Friday, November 15, 2013

Patients, Please have Patience!

This is the snooty part of town. People demand to be waited on immediately, no matter what you're doing. You could be providing life-saving CPR to grandma, but you better damn well stop to get someone's freaking Ambien off the shelf for them.

My pharmacy is long and narrow. It has a drop-off window at one end and a pick-up window at the other end.  How people get these two terms confused is beyond me, but that's ok, we deal with it. I'm talking about something else right now. If I'm at one end of the pharmacy, working on something, helping someone, trying to bite off a piece of my sandwich, or whatever, and someone comes up to the other end of the pharmacy, that's when the fun begins.

Some people are very forward an announce their arrival. "Hello? HELLO?!" (The second "hello" is always louder and more forceful despite the fact that they didn't even give me a chance to respond to the first "hello.") 

Then there are the people with the fake cough... apparently they think this is somehow more "polite." Nevertheless it is still annoying. 

One thing more annoying is the knocking on the counter.  For some reason it is a "knock... knock... knock." One knock with one hand, following by a second knock with the other hand, then back to the first hand for a third knock. So many people do this that it can't be a coincidence. There must be some secret "knock... knock... knock" school out there for taking control of any situation.

But the third thing...  this annoys me beyond belief. I'm gritting my teeth even thinking about it. It drives me insane. If I ever start packing a gun at the pharmacy this will be a sad day for the next person who does this...  the KEY RATTLING! They walk up to the counter. Most will just drop their keys on the counter. Others play with them. It drives me INSANE and normally I'm fairly sane. Serenity now! Serenity now! (obscure TV sitcom reference).

What's all this for? Getting helped a total of 30 seconds faster than if you just stood there and I noticed you. I spend my day at the pharmacy like a Green Beret looking for an invader. I scan the horizon constantly waiting to provide superior customer service. I do see out of the back of my head too and I know when you're there... I just might be helping someone else. I'll get to you.  Patient, CALM DOWN!

5 comments:

Anonymous said...

I... never knew that my natural nervous figiting was a demand for attention D:

Anonymous said...

At least you don't have drive-thru. It doesn't matter that the sensor alerts us to someone pulling up, they always ALWAYS push the damn bell to ring the phones. They must drive up with their window down and arm already sticking out of the window, ready to push that button before their car comes to a complete stop.

Anonymous said...

Seinfeld :)

Abigail Cashelle said...

In the clients' defense, not all retail pharmacies have the different window system. One pharmacy that I went to very often just had three windows, all of which were the same (and all of which were next to each other.) It wasn't necessarily efficient, but nobody got confused standing in the wrong line.

Anonymous said...

You know, the more I read your blog, the more I want to show up at your pharmacy and be a stellar customer and make your day. :)