Saturday morning, I had a coughing fit around 7:00. I wandered into the kitchen, just to be vertical for a few minutes, planning on going back to bed. I'd only been sleeping for three hours. This cough has kept me up even later than my usual 3:00 a.m. bedtime.
While in the kitchen, where I keep my everyday prescription meds, I decided to call in my refills. I had several left past the refill date. I'm not like Farmer H, who calls them in the day before he runs out. Sometimes the day after he has run out. Actually, he doesn't call his in at all, but drives the empty bottles there and drops them off and comes back for the refills.
Anyhoo... it's an automated number, so I punched in my refills, and the option to pick them up at the store. I always do that. No deliveries for me. The recording said they would be ready after 10:30. Which usually means AT 10:30, or before, from my many years of business with my pharmacy.
It was 10:00 when I re-crawled out of bed, not really refreshed by my intermittent six hours of slumber. I would have slept even later, but it's easier to cough sitting up than laying down. I puttered around with HIPPIE. Put away some laundry. Coughed. Got a text from my pharmacy at 11:09 that my three refills were ready. Okay. Good to know. I figured I could pick them up when I went to town. I watched some TV. Decided to take a shower. OH CRAP! It was SATURDAY! The pharmacy closed at 2:00. Or was it 1:00?
Well. It didn't really matter if I picked up the prescriptions that day, or waited until Monday. I had enough. But I was going to town anyway. I'd be there by 2:00. Maybe even 1:00. I might as well get it over with. I'd have to hustle, though, to get there by 1:00. If the pharmacy was closed, no big deal. But I might have something else I wanted to do on Monday...
I hurried around. Got showered and dressed. Gave Juno a quick pat and a few nuggets of cat kibble. Scurried to EmBee on my way out, finding only a single one-page glossy advertisement for the used car business that had sent out those troublesome fake keys last time. I put T-Hoe's pedal to the metal, and zoomed off to town.
It was 12:52 when I parked in front of my pharmacy. The sign on the door said it was open from 9:30 to 1:00 on Saturdays. The clerk behind the counter greeted me and rushed to help. She took my info, and went straight to the hanging alphabetized bags of orders waiting to be picked up in the drive-thru bay. Brought mine back, set it down, said the price, and TOOK MY DEBIT CARD! Yeah! I KNEW that was possible, even though the doofus who waited on me the previous two months said it couldn't take a debit card.
After entering my pin, and signing for the meds, I took back my debit card from the clerk. She pushed the stapled-shut paper bag across the counter, and said,
"Oh. We were short on one of your medicines. We owe you 25 pills. You can pick them up on Monday."
SWEET GUMMI MARY!
WHY did they send that text saying:
"3 of 3 Rx's ready for Hillbilly Mom at 11:08 AM. Thank you!"
Clearly, only 2 of 3 Rx's were ready! If I'd known that, I definitely would have waited until Monday to pick them up.
The tale of Monday's pick-up tomorrow.
Hick drops off his empty bottles and picks them up later; you get your refills into the empty original bottles? Our pills mostly come in boxes of blister packs. I we drop off the prescription on the day we need them we get a $1 discount, if we get them early to be sure we don't run out, the discount doesn't apply. I think that's to prevent people stocking up their pills and maybe selling them for drug money. I need to spend several hours tomorrow getting to and from the clinic where I get my prescriptions, it's only two suburbs away, but the bus doesn't go directly there. I have to get a bus to the city then a bus to the suburb and revers on the way home. Then at the clinic, there's usually a two hour wait to see a doctor. I'll have a nice fat book to read when I go.
ReplyDeleteRiver,
ReplyDeleteNo, he gets new bottles. He just drops off the bottles because they have the prescription numbers on them, and it's easier than punching in the numbers on the phone if he calls in. It would make more sense just to slap a new label on the bottle, and save the resources. I guess they don't know what residue might be in the bottles. Even though he'd be getting the same drug in them.
I need to make an appointment for the doctor (nurse practitioner), because this was my last refill. He gives me 6 months at a time, then I have to go back. I try to get the first appointment of the day. I hate to get up early, but I hate waiting more.
I don't like waiting until the last day for refills, just because sometimes the pharmacy is out of medicine! I hope you don't have to go back for the rest of a prescription. At least I just have a 10-minute drive.
Today's clinic wait was 3 1/2 hours. I'm going to look for a clinic closer to home. I can make an appointment at the far clinic and see a doctor at a specified time, but it's a two bus trip and if one or both buses are running late, I'd miss the appointment and still have to wait.
ReplyDeleteRiver,
ReplyDeleteOh! I'm sorry you had such a long wait. But at least you caught up on your reading. I think the longest wait I had was 2.5 hours. That's WITH an appointment, when I had to go after school when I was working. The longer the day goes, the farther they get behind.