[CindyLou]

Good luck with your nerve conduction tests today Abbe, and I hope you get lucky too! Thank-you for your kind words as well.

Chuck, I hope you don't find me "ungrateful" for pursuing and hoping for the whole compensation. I'm allowed to be disappointed, and $67,540 divided in half, and after taxes is more like $18,000 to $19,000, not $33,000. (we pay huge state taxes here in Minnesota) So, yeah, I'm more than a little disappointed, but I'll get over it. But I don't appreciate your words or tone, which implies to me that: #1, you consider me a whiner, and more importantly, #2, I am not at liberty to express myself honestly on this board.

Things are getting a little dicey with this whole thing because: my husband has had a more difficult time with it, and decided he wanted to write to the lady at HR, expressing his disappointment with the final decision. Well, she shot him an email back saying "how dare he be disappointed" blah, blah, blah, and putting the Pres. of the co. in this difficult position. And then where she really went WRONG, was she cc'ed a copy of it to Rick's boss (who knows nothing of this whole thing because, hello, HIPA)! and of course cc-ing it to the Pres., which she should. So, needless to say, my husband is livid for the HIPA violation, and I suspect he will request a meeting w/ the Pres. today. I had also remembered one night when I wasn't sleeping well, that she told me she had talked to her husband about it, asking him if he would have spent $70,000 on her if she had a bad back, and he said yes. Another HIPA violation, talking to her husband, who we also happen to have a relationship with as our insurance agent! What a mess. I sure hope my husband doesn't get fired today.