There Goes The Neighborhood

I met my future neighbor today. She may have just passed muster.

I was leaving for work, and as the garage door was opening I spied a car at the end of my driveway. My real estate agent was in the passenger side, so I approached to say hi. It turns out that she and the newest resident of the neighborhood were stopping by her house (which is still under construction) to check on it's progress. Here's some examples of the conversation that lead me to believe she may be a better time than the rest of my neighborhood:

• Have you guys thrown any good parties yet? Once I'm moved in, you better invite me.
  
• Do you know how to drink? I make a mean martini.
  
• (real estate agent) told me you have a hot tub. Can I use it whenever I want?
  

This seems promising, because so far our neighbors across the street have done nothing but give us the ol' stink eye. Of course, when Don'tworryaboutit is in an absinthe haze and screaming about 'fist-fucking' most Saturday nights, this doesn't surprise me.

Saturday Sampler

Today at the pharmacy was busy, as all the pill-poppers are still ramping up for the holiday season. Getting through family gatherings sans Xanax and Vicodin can be a daunting, miserable pursuit. People came to see me not only to procure apothecary goods, but also knowledge.

Woman: Where is the expiration date on these batteries? I can't find it.

The batteries are at the front of the Corpopharm that I work in. The pharmacy is located in the back. That means this woman picked up the batteries and then wandered aimlessly to the farthest possible point within the confines of the store from where she started to find yours truly. I guess it was meant to be.

Me: I don't know. I don't know a thing about batteries.

She appeared defeated, but only for a second. She perked up and soldiered on:

Woman: It's usually printed right on the package! Where is it?!?

I stood there, struggling with the urge to tear out her ovaries, disabling her ability to reproduce retarded battery seeking offspring. Reason ruled out, and I settled for a subtle if indirect insult:

Me: They probably last forever. At that price, you can't afford not to buy them.

By 11 AM, it was sleeting. By 1 PM, it was snowing. In my area of the country, precipitation reduces driving IQ by an average of 40 points. I've previously lived a few degrees latitude north of here. As such this weather seems pretty mild to me. To these people the weather today meant the storm of century. I expected this would keep people off the roads and out of my pharmacy. No such luck. The good times just kept pouring in.

One couple brought in a shitload of scripts from a hospital discharge. At first they loitered by the blood pressure monitor, staring at it as if it was some kind of torture device. Being the caring pharmacist that I am, I interluded.

Me: Do you guys have any prescriptions to drop off?
Guy: Well yeah!!

Shit, pardon me. They proceeded to hand off a stack of scripts that Dr. McShittyhandwriting apparently had his epileptic monkey transcribe for him. Hoo-ray. A note to anyone reading this: the quality of your physicians penmanship is directly proportional to how much they like you. I decided to ask the most obvious question you can ask in a pharmacy:

Me: Are you guys going to wait for these or come back later?
Lady (with guy): I'm not going back out there! The weather's terrible!

I would tell most people that brought me 10 brand new scripts to fly a kite if they planned on waiting for them. 10 new prescriptions can take some time, and I wanted to makes sure my two newest friends had realistic expectations.

Me: It will be at least a half hour to get all these ready. You guys can have a seat and I'll call you when they're ready.

The lady rolled her eyes, and the guy favored me with a scowl. I love people.

Spiffy Takes PIC, Gets Partner

PIC means pharmacist in charge. By law, each and every pharmacy in George's America must have a PIC. The PIC has several responsibilities that they must perform to conform to pharmacy rules and regulations. I would go into detail, but it's incredibly boring. For those of you outside of the pharmacy, this may sound like a promotion. Don't be fooled. The PIC title basicly saddles you with more responsibility and less freedom.

The good news is that now I have a partner. No, not the gay kind. Since I started in my pharmacy in July I've been the only full time pharmacist. My pharmacy is open 88 hours each week. I'm there around 50 usually. This means that for the hours I am not here, Corpopharm has supplied me with 'floater' pharmacists. 'Floaters' are pharmacists that are employed by Corpopharm to fill in the gaps at pharmacies that are not fully staffed. They work in different pharmacies every day, and are generally the shitiest pharmacists you'll find within any company. Here's some examples of the quality work floaters have done in my pharmacy.

Floater A informs Patient A that his prescription isn't ready yet because of an insurance issue. Patient A asks for an explanation. Floater A threatens to call the police.

Floater B doesn't like how often the phone is ringing. He proceeds to walk around the pharmacy unplugging handsets from the telephones and depositing them in trash.

Floater C explains to me that she took back a frozen vaccine that had been dispensed to a patient because it didn't feel cold. I open up the freezer, remove an icepack that is frozen solid and sitting adjacent to the vaccine, and ask her what it is. Floater C responds: 'An icepack'. I respond: 'Keep repeating that until you get it'.

Floater D tells me as I'm walking into the pharmacy that there's a patient on hold with a question. I Floater D why they aren't taking care of it, and Floater D responds ,'I don't know the answer, I've just kept putting them on hold the last 10 minutes.'

I wish I were making this shit up.

The Kegerator Misadventure: Part 1

It was Friday, 4 PM. I had gotten done counting pills at 2 and had just completed my run when Don'tworryaboutit called me.

DWAI: Dude, we have to get up north. The appliance store closes at 5.
Me: What the shit? You said they were open until 6.
DWAI: Well, I was wrong. Get moving. *click*

I was sitting at my computer sweating. It takes me a good 20 minutes to cool off after running. Today, there would be no such time allowance. The time for greatness had come.

