What's Going On: Medicare Advantage, Gift Ideas from Fine Wines and Good Spirits, Beyoncé

The deadline is fast approaching to sign up for Medicare. Whether you qualify as a person 65 or older or you want to support a senior in signing up - I have an interview that will tell you what you need to know plus information about Medicare Advantage. I speak to Theresa Lauer, Vice President of Medicare Marketing & Sales for Independence Blue Cross.
https://www.ibx.com/medicare

Desperate for gift ideas during this holiday season? My go to is wine or spirits and we'll be getting tips from Liz Tarditi, Wine Specialist for Fine Wine & Good Spirits. https://www.finewineandgoodspirits.com/

First a segment from the archives about The Queen Bee herself. I chat with New York Times bestselling biographer J. Randy Taraborrelli about the first comprehensive biography ever published about America's favorite living pop icon, Beyoncé.
Becoming Beyonce

Episode Transcript

(00:00):
Good morning, Welcome to What's goingon? A show about making a difference
in our lives and our communities.I'm Lorraine Balladmorrel. The deadline is approaching
to sign up for Medicare, whetheryou're eligible or want to support a senior
in signing up. I have aninterview that will tell you what you need
to know, plus information about Medicareadvantage. Desperate for gift ideas during this

(00:22):
holiday season, my go to aswine or spirits. We'll be getting tips
from a wine and spirits specialist.First, a segment from the archives about
the Queen Bee herself, Beyonce.I do have on the line Jay Randy
Terra Borelli, who is an extraordinarywriter of biographies. He's done a lot

(00:42):
of biographies you probably have heard about, like After Camelot, The Secret Life
of Marilyn Monroe, Elizabeth Jackie,ethel Joan, Women of Camelot, Sinatra,
The Behind the Legend. He's writtenso many amazing, interesting books that
Michael Jackson The Magic, the Madness, the Whole Story is perhaps one of
the most well known books that hehas written. And we have him on

(01:04):
the line right now because he haswritten a new book called Becoming Beyonce The
Untold Story. Randy, thank youso much for joining us today. Thank
you very much for having me.Before we get into the specifics of this
book, i'd really be very interestedin hearing what draws you to write books
about the most famous people. It'snot only biographies of people that are famous.

(01:27):
These are all icons that you've writtenabout and try to create a sense
of who they were. What drewyou to that, Well, I'm fascinated
by people just generally, and Ithink what's really fascinating are celebrities who,
despite the fact that they're so highprofile, still remain enigmatic. And most

(01:52):
certainly in the case of Beyonce,you know that certainly holds true. This
is a woman who is so activein social media and such, uh you
know, such a presence in headlinenews. Yet despite all of that,
we really don't know a lot abouther at all. And for a for
a woman, an entertainer like that, she's golden for a biographer to,

(02:15):
you know, delve into the waythat I was able to with her.
So to answer your question, I'mfascinated by the idea of biography being in
the great leveler. In other words, at the end of the day.
What I really think about is whatare celebrities contemplating when they go to bed
at night and they're laying in They'relaying in bed alone, and they're staring

(02:38):
at the ceiling. You know what, what what are those moments like,
I'm not so interested in what's happeningon the set of movies or what's going
on in the recording studios. Ithink my readers know that they're not going
to that. That's never going tobe the emphasis of any book that I
write. The emphasis is always goingto be on the person's personal life and

(02:59):
on their family life. So let'stalk a bit about that element of fame
that we often can't get behind.Because someone like Beyonce, someone like Michael
Jackson or Frank Sinatra, they havea persona that we become very Marilyn Monroe.
We become so ingrained in the imagethat we have no sense of what

(03:24):
people are as individuals, the realfeelings that they have, the sincere feelings,
and in some cases, perhaps theimage and the reality of the person
sometimes ends up merging. Maybe thereis no there there, you know what
I mean. But I wonder ifyou could tell us a little bit about
about what you found out about Beyonce, because she comes across she's very private,

