The Day of Atonement, Yom Kippur, is a very long day. Even when we had services in person, there was a break between roughly 1-3pm – that was even more necessary this year, with services on TV. But it’s not exactly a break – instead, there are always study sessions and opportunities to reflect. Or you can go home and take a nap, which we’ve been known to do!

This year, Rabbi Hugh Seid-Valencia from Jewish Silicon Valley led a session on Jewish mindfulness meditation, and both Diane and I attended. There was a short focusing meditation, then some discussion, then a 15-minute meditation, and that was it. Rabbi Hugh suggested meditating on the breath, since it’s always with you; I tried it, and the 15 minutes went by very quickly indeed. Thoughts came into my mind and left on their own; I felt refreshed afterwards.

I’ve been meditating almost every day since Yom Kippur. It’s a wonderful way to spend the time between getting a desensitizing shot and being allowed to leave (it’s certainly better than looking at Facebook and Twitter). And it’s a change of pace – a quiet time.

Today, we’re flying East for my 50th Reunion. We splurged and got seats at the front of the plane, so there’s a bit of room. They fed us soon after takeoff; we have several hours before landing, so we both meditated for part of the time. Noise-cancelling headphones helped – people are talking, but I’d have to try to hear them well enough to understand what they were saying, so I could ignore them (the same as when I meditate at the allergy clinic). When I opened my eyes, I discovered that a flight attendant had come by and taken away my empty cup, so I guess I was really focused on my breath and not the world around me!

When we arrived at Washington National, I was pleasantly surprised to find a comment on yesterday’s entry from the founder of RxGo explaining the price discrepancy I wrote about yesterday. It turns out that the list price of the toothpaste increases linearly with the number of tubes you get, but the discounted price doesn’t; I’d searched for the price of one tube ($10.56); the discounted price for three tubes is quoted at $16.67, which is more than I paid – a pleasant surprise indeed. You can read his entire reply here; thanks, Jeremy, for explaining what was going on and for providing a valuable service.

My ex-VP, John Patrick, sends out a weekly newsletter; last week’s edition was titled “How Big Is the Big Pharma Lobby?” and he covered some of the same territory I’d talked about at Toastmasters last week. He mentioned Amazon Pharmacy in that article; it looks good for long-term prescriptions when you have a few days of lead time. But if you need a prescription sooner, Amazon Pharmacy also offers a Prescription Discount Benefit card which works at CVS (and many other places).

We used the Amazon card at CVS a couple of days ago for a new prescription for Diane that wasn’t covered by her insurance; it cut the price by 70%.

Today, I needed to refill my prescription for high-strength fluoride toothpaste (not covered by my insurance). Amazon’s price, delivered, is $2.54 for a tube, but I didn’t have the time to wait for delivery, so I took the prescription to CVS. When I went to pick it up, the price on the bag was $47.99! Amazon’s card doesn’t cover this particular item, but others do – I picked RxGo which showed a price of $10.56 for one tube and gave the pharmacy the info. The clerk punched in the codes and told me that the new price was $14.71 – I decided that was ok (there are always weasel words on the cards saying that the prices are approximate) and paid.

When I got home, I discovered that there were three tubs in the bag, not one (the prescription was for a 90-day supply). So I wound up getting the toothpaste for a bit under $5/tube – less than half of the price that the discount card showed.

I’m very confused.