You see, 2 weeks earlier, Don'tworryaboutit, myself, and Risk were picking out the appliances for our house. A helpful young lady showed us all the options for the standard washer, dryer, and other such domestic niceties. She could have told us said appliances aborted children while simultaneously destroying the ozone layer. We mostly just said yes, yes, yes, and fine. Hey, we're guys. Everything looked pretty much the same. The more expensive models all had more buttons and dials, but didn't really seem to do much more. All except one. Suddenly, Risk livened and gestured to the far end of the display room. His tone was inquisitive yet determined:

How much for the kegerator?

-Kegerator is a slang term for a a keg (usually of beer) stored inside of a refrigerator in order to keep the keg chilled. In most cases, the user is able to tap the keg without opening the door because of specially drilled holes.
en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Kegerator

There it stood. A majestic, gleaming monument to consumption. The American Dream wrapped in stainless steel flowing with freon. Needless to say, we were all smitten. We bought it on the spot, with one exception. It lacked an essential part (the CO2 tank) that would need to be ordered from the outlet's supplier. Fine. The wait would be approximately one week. Long enough to consider what we had done and come to terms with a few more years of alcoholism.

I got up from my desk, showered, and drove to DWAIs in a frenzy. It was 4:36, and traffic heading north out of the city at that time of day was sluggish at best. I spent most of the drive screaming obscenities and shaking my fist angrily at commuters. I don't think it actually saved me any time.

DWAI made it to the appliance store by 4:55. It was the classic let's-hurry-the-customers-the-fuck-up-and-get-the-store-closed Friday afternoon drill. So, we grabbed the fridge and carried it out to DWAIs car. The moment of truth had come. DWAI drives a Subaru Outback, which is basically a downsized minivan. Whether or not the fridge would fit was questionable. God as my witness, it made it by about 2 centimeters. We almost had to remove the tapper.

10 minutes later we were back at DWAIs and had the fridge moved into his living room. We were still missing 2 crucial elements to the keg fridge equation. One was the keg of beer. The other was CO2 for our cannister. Getting ahold of the keg and fridge had been no problem, but the CO2 for the cannister was not an easy thing to come by at 6pm on a Friday evening in my metro area. It was time to get persuasive...

This weekend in Vegas I...

...had my first drink of the day no later than 1 pm every day.

...got told by an 80 year old lady in Caesar's poker room that I was 'full of shit'.

...had my first In-N-Out-Burger. Awesome.

...gave Humpty Dumpty the finger.

...got kicked out of a VIP area at V bar because I wasn't purchasing bottle service. Assholes.

...played penny slots for major profits ($10).

...got questioned about my personal drug usage history by pharmacy residents.

...viewed an exhibit of plasticized human bodies. Sweet.

...had my drinking habits questioned by numerous 3-6 limit poker players at Caesar's. Talk about judgmental, I'm on vacation.

Spiffy gone

In 24 hours, I will be on the Las Vegas strip, drinking Singapore Slings with mescal on the side(that taste of burnt driftwood will be awful and wonderful simultaneously). Corpopharm will be so far away that my senses will no longer perceive it. I will achieve singularity and sanity in the same moment.

My hope for the weekend is that I will be a horrendous wreck, even by Vegas standards. My only plan so far is to spend enough time in the poker room at Caesar's to consume a baker's dozen of White Russians. That seems like an attainable goal.

I may not return to the real world after this. Vaya con dios.

Spiffy Tired

Corpopharm is stealing my life, and I'm not entirely sure how it happened. Last week I worked 64 hours and this week I'll have 44 hours by Wednesday night. All I've done in the last 10 days is count pills, explain Medicare D plans and erupt in the occasional emotional outburst. Here's an example, as seen from the eyes of Giggles, my lead technician:

Me (checking a script. Suddenly, I slam my fist into my keyboard and offer a few eloquent curses) Ratfink! COCKMASTER!!!
Giggles: Uh, Spiffy, what...
Me: Some asshole stole my phone list again!! WHAT THE FUCK!?!?!

I have a phone directory of the all the Corpopharms in my metro area. This phone directory sits at my workstation with other important pharmacy equipment. This includes my calculator, my fish bowl (it holds crap that I leave to deal with when I'm not busy), and my script pads. The only other people that occupy my work station are pharmacists. As the simplest explanation is most often the correct one, this leads me to believe that some floater pharmacist walked off with my phone directory. This, my friends, is not acceptable.

Having a phone directory is important because people call me all the time and expect me to give them the phone number, directions to, and to-the-pill drug inventories of Corpopharms in Bumfuck, Egypt. Here's my usual response:

Me: I don't know. Call 411.

I say this because it is inappropriate for the general public to assume that their pharmacist is a phone directory, and has nothing better to do than play operator all day. Moreover, I don't have the time. I keep the phone list because sometimes it is important to get people connected to the proper pharmacy in a timely manner so that they can get their boner pills or early Norco refill.

After the above mentioned fit, I walked around the rest of the day with a set jaw and clenched fists. At that point, I had been working far too much and just didn't want to be in the pharmacy that day. It was sort of a straw that broke the camel's back situation. My phone list had been pilfered a few times already, and that time just set me off. It was actually pretty amazing. People would approach the pharmacy, see me, and suddenly veer off as if it suddenly seemed wiser to not engage me conversation. I need to get pissed more often.

After leaving work that day, I realized it was a bit silly to become so upset over a trivial event. I came back to work the next day to discover a note that I'd attached to my new phone list in response to the recent larceny. Apparently I was in quite a fury, because I don't remember doing it:

If you take this phone list, I will find you and burn your house down. Love, Spiffy.

Work in my pharmacy at your own risk.