(03:49):
clearly, and she has this personathat is so fierce, but she's
a human being. What did youfind out about the human being that is
Beyonce. Well, you know,when I started the book, was a
fan of Beyonces, like we allare, but I really knew nothing about
her at all. I had interviewedher in the past, and she came
across as very nice and humble,and I actually I sort of imagined that

(04:10):
she was just an easy going girlwho maybe was a bit of a pushover,
who had been sort of molded andcreated by her father. I mean
that was sort of my impression.I think that that's most people's impression of
Beyonce, and I found that noneof that turned out to be true.
I mean I basically learned that,you know, she has been a co

(04:31):
creator of her persona and her imagefrom the time that she was about eleven
years old with her dad, thatshe has always been very focused and directed,
and she was not molded by herfather in any way. In fact,
she and her dad went up againsteach other all the time creatively in

(04:53):
terms of what she wanted and whathe wanted for her. She just was
a very determined young girl. Aninteresting story in my book, when she
was eleven years old, she andMatthew Knowles, her dad, were sitting
across from each other in the kitchentable, eating ice cream, trying to
make a decision as to whether ornot one of the girls in the group,

(05:13):
Lettrya Luckett should stay or be fired. And at that point, Beyonce,
she was only eleven, and shewas, you know, at the
helm of these kinds of decisions.So what I found is that she,
you know, she's much more powerfuland formidable than I would have imagined.
I was thinking she was more alongthe lines of, you know, Britney

(05:33):
Spears or a person, you know, a child star who had been coaxed
and coached and prodded and along theway by her stage mother and father.
And that's not Beyonce's story at all. You talk about the breakup between Beyonce

(05:54):
and her dad, what led tothat and what do you think the impact
of that for her? Well,you know, Beyonce and her dad were
sort of the ultimate show business duo. I mean, I don't think any
father daughter in history has ever achievedwhat they achieved together, both with Destiny's

(06:15):
Child and as a solo artist.But what happened I explained it thoroughly in
the book, but to give itto you in quick brush strokes, Beyonce's
promoter accused Matthew Knowles of stealing moneyfrom Beyonce and forced her into a terrible
situation whereby she had to audit herfather. And when the results of the

(06:35):
audit came back, they suggested thatMatthew had stolen money, even though he
vehemently denied it and continues to denyit to this day. And she was
left with no choice but to firehim as her manager. And if you
understand how close these two people areand what they meant to each other over

(06:56):
a period of about twenty years ofworking together, or you can imagine how
devastating this was not only for Beyonce, but for Matthew as well. And
so this family drama plays out inexplicit detail in my book. Is there
any reconciliation or hope of reconciliation,Well, you know, Beyonce has since

(07:18):
she had her own child, BlueIvy. You know, my information is
that she has sort of a differentview of parenthood and of what she means
to her dad. And I thinkthat when you have a child of your
own, you begin to look atthose kinds of relationships with parent daughter relationships

(07:41):
in a whole different way. Andyeah, so from what I understand that,
you know, they do talk,they do communicate, there are work
they are working on it, butit's not what it was, and who
knows, maybe it will be better. I mean, that's that's always the
hope. All right, let's talkabout her relationship with jay Z. One
thing that I think some people mightbe surprised about is it's not like she

(08:03):
dated a lot of people before shemet jay Z. Right. Well,
that was a surprise for me aswell, because of her sort of sexually
charged stage persona. I figured probablyand she'd had a whole lot of lovers
along the way. I know,when I wrote about Madonna, you know,
I had to you know, sortof keep an alphabetical list, you

(08:26):
know, And so I thought Iwas going to be facing the same situation
with Beyonce. And what I learnedis that she had only had one relationship
prior to jay Z, and thatwas with Lyndall Locke, her boyfriend in
Houston. Texas that she began todate when she was twelve and he was
fourteen, and they continued dating untilshe was in her early twenties, and

(08:48):
she went right from Lyndall to jayZ. So, you know, I
thought that that was quite a surprise. It's I say a lot about her
as a woman, and about theway she was raised east and about her
loyalty just in general. In fact, there were many people that I interviewed
for the book who felt that afterthey broke up, if Linda had tried

(09:09):
just a little bit harder, shewould still be with him today. The
elevator incident is one we still talkabout, and that's the one where I
guess the security camera caught Beyonce,Solange, and jay Z in an elevator
together and there was there was alittle bit of violence that occurred with Solange,

(09:31):
and of course we'll never know,will we what happened? But what
did that incident tell you about Beyonceand her personality? Well, it told
me. The incident in the elevatortold me so much as a biographer about
the true nature of the characters ofBeyonce and Solange and even jay Z.

