I don’t know what sort of plague has befallen me of late, but I seem to have suffered here lately from spate of experiences with inferior customer service by several companies that I’ve had the misfortune of choosing to do business with. I don’t understand why this has come on all of a sudden. I really hadn’t experienced such a bad run of poor service before in my life. Maybe it’s because only recently I decided to stop beaing such a cheapskate all the time and actually go buy some stuff.

I’ll discuss the least distressful one first, and after you read this and realize that the others must be worse, you’ll wonder how I haven’t found myself a semi-automatic and gone postal at some company’s customer service center by now.

This first episode involved a prescription that I had purchased at the pharmacy of a major discount store which shall remain nameless but rhymes with “fart”. Upon my arrival home with said prescription, I quickly noticed that it had come with no instructions as to the dosage. I looked all over the package, and all it said were “refer to enclosed dosage instructions”, of which there were none.

So, I called the main number of this major discount store, and explained my issue to the person who answered. She put me on hold and then transferred me to the automotive department. I explained to the person who answered how I had been misconnected, and he said he would transfer me back to the operator. In the transition, the line went dead.

Following this slightly aggrivating incident, I came up with what I thought to be a clever ploy to circumvent this harrowing system. I called back, this time explaining to the operator that I had a problem with the tires I had just purchased. Surely this would get me connected to the pharmacy so that I could obtain the vital instructions that could very well prevent my death by a drug overdose had I tried to guess how much of the medicine to take. No such luck- my call was transferred to sporting goods.

Now, this was starting to become a game for me, and I was bound and determined to reach the end of this telecommunications maze and claim my prize- “Take twice daily with water before meals”, or something like that. So, in my next call, I explained that I had a problem with my new fishing pole. Off to hardware.

Called back to say they mixed the wrong color paint- off to lawn and garden.

This pattern repeated itself for a few more rounds until it all came to an abrupt end with a transfer to lingerie. I simply could not bring myself to calling back with the explanation that I had a problem with my bra strap.

I was beaten!

As for the prescription? A few minutes on the good’ ol Internet and I find what I need at the pharmacutical company’s web site.

Some say that computers are no substitiute for people. It appears that, at times, the opposite is also true.

Stay tuned for more hair-curling customer dis-service stories!

When you get to the age where you are officially over the hill, there’s two things for sure that happen. One, gravity works a lot better. (This is true for both sexes.) Secondly, doctors start performing more and more tests on you so that they can better monitor your slow but sure demise.

During my last annual physical, my doctor informed me that I was now at the age where I should get a colonoscopy for precautionary measures. Now, the procedure itself didn’t seem so bad, but the preparation sounded like sheer hell. They put you on a diet where the delicacies are chicken broth and popsicles (and even then cherry is taboo), and you spend all day on the throne. You become, as Larry the Cable Guy puts it, “King of the Poopers.”

He referrerd me to a specialist who performs these procedures, and I managed to ignore the messages from the nurse who called several times to schedule the appointment. I could not, however, ignore my wife’s encouragements to get the deed done. I must say, she looks out for my health a lot more than I do myself. I like to think it’s because she loves me so much, but I really believe it’s just a sign that I’m not carrying enough life insurance.

I managed to procrastinate for about six months, but, seeing that my lady wouldn’t let up, I finally caved. Today was the big day. So, yesterday was “the prep”. The instructions are to drink a half gallon of this concoction that’s supposed to clean you out. I hadn’t drank so much fluid so fast since I was on the eight man keg team for my college fraternity. I felt like I had swallowed Lake Ponchartrain.

That wasn’t the worst part of it, though. That evening, it was our turn to work the bingo for the Knights of Columbus. I have a ritual for this duty. I start off in the kitchen cooking the cheeseburgers. Being the chef, I always treat myself to a nice big double cheeseburger, smothered with fried onions, mustard, and lettuce. So here I am cooking and smelling these cheeseburgers, denied my usual pleasure. I glance back to see my wife at the other end of the kitchen, snickering as she prepares the popcorn (which is my normal desert, another pleasure that I am denied on this particular evening).

So today I go through the procedure, and I’m given a clean bill of health. That doesn’t surprise me, given the special high fiber cereal that she always feeds me for breakfast. It tastes like I’m eating pine bark mulch with a few nuts tossed in.

On my way out, the nurse warns me to consume light meals for the next day or so. Screw that; I made a beeline out of the clinic straight to Logan’s Roadhouse for a big steak and french fries.

Having endured this ordeal, I think that I’m going to go out and get a supplimental life insurance policy. That way I ought to be able to smoke and drink to my heart’s content, and avoid the doctor’s office without my wife’s objections.

What can I say? I like to live my life according to the lyrics of Jimmy Buffett songs. There’s one that goes:

“I’d rather die while I’m living than live while I’m dead.”

There sure is a lot of discussion these days about the health care reform bill that congress is currently working on.

I don’t think I’ve seen so much public debate on any topic since opinions flared over who should have won the last American Idol.

The only thing about this bill that everybody agrees about is that it’s got a lot of pages. It’s got so many pages, in fact, that not a single member of Congress has had time to read it. For all they know, it could require a patient to get a second opinion from a witch doctor before undergoing any surgical procedure. Or, dread the thought, it may even contain a provision that places a cap on the size of breast implants. (We wouldn’t have had to worry about that under any Clinton plan.)

This would be a direct threat to our American way of life. We might as well be living under the rule of the Taliban.

So, there is intensive argument from both sides of the aisle regarding a bill that none of them know anything about. That’s nothing new; to do it any differently would break from decades of American tradition. After all, congressmen are very busy people. They have to attend many important hearings, like the ones where they scold auto executives for not coming from Detriot on bicycles. And when they’re not doing that, they have to pour through brochures from Lear and Cessna so they can make an informed decision on where to spend the next $500 million that they’ve borrowed from the Chinese for new congressional jets.

One argument that you hear a lot is that the bill would lead eventually to nationalized health care, and if that happened, it would seriously jeopardize the quality of care that we enjoy here in the U.S. This is a legitamite concern. After all, it’s well know that, among other things, our doctors’ offices are equipped with the most high-tech tongue depressors in the world. The way I hear some people talk about it, with nationalized health care, we might end up having recycled popsickle sticks shoved down our throats whenever we say, “Ahhh.”

On the other hand, I, for one, don’t think I’d be a happy camper if the government were my only option for health insurance. Judging from the tax form I have to fill out every year, I could just imagine what the insurance application would be like:

“Enter on line 28 the number of prescription medications that you take. If the number is two or more (three if you are married and applying jointly), fill out the worksheet on page 62 of the instructions to determine if you are required to submit form 3307A with this application.”

No thanks; I think I’d rather die young. On second thought, I think it’s too late for that.