No, you can NOT punch Santa...even if he's MAN-SPLAINING.

Good afternoon all!

Two blogs in two days?  What is going on?

My life. The weirdness in my life. I live it, take note of it, and report back to you.  That's how this works.  And this time, this blog has been certified FUNNY by Hubby and Serena (not her real name, but she knows who she is because I told her this story over bad whiskey sours earlier this week.)

So, I was at the grocery store on Monday, the Meijer store in my town.  I like the Meijer store. I used to like Woodman's, and then I found Meijer, which is cleaner, less crowded, and tends to have enough cashiers on to handle the check out duties.  Also, the produce department doesn't smell funny.  

At Meijer they have door greeters. Like Walmart, but less...no, wait. These greeters are just as funky as the ones at Walmart.  There's one woman who sounds like she's on a looped tape:  "Welcome to Meijer...haha...have a great day..haha."  Every ten seconds.

There's the guy who pushes his cane in a shopping cart.  Think about that for a minute.  HE. PUSHES. HIS. CANE. IN. A. SHOPPING. CART.

And then there's Santa Guy. Santa Guy is exactly what he sounds like: A guy working at Meijer who looks like Santa...at least from the neck up.

What?  Santa can't have an off season job?  

Anyway, back to my story.  

So I'm shopping and I find a couple pins that would work for my mom's art.  She does this really cool thing with old jewelry and picture frames.  If I see jewelry on clearance I'll pick pieces up for her.  Such was the case on Monday.  I found two small star pins, about the size of the top of my thumbs.  80 cents each.  I tossed them in with the rest of my groceries and went through the checkout line.

I don't know if I'm alone in this, but I don't spend a lot of time staring at how the cashier is loading my shopping bags. I'm busy typing in my ID number so I can get all the coupons and bonus savings and what not, and then I watch the screen to make sure all that gets to my total.  By the time the bags are in my cart again, I barely have a clear picture of everything I bought.

My cart after grocery shopping. No, not feeding an army...just four people...

In order to leave the store, I have to walk past Greeter Santa Guy. I wave at him and say, "You too!" when he says, "Thanks for Shopping at Meijer."  (Because that's what you do, right Brian Regan?)

As I walk between the two security posts the red lights flash and the beepers go off.  I do that thing where you look around to see who tried to shoplift something...and I realize it's me.

So now Santa Guy is walking closer to me.  I pull my cart back to him, no small task, and I say, "I'm not sure what set off the alarms, but I did buy a couple pins so maybe that?"

Santa guy:  That might do it. They can't remove the security tag on jewelry.

Me: Well here's my receipt (I pull it out of my pocket).

Santa Guy:  (scanning) Yes, I see it. You paid for two pins.

Me:  80 cents each.

Santa Guy: Yes.

Me:  Great. Have a nice day.

Santa Guy:  We have to find those pins.

Me:  What?

Santa Guy:  We have to find the pins, in your groceries.

Me:  I haven't a clue where she put two pins in the ten bags in this cart.

Santa Guy starts digging around in my cart. So I start digging two.  At this point, finally, a SECURITY lady huffs up to us.

Santa Guy:  She set off the alarm, she bought two pins.

Me:  80 cents each.

Security Lady: That'll do it.

AND SHE WALKS AWAY.

Now, I've told him what I got. He knows I paid for them. And the security lady doesn't see to care.  So why am I standing in front of an open door at Meijer on a hot day, digging through all of my groceries, (WHICH INCLUDE SOME FEMININE PUNCTUATION ITEMS) with Santa Guy?

But, dig we must, apparently, so dig we did.  While other shoppers passed us, staring at me like I'm a criminal, Santa Guy and I opened and pawed through every single bag until finally...just under the Feminine Punctuation products (or course) we found the pins.

That should have been the end of it. And had it been, there probably would have been no blog.  But this is where it all goes really sideways in my brain.

(I should note I typically do not think of the way the older generations talk as condescending. Language is an evolving thing...people typically are not when it comes to their habits. If they did evolve, then the phrase "should've went" would be dead. But it's not.)

Anyway, Santa Guy picks up the pins and points out the black security tag on the back of each one.  "That's what set off the alarms," he says.

Now, he's still holding the bag with the items and he's still holding my receipt.

Santa Guy: I want you to watch what I'm doing now.

Me: Okay.  (Waiting for a magic trick or some coupons or something for my trouble)

Santa Guy:  I'm taking the receipt and I'm putting it in this bag with the pins so that you don't have the trouble you just had.

Me:  (Wait, you mean I might get stopped again by you if I walk three feet to my left and try to leave the store in the next ten seconds?  Really?)

Santa Guy:  And now I want you to see what I'm doing.. Are you watching?

Me:  (Starting to chew on the inside of my mouth) Yes...

Santa Guy:  I'm tying the handles of the bag together so the receipt won't blow out of the bag and you won't lose it.

O-M-G  I just got MANSPLAINED BY SANTA.

(Those of you who don't know what Mansplaining is...just Google it.)

I soooooooooo wanted to punch Santa Guy right in the face.  And I'm so not a violent person...not really. Sure, I'm going to probably kill him in an upcoming novel, but that' not violence, it's literature. Or it will be in a 100 years when they teach my novels in college classes.

Instead of punching Santa and getting put on the naughty list, I turned out to make my escape. If course... I set off the alarm again, since NO ONE at Meijer is apparently able to remove the security tags from jewelry.

But hey, Santa Guy smiled at me the way you would smile a cute puppy who has just chewed on your worst enemies' shoe.  And he said, in the tenderest of condescending voices, "You're fine now, you can go along."

