Medical Retirement from Federal Employment: Contested lives

We hear of such terms in specific linguistic contexts; of a “contested” divorce, or that a variable version of a testimony or evidence has been “contested”; or that the results of a certain race or game has been contested.  If you drop the affix placed after the stem of the word (i.e., the suffix or the “ed”), and emphasize the first syllable, it becomes a noun; whereas, if you engage in the identical mental exercise but intone upon the second syllable, it becomes a verb.  As a noun, it is normally relegated to a challenging game, a sport or perhaps some duel; […] Read More …

Disability Retirement for Federal Employees: The unmerited edge

And what did they all do to merit the position of harassing?  Merely a negation of something never earned:  Not getting sick; not becoming crippled with a medical condition; not having a medical disability.  Of what accolades should be showered for that?  Why is it that the person whose only success in life is a negation of nothingness, should have any edge at all, merited, unmerited or otherwise?  Life often makes no sense; and, while the concept of “fairness” is quite a subjective one, […] Read More …

Medical Retirement from Federal Employment: Scoffing paradigms

Of course, such a title can have a double entendre or duality of meanings – that, in the first instance, the accent is upon the word “scoffing” with a lowering of one’s voice upon “paradigms”, and that would mean: One turns up one’s nose at the very idea of paradigms. Or, alternatively, if both words are of equally monotonous tonal undulations, then it could mean that the paradigm itself is one which scoffs at other paradigms, differing principles or contrary perspectives. […] Read More …

OPM Disability Retirement Benefits for Federal Employees: The bugle

Unlike its cousins, it has no valves or pitch-altering devices, but must be modified through the movement of the lips, the extent of breath exhaled and the undulating modifications of combined muscles in the lips, tongue and throat.  Perhaps from the days of riding a horse in the cavalry, where playing an instrument while charging full force ahead on a horse stumbling across rough terrain forced the instrument’s player to modulate through strain of keeping one’s self from falling; in any event, its very lack of complexity belies the simplicity of the bugle, as appearances are indeed deceiving. […] Read More …

FERS & CSRS Disability Retirement: The Hangman’s Knot

The perfect knot is the most effective, and development of its features occurred over time through a science of art and an artistic employment of science. The placement of the knot behind which ear; the number of coils before they became an impediment; and the avoidance, at all costs, of trespassing upon superstitious beliefs and potentially supernatural reverberations — these were all taken into account in perfecting the science of the art. Its corollary, the art of the science, disregarded the efficacy of the knot; it was only the former which concerned itself with an objective evaluation of the results after each occurrence. […] Read More …