(09:52):
But whether old sisters are concerned.What we saw in the elevator basically was
Beyonce sort of suppressing her in motionsand being you know, very sort of
polite and decorous, very much likeher mother. And we saw salone living
her life out loud, you know, impassioned, uh, badass in every

(10:13):
way, if you will, verymuch like her father. And these were
two women who were raised in thesame household, who are exact opposites.
And you know, it's so unusualfor celebrities to reveal themselves that way on
camera, and of course they didn'tknow they were being filmed, and so
we were really privy to, youknow, this sort of dynamic playing out

(10:35):
in view of the whole world,much to their later dismay, but much
too, sort of the enthusiasm ofthe entire world, who was riveted by
that footage for what's going on.I remember seeing a Chinese news report where
they did a computer animation recreation ofplastic crazy. I know, listen,

(11:01):
this book is thick, it's big, it's detailed, and you've talked to
a lot of folks. How didyou get people to talk about Beyonce to
reveal well, you know, thisis my eighteenth book and I've been lucky
enough to have had a long career. I've had fourteen New York Times bestsellers,
and you know, I've reached apoint in my career I'm happy to
say where people trust me. It'snot as much of a struggle as it

(11:24):
was when I was a kid knockingon doors trying to get people to know
who I am. Today, ifyou really want to know anything about me,
all you have to do is pickup, you know, one of
my books, and you will knoweverything there is to know about me,
because I am as present in mybooks as my subjects are. You will
see that I you know, Iwrite an objective account that's you know,

(11:46):
as empathetic as possible, and youwill understand that my intentions are always pure
with the biography, and that isreally my best calling card. I have
to say that whenever I send aper and I want to interview a copy
of my most recent book, theanswer that comes back is usually yes.
So I think that my work speaksfor itself and it's helped me an awful

(12:11):
lot in sort of breaking down barriers. Well, I want to thank you
so much for joining us today.It's Jay Randy Terra Borelli, who's written
the first comprehensive biography ever published aboutAmerica's favorite living pop icon, Beyonce,
and the book is called Becoming BeyonceThe Untold Story. It's not a hatchet
job, but it's a very detailedand very nuanced look at the woman that

(12:33):
we see as Sasha Fearce. Thankyou so much for joining us today.
Thank you so much. I reallyappreciate it. It's the holiday season,
the giving season, and a triedand true present for friends, family,

(12:54):
and colleagues. Wine and spirits.They're timeless and sophistic making them versatile gifts
for even the hard to please.Ultimately, the act of giving wine and
spirit reflect a gesture of appreciation,adding an extra layer of warmth and connection
to the gift giving experience. Togive us some advice on gifting ideas,

(13:16):
we are joined by Fine Wine andGood Spirits wine specialists Liz Tarditi. Liz,
thank you so much for joining ushere today. This is always one
of my favorite things to do everyyear, is to talk to you all.
Thank you so much. Lorraine.It's great to be here. So
we are speaking to you from oneof the locations. Where are we speaking
to you from I am in thePhoenix Films store. I'm right here on

(13:37):
the floor of the store. Yeah, so if you hear any tingling in
the background, that is the reasonwhy. Well, Liz, let's talk
about some of the ideas for giftgiving. There is traditional you can always
give a bottle of wine or abottle of spirits, but you have some
special packages that people can take advantageof. Tell Us More. We do
this time of year. We havesome great holiday gifts that everyone should know

