It's been an interesting few days, and.....

I'd rather be bored!

The saga of the knee is being resolved. After phone calls and e-mails, I FINALLY got a call from the administrator of Dr. Israelite's practice to call me, and she feigned shock and surprise over my experience. "Oh, how could this happen in MY practice?" No answer needed. I also got an e-mail from the famous doctor, stating that he would correct his mistake in the dictated report (the wrong medication was put into the report, and he neither proofread the typed report nor checked it against the chart). Okay, onto the next.

I got my blood test results from my physical last week (my GP sends me records without needing reminders). The demon cholesterol is dropping nicely, thanks to the proper medication he recommended. The blood sugar is at 76!!!! Whoopppeeeee!!!!!!!!!! All is well on that front.

As a consumer, well, there's another story. I purchase a probiotic medication for my dog, who has colitis, from a firm in CA. It's far cheaper than my vet sells it, and it arrives FedEx! What can go wrong? Plenty! It was due to arrive last Friday, and I tracked the shipment. It was "On FedEx truck for delivery." All of a sudden, it was 4:30 - and no package. I called and was placed on hold forever. After numerous attempts, I finally got a supervisor, who admitted that the route was assigned to a "fill-in" driver, who didn't know the route and who simply returned to the terminal with a number of boxes undelivered - with no attempt made. Ya think maybe this half-brain-cell could have called the dispatcher for directions or asked for help? Nooooooo! I called the firm in CA to tell them that they were do a refund of their shipping charges. They were more than responsive and - get this - apologized for FedEx's screw-up. They refunded my delivery charge and assured me that they would go after FedEx and get their money back. Okay, my regular driver returned to work yesterday - and the medicine arrived safely. The important thing here is that I always order medicine and dog food long before her supply will run out, just in case something goes wrong.

Question: Why are things so blasted complicated?

Answer: MANAGEMENT! Youngsters graduate with an MBA, lots of rules and theories and NO practical experience in the actual field they're going to manage. So, their rules tell them how many people are needed to do a job and even how to do the job. Whatever you do: Don't ask those who do the work for input! The end result: under-staffed/under-qualified staff because the wages have dropped and the duties increased. That translates to dissatisfied customers, who have to chase after the simplest of things. If we don't fuss, then management doesn't see a problem, and the sloppy way of doing things and the lousy way of treating customers will stay.

So, maybe not having a boring week was good. Even if I'm the only one doing the fussing, it has to be a tip-off that there are more people who are unhappy with lousy service. Now, if everyone of us would start making those phone-calls, we could shake things up a bit.