated by endorsers who help pay them. In addition in the shooting category you’re (as I understand it) allowed a certain amount of tech to help you out. This man is older, didn’t wear the endorsed fashion clothes or the tech and won gold silver so he feels like a rare “every man” win in the Olympics. He is not an “every man” (believe he’s a decorated military and police man in his country), but a lot more people can relate to him winning gold silver than a 14 year old who’s been training for this since diapers in a fashion house outfit.

It’s not the kraft variety.

Yulo was also offered lifetime supplies of free buffets, baked mac and cheese, and chicken inasal, a grilled chicken dish, by various chain restaurants.

I also thought no one used facetime until I worked retail recently… The amount of people I saw come in on a facetime calls where they both just had their cameras pointed at the ceiling was bizarre and boggling.