(14:01):
about and love. We have boxsets of different spirits that have mugs in
them, or glasses or special shakers. We have candy canes filled with fireball
and cocktail kits. Our holiday productsthis time of year just offer a great
array of different things, even thingsfor eagles lovers. Oh really, tell

(14:22):
us More. Both Absolute and Jamisonhave go birds and they have an eagles
glass and with their product, andit comes free. It's the same price
as the bottle for any fan.This is something not to miss. Oh
wow, that sounds pretty great.You know. Another cool thing, and
I've done this in the past,is there's so many celebrity endorsed wines and

(14:46):
spirits, so you can actually givea Francis Ford Coppola wine or someone from
the Grateful Dead, I think theyhave a wine or spirit they do,
Yeah, tell us, tell usabout jan bon Jovi has Hampton Water,
which is a wonderful rose from thesouth of France, from the Provence area.
It's crisp and delightful and citrusy delicious. This is where someone like you

(15:09):
comes in because I personally do notknow very much about wine and spirits,
so I really do rely on anexpert to tell me what direction to go
in. So tell us. Soif someone walks into one of your fine
wine and good spirit stores, whatshould they look at for when they speak
to someone like you? First ofall, people like me, the wine

(15:31):
specialists are in all of your premiumstores and we love helping you, so
we can help you make that specialselection. But if we are not there,
go to the Chairman's Selection because thatis a curated collection by our wine
experts. It is one of thebest programs, the Chairman's Selection. It's

(15:52):
unique to Pennsylvania. What it isis we buy were phenomenal wines at great
and so you automatically get a savings, but they're also very highly rated and
you can see the ratings right there. Every single Chairman's Selection in the collection
has a great sign in front ofit. It will tell you whether it's

(16:15):
dry or sweet. It will tellyou if it's oaky or unoaked. It
will give you a great feel forthe flavor profile. When you're gifting to
friends or when you're pairing your holidaymeals, the Chairman's selection, all the
work is done for you. It'sa sure thing, right and plus,
you have a lot of items thatwould make great stocking stuffers. We do.

(16:40):
So. We have a lot ofsmall things like minis and we have
a fireball candy cane that has abunch of minis in it. We have
small packs and cocktail sets, cocktailmaking sets, anything you can imagine that
you could give as gifts perfect forhere and for those who are a little
crafty and I'm one of those people. You'd actually have an aspect on your

(17:06):
website that can help people with ideasand how to create crafts utilizing your products.
We do. We have Fineline GoodSpirits. That's fwgs dot com and
you can go there for craft cocktailrecipes. We also this year have a
mini's wreath. There's a YouTube tutorial. We're on YouTube, We're on all

(17:30):
of your social media, and youcan find different craft cocktail recipes, different
crafts to do for the holidays tojust make it more happier, right.
And if you're like me, Ido a traditional koquito every year, and
I'm always making my trip to FineOne and Good Spirits and filling up my
shopping cart with some excellent rum toinclude in the recipes. So there's a

(17:56):
lot of gifts like that that youcan prepare on your own, being a
little bit creative that give it apersonal touch. Absolutely, and this is
the time of year where you mightwant to splurge a little bit on what
you buy, especially when you're gifting. And we definitely have those premium products
that everyone's looking for, Tequilas,bourbons, rom definitely. And for those

(18:19):
out there who would actually rather shopfrom home, there is that option as
well. There is it's a wonderfulprogram where if you buy more than ninety
nine dollars on our website, itwill ship for free right to your home.
Otherwise you can ship it to thestore and just come in with your
ID and pick it up. It'sthat simple, and there's much more on

(18:42):
our Fine winean Goodspirits dot com thancould ever be in a single brick and
mortar store. So if you reallywant to see the full array of products
for fine Wine and Good Spirits,definitely visit our website. Any final words
before we close, I would justsay everyone, please drink responsibly. We
want to see you in the newyear, Stay happy and safe and thank

(19:07):
you and cheers. Great way toend our interview. And again, what
better way to gift for those veryhard to gift people than find Wine and
Good Spirits. And this is theplace to go. What's that website?
One more time FWGS dot com.Thank you so much for joining us here
today find Wine and Good Spirits winespecialists. Liz Tarditi, thanks for joining

(19:32):
us today. Thank you for havingme. We're in the final stretch of
the Medicare annual enrollment period, whichends on December seventh. At this time,
Medicare beneficiaries can take a look attheir coverage and decide whether they want
to stay with the same plan forthe coming year or make a switch.

