It wasn’t the best 24 hours of our vacation in Fort Lauderdale.
My wife had developed an earache and a sore throat. We abandoned our tourist agenda and headed for nearby Broward Medical and Urgent Care. My wife was seen promptly by Dr. Chau Nguyen and she walked out of the office clutching two prescriptions.. One prescription we were able to fill immediately at a nearby Walgreens. The next would take overnight.
And then some.
When we went to pick up the prescription the next day it wasn’t ready for two reasons:
First, we hadn’t paid (or been asked to pay) in advance. And,
Second, they didn’t have the ingredients. Would “after 2 the NEXT day” be ok? It wasn’t, so they transferred the prescription to another nearby pharmacy in their chain and told us it would be ready in two hours.
I suggested a little sun might be good idea so we headed for a fast food chicken place I remembered to pick up food for an impromptu picnic at Hugh Taylor Birch State Park. After a longer drive than I remembered it to be, we came to the chicken place. It was closed for remodeling. Nevertheless, a person was patiently waiting in the drive-thru lane for someone to take her order.
Next door was a Burger King. Not our first choice, but it was convenient and didn’t appear to be busy. Only one car ahead of us in the drive-thru. Even so, it took awhile before it was our turn. And then it took quite awhile longer before they took our order.
I ignored my better judgement and waited.
We placed our order and pulled around the corner to find two cars waiting for their food ahead of us. By the time we got to the window, there was a pickup truck and a car waiting behind us.
“Be right with you!” said the lady working the window cheerfully.
And we waited some more.
Then the honking began.
First, I thought it was the guy in the pickup behind us. The honking continued. If anyone has any suggestions about how to hurry when waiting for a very simple order at a drive-thru window I would be interested. The honking continued until a woman two cars behind us had had enough. She veered out of line, pulled alongside of us, and hollered “What the f*** is taking so long?”
This was a woman in a hurry for a whopper.
The window clerk politely hollered back “We are slammed and doing the best we can!” to which the impatient whopper-craver hollered another rude comment. Use your imagination.
The drive-thru attendant then hollered “Have a blessed day!” as the honking woman beside us accelerated out of the parking lot.
Whew! That’s a big departure from the normal “Would you like fries with that?” drive-thru dialogue.
Thru the window came our bag of food. I thanked the lady and off we headed to our picnic site.
On the way we encountered a work zone traffic jam. As we slowed, an SUV suddenly swerved into our lane in front of us causing me to slow much more abruptly. Prominently displayed on the back window of the SUV was a sticker that said “BE NICE”.
Nearing Birch State Park, my wife got an email. Her prescription was ready. Things were looking up. We found a picnic table alongside the Intracoastal Waterway which borders the park on the west. and had our hard-earned, not exactly hot by then, lunch. Soaking up the sun, we watched boats pass, some of which cost more than many people would earn in a lifetime.
Feeling refreshed after a meal, some sunshine, and the absence of any high-volume arguments, we headed to the pharmacy to pick up my wife’s prescription.
“Be ready in 10 minutes!” the attendant said.
“But we got an email saying it was ready” I responded.
“It was wrong” said the attendant. “Come back in 10 minutes.”
With the wisdom displayed on the back window of a crappy driver I nearly rear-ended running through my mind, I pulled around, parked in the warm sunshine, and cooled my jets.
“Be Nice!”
It sounds a lot easier than it is some times.
The View From the Other Side of the Hill 