Oh, and as for that security tag no one could remove?  While I was telling hubby this story, I held one of the pins in my hand and tugged lightly on the tag to prove it could not be removed. It fell off in my hands.

Happy weekend everyone!

Hey, Foot Doc, YOU'RE FIRED!

Good day to all!

Before I begin my rant on the state of the American Health Care System as it pertains to my foot, can we acknowledge how hard it was for me to find a meme with the words "You're Fired" that did NOT involve the current president?

Thank you.

Now then, on to my rant.

So last week I went to my podiatrist for a check up. After almost six weeks of Franken Boot and treatment by PPTB, it was time to check in with the doctor.  No fake names here, because I feel the public must be warned against bad medicine.

My history (this time around) with Dr. Tracy Coulter is as follows:

First appointment:  Sent to X-ray immediately without more than a couple questions as to what kind of pain I was feeling.  ("The arch of my foot hurts.")

After a glance at the X-ray, she actually looked at my foot, touched it, had me stand on it, and then said she knew exactly what it was, that it was a tendon, not a bone.

Could have done that in six minutes, (which, by the way, is the exact amount of time she's spent with me at each of my appointments), without the cost of the X-rays.

Told me to wear a boot, didn't bother to tell me to get a lift for the other foot, had to find that out on my own AFTER my hips started hurting.

Sent me to PT, which was fine. I felt things were starting to get better. Went in to have her look at it.

She showed up 24 minutes late for the appointment.  It was supposed to be a ten minute appointment at 2:30.  Her check in desk assured me she was not running behind.  She showed up 24 minutes late, without apology or explanation.  

She then asked if I'd gone to PT. I said yes. She spent two minutes (I timed her) looking at the computer records and then admitting that I had, indeed, gone.  Basically treated me like a liar.

In the remaining four minutes of her precious time, she poked my ankle, asked if it hurt. Of course it did, she JABBED MY ANKLE.  

She told me to schedule an MRI.  She spent more time putting on gloves on both hands than she spent actually examining my foot.

So on Tuesday of this week I went and got an MRI.  

On Wednesday, her nurse called with the results.  The MRI showed a slight tear, which we were expecting.  Then she read me Dr. Coulter's Notes.  Here they are:

Because she did not improve with walking boot and PT, she could try a brace, but still continue with PT.
Otherwise she has to consider surgery to address.

Very definitive results and thoughts indeed.  Glad I'm paying her for this. Here's the thing:  How do we know the tear isn't improving?

Baby boot: 

They billed my insurance $99 for this thing which is basically an elastic sock with no toes. I have several pairs of those I got online for about $10.  I also have about six miles of ACE bandages in my medicine closet. If those worked, I wouldn't have needed a podiatrist in the first place.

The nurse who called me told me I should come up to the Sussex office to pick up the "brace" (25 minute drive as opposed to the closer office which is ten minutes) and get there before 2:30 because Dr. Coulter was gone for the week and she, the nurse was leaving at 2:30.  ( I work until 2)

So I raced up to Sussex yesterday to get this brace that was going to help since I hadn't shown improvement.  Still, how would she know if what she saw was an improvement??  She took X-rays first, then sent me to PT, then did an MRI...that's...what's the word...BACKWARDS?  I mean, the minute she decided it was not a bone, shouldn't she have schedule an MRI to get a baseline measure of the injury and then decide if I was improving or not?

Especially since her grand total time of actually looking at my foot is 12 minutes over two appointments.

So now I'm in what I call the "Baby Boot." But ponder this:  I asked the nurse if I was supposed to where BB INSTEAD OF Franken Boot or in addition to.  Her answer?

"Whatever you think works best.  I don't know how much pain you're in."

Isn't that sort of the problem? Not just with this doctor and her staff, but with the whole system?  Run tons of expensive tests, don't listen to or trust the patient, and never, ever, find out how much pain they're in.  Take time to put on gloves but don't take time to fully examine the foot once the gloves are on.

And hey, if you're not sure...dump the patient off to surgery rather than spend time explaining anything.

I don't have a medical degree.  I have a BS in Elementary Education, which means I can teach first graders how to spell their names and do basic addition.  But I didn't need a medical degree to diagnose my progress yesterday. Instead, I did the one foot test. And I stood on one foot without crushing pain.

Then I walked down a flight of stairs, in the normal manner, not sideways like I've been doing for the last six months.  And my foot didn't scream in pain.

So...I'm guessing that I have, indeed, improved. Which I could have told her, had she asked me that question last week instead of jamming her finger into my ankle and asking if that hurt.

So, since Dr. Coulter is out of town, and her nurse has left my medical choices up to me, here's my plan:

1) Fire Dr. Coulter.

2) Go to a couple more Pt sessions with PPTB because...well...he's pretty. Also, because he's the one professional in this scenario who has actually been helpful and I trust his opinion.

3) Continue wearing Franken Boot outside the house with Baby Boot underneath because that seems to feel good and wear Baby Boot and a normal shoe in the house for the same reason.

4) Live my life as a normal human.

I used to think the American Health Care system was good, solid, and that it was the insurance companies who were the problem, and that the doctors and nurses were doing their level best to operate within a system that tied their hands and limited their time.  But I'm starting to think maybe there are doctors out there who simply don't give a crap and are more interested in ordering tests than actually talking to their patients. This is a new feeling for me.  I don't like it.

I am, however, laughing about it. I do enjoy a good, soul cleansing rant.