(19:55):
Plan changes will go into effect onJanuary first. To give us an update
on everything we need to know aboutMedicare and Medicare advantage. We have Teres
Allow, vice president of Medicare Marketingand Sales for Independence Blue Cross. Well,
thank you so much for joining ushere today. Thank you Lorain,
nice to meet you. Well,this is a good conversation to have not
only for our seniors, but thosewho support our seniors, because sometimes we

(20:18):
need some of the younger folks tosupport the older folks. So let's talk
about the basics. What age arefolks eligible to enroll in Medicare. Most
folks become eligible for Medicare when they'returning sixty five, So you wouldn't start
to enroll in Medicare three months beforeyour sixty fifth birthday, the month of
your sixty fifth birthday, or threemonths after. That's the initial election period.

(20:40):
But there are other opportunities where somebodycould become eligible for Medicaid that it
could be under sixty five. Forexample, if you are on disability and
you become Medicare eligible. That isone way, all right. What are
the different parts of Medicare and whatdo they cover? So Medicare I like
to consider has four parts. Youhave your Part A benefits, which is
all of your hospital benefits. Youhave your Part B, which you consider

(21:02):
to be all your doctor services andtests and so on and so forth.
In some drugs. Medicare Parts Cis what we call Medicare Advantage, and
those are plans that are sold throughprivate insurers like Independence, Blue Cross and
Medicare Part D is your pharmacy Partd RX prescription drugs. All right,
we're going to get to Medicare Advantagein just a minute. The annual enrollment
period, as we mentioned, endson the seventh of December, and so

(21:26):
if you miss it, what happensif you miss it? There are other
opportunities for you to make a changethat typically happens between January first and March
thirty first of the following year.So in our case for right now,
if you happen to miss signing upor re electing another Medicare Advantage plan,
you can make one time election betweenJanuary first of twenty twenty four and March

(21:49):
thirty first of twenty twenty four,and now it will become effective the following
month that you've made your coverage decision. All right, now, original Medicare
Parts A and B, may Icover all of your healthcare needs and a
lot of folks choose to enroll anadditional coverage such as Medicare Advantage plans or
supplemental insurance to fill the gaps.Now I can tell you from personal experience

(22:11):
how important having really good insurance,what difference it makes. I went from
an insurance policy that was kind ofminimal to actually independence boo cross. So
I go to the doctor more oftenbecause I see that I have a zero
copay or very inexpensive go copay.So for me, as I'm getting more

(22:33):
senior, I am very interested instaying healthy. So that's where I think
Medicare advantage comes in because it doesoffer additional advantages in terms of what it's
covering that might make again coverage moreincentivized for folks like me. So let's
talk about Medicare advantage. You dooffer a program, tell us what it

(22:56):
covers and what people need to knowabout it. Yeah. So today,
right now, we cover a littleover one hundred and eight thousand Medicare Advantage
lives in our southeastern Pennsylvania marketplace.And so we've been deeply rooted inside of
Philadelphia for over eighty five years ensuringour communities and making sure that we have
access to the largest networks available sayingfor pharmacy and being able to work with

(23:19):
community partners and helping to make ourcommunities have a difference and a meaningful difference.
We do this by trying to addresswhole person health. So going back
to what you were saying about howMedicare advantage can give you more or how
health coverage can give you more thanjust what Medicare Part AM Part B can
give our Medicare Advantage plans can coverthings such as routine dental vision and hearing

(23:41):
coverage. You can also get anover account allowance that you can use out
of pharmacy. It's a separate debitcard like style. You can go directly
into that pharmacy, pick your itemsoff the shelf that are approved, swipe
the car and walk out with yourover the counter and being able to offset
those costs that you would traditionally haveto take out of your own piggy bank.

