I haven’t been eating the way that I should lately, so, my blood sugar was a little high when the doctor checked it last week. As a result, my doctor declared me to be diabetic and wants me to test my blood sugar twice a day at home in an effort to get those levels back down. And to accomplish this, he wrote me a prescription for the complete blood sugar testing kit. Great!

When I took the prescription to Meijer’s (regional grocery chain), they said that everything was covered by my insurance except for the actual meter. Rats! I figured that those little meters would be rather expensive so I was delighted to find that they were only $20.

I wondered how they could afford to sell such a complicated and delicate piece of equipment for only $20. But then I saw the price of the test strips. At over a dollar a piece, they were going to make their money on their proprietary test strips and not on their proprietary meters. But, since the test strips are covered by insurance, I guess I don’t really care.

When I got the meter home and took it out of the box, I discovered that there was a 100 pages of instructions. Wow! The ads on TV show the guy just touching his finger to the test strip and the numbers pop up in seconds. Well, I guess it is more complicated than the ads show.

About 70 pages into the manual, I discover that the meter has an infrared unit for transferring data to your PC. And since the meter came with a CD, I figured that the software needed for the PC came on it. Not so. The CD shows you how the software would work if you had the software.

The software can be purchased from the company for $40. I guess, for $40 dollars, I can load the readings into my own spread sheet.

Well, I am sure that the blood testing will provide ample material for my blog.