FERS Disability: civil service medical retirement

Federal and Postal Disability Retirement Benefits: Signs

September 10, 2016

It is the title of a song by a group called, “Five Man Electrical Band”, first released in 1970, then re-released in 1971, and the lyrics intelligently portray a world replete with warnings, admonitions, commands and curtailing threats, demanding of us a conduct of conformity otherwise ignored unless backed by such direct mandates. Of course, there are the other, more subtle signs that we either ignore or otherwise dismiss because of the quiet manner of reproach initiated. Those subtle signs as evidenced by facial expressions; […]

FERS & CSRS Disability Retirement: Life’s Alliteration

August 6, 2016

The repetitive recurrence of mirroring sounds or letters at the beginning of adjacent words is merely a reflection of how we live our lives. What is inherent in human beings that we would discover, create or otherwise compile an aggregation of such a linguistic phenomena? The universe could have continued happily on its mindless course of fated determinism without people engaging in such nonsensical rhythms of prose and poetry; but as each act of indeterminate vacuity [… ]

FERS & CSRS Disability Retirement: The script of life

July 22, 2016

Seeking out the pathways of precognition by consulting with the ancient oracles, was merely that same attempt. Prediction and foreknowledge were the precursors of script writing; as the former failed to provide an advantageous statistical weighting, so the shift to a more pragmatic approach reflects the recognition that the gods provided no greater insight than mere chance, and so we’d better get on with life and attempt to control fate, destiny and the travesties of life’s lottery by writing the narrative ourselves. Thus do economic systems of varying control mechanisms arise, […]

FERS & CSRS Disability Retirement: The numerical veil

June 9, 2016

Statistical constructs indicate group shifts and movements; numbers, based upon controlled samplings, provide the substantive fodder for analysis of trends and patterns of population deviancies. There is, however, the question of the incommensurate nature between mathematical paradigms and linguistic application; stated more simply, Do numbers hide more than reveal, and can anything be extrapolated from them and interpreted in terms we can understand and comprehend? To a winner of the lottery, the numerical phantasm “one in a billion” […]

Medical Separation & Retirement from Federal Employment: Existence preceding essence

April 11, 2016

Once, in the vaunted Age of Reason, when Western Philosophy reached its pinnacle as the conduit of all knowledge, wisdom and human achievement; and when other disciplines fell under the umbrella and aegis of the methodological sanctity of its pursuit; then, it was determined that time was merely a linear ladder to climb, and all knowledge would be captured like the essence of heightened fragrances in a bottle of perfume, ever sweet smelling and able to conceal the undercurrent of stench. But then came disenchantment, pestilence, wars and human cruelty — just the regularity in the rhythm of man; you know, those things that are inevitable. […]

Early Medical Retirement for Federal Employees: The Gatekeeper

March 17, 2016

Garbage in, garbage out; leave the door wide open, and the flies come in; “we don’t live in a barn”; and other similar quips, quotes and quotidian truths abound to guide us throughout the day. In Medieval times, the Gatekeeper held a prominent position of authority and safekeeping; trust was of paramount importance, and the potential for bribery to undermine loyalty and fealty to the inhabitants of the Court or Castle meant that treatment of the assigned individual demanded respect as well as adequate renumeration. […]

FERS & CSRS Disability Retirement: Time Travel

March 2, 2016

H.G. Wells touched upon our imaginations in 1895 with his novel, The Time Machine, and ever since, the concept itself has been accepted within the cultural milieu of ideas incandescent. Mathematicians find it as a challenge to decipher; astronomy, an idea to ponder; astrophysicists, a vehicle to revitalize the despair of incomprehension; but for poets and prophets, it is the fodder for creativity and imaginations to become unfettered by want of belief. What child (or adult) does not ponder the mysteries of the universe by means of a device to enter a future yet unknown or a past replete with narrated stories of pirates, […]

Postal & Federal Employee Medical Retirement: When coincidence ignores sensitivity

February 20, 2016

What if a ‘special day‘ falls upon an unfortunate date? What if one’s birthday, for example, happens to be on 9/11, or on Christmas eve, Valentine’s day, etc? Or, for those who strictly proscribe the Sabbath Day, what happens if one’s birthday happens to fall coincidentally upon the concurrent segment of solemnity? Does one set aside the significance of the unfortunate date, and celebrate that special day as if the former is an irrelevancy, trumped by the latter? […]

Federal Disability Retirement: The Hesitant Hole

February 18, 2016

The famous one, of course, and the one which draws the imagination, is depicted in Lewis Carroll’s tale of Alice and her journey down the rabbit’s abyss; another, the one which determines the relative shortcomings of weather predictability, but that one is guided more by shadows and perceptions from above, as opposed to the one dug below; or, there is the one which we dig for ourselves, and the proverbial timelessness of our foolish deeds. […]

OPM Disability Retirement: A Pedigree of Choices

February 12, 2016

There are still some parts in the world where line of descent and lineage of genealogy matter; certainly, for spectacles such as the Westminster Kennel Club Dog Show, the origins of breeding, the line of winners, and the genetically pure tree of aristocratic connections matter still. But humans are different; or so we like to think. We are repulsed by the very idea of placing substantive significance upon birth rights, yet we fawn all over royal births and deaths; […]