(24:03):
We also offer additional things like agym membership which includes all of the
YMCAs in the Southeastern area, soyou can live active and be independent and
age gracefully in place. Those aresome of the reasons why Medicare Advantage plans
go above and beyond your traditional MedicarePart A and Part D, as well
as giving you other opportunities to wrapeverything together into a one card solution that

(24:26):
includes your medical all your additional ansellary benefits, and your Part D prescription
drugs for one low cost or nocost at all. Talk about the cost
of Medicare advantage. What are thethings that people need to know about that?
So we have a range of premiumsand a variety of different products.
We have products that go from zeropremium up to mid tier and higher priced

(24:48):
products that are available. We alsocarry HMOs and we carry PPOs. So
right now we have a very lusciousPPO product line that offers you things such
as all the answllery benefits mentioned before. We have plans that can give back
to your Social Security chapter, yourPart B give back. We also have

(25:10):
HMO plans that are sturdy in ourkeystone product line that have been around for
quite some time and who have obviouslya lot of advantages when it comes to
network and the breath of the network, and all of these have no deductibles
and no referrals. Well, let'stalk about that again. I can't even
tell you, I can't even beginto tell you what a difference it makes
to not have to worry about amassive bill or a huge copay or a

(25:33):
huge deductible, and that is forme such an important factor as I age
gracefully and want to make sure thatI have all of my checkups done,
that I go to the dentist,that I go to the eye doctor,
because all of those things contribute tohealthy aging, isn't that right? They
are, And we also want tofocus on access to because it's critically important.

(25:56):
You have to make sure that whenyou're making a decision your doctors,
your hospitals, parcies and how fastyou can get into those services or those
providers is important. You can't bewaiting around months or weeks and so to
be able to get in. Sowe offer a variety of different network types,
right, so you can go tothe traditional brick and bordar doctor,
or we have online resources through telemedicinewhich allow you to get medical, behavioral

(26:21):
health and dermatology visits through our vendorservice. So there's a variety different ways
for you to be able to getcare. Everything is cost monitored, so
it's predictable if you remain in network, you're going to know exactly what your
costs are going to be. Andif you decide on our Ppo product line
to go out of network, well, you can leverage our Blue Cross and
Blue Shield Association network across the countryto be able to access care while you're

(26:45):
away from home. It's really importantto keep all these things in mind and
also ensure that you have a trustedpartner when it matters most same thing with
our registered Health Coast, you cancall any of these different variety of resources
to be able to get somebody tospeak to and help you navigate through situations
that you might not feel that you'reable to do on your own. If

(27:06):
people want to find out more aboutwhich plan works best for them, how
do they find out more? Yeah, it's simple. You can go to
ivxmdicare dot com to learn more.On that web page, you'll be a
phone number. You can connect withus over the phone. You can have
somebody come out to your home ifyou would like to have a kitchen table
conversation, or you can viewer optionsall online at home on your own device.

(27:30):
So there's a variety of different waysfor you to get in contact with
us and for us to be ableto keep the conversation going with you,
fantastic, Any final words before we'reclothes. Just it's really important right now
to make the right decision based offof how your health and financial needs have
changed. You're not in this alone. If a member or a Medicare beneficiary
has any questions, we are hereto help you because we are that community

(27:52):
resource and that neighborhood sponsor that wantsto be that person that's able to support
you through these times. So atany point in time, if you have
any questions at all, anybody canreach out. We're here to help.
Teres Allow, our vice president ofMedicare Marketing and Sales for Independence Blue Cross,
thank you so much. Thank you, Loraine. You can listen to
all of today's interviews by going toour station website and typing in keyword Community.

(28:15):
You can also listen on the iHeartRadioapp Keywords Philadelphia Community Podcast. Follow
me on Twitter and Instagram at LorraineBallard. I'm Lorraine Ballard MOREL and I
stand for service to our community andmedia that empowers. What will you stand
for? You've been listening to what'sgoing on, and thank you