Friday, July 30, 2010
Johnson City Record Courier :  : Hometown of President Lyndon Baines Johnson
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Come on down, your pills are ready

Being that I am several years older than the invention of rope, I require a handful of pills each day to keep my body functioning well enough to have an enjoyable life.

When I got all the prescriptions written several years ago, I carried them down to the local big chain supermarket’s pharmacy. They were happy to get my business. They even had a robot telephone answering machine that would take my order for pills. This worked pretty well until they “improved” their service by offering a plan that would have the computer keep track of what pills I was taking and how many and would email me when the new supply was ready.

The only catch was the “improved” service never worked. I would run out of pills and there would be no email in the bin telling me to “Come on down, your pills are ready”.

When I went in person to the “pharmacy” in question to see where my pills were I was told, “It is not our fault”. If I questioned that statement I was told I was being rude.

After this happened about twice in two months I moved my prescriptions to the big national chain store up the road. This place didn’t do any better than the first place.

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My next option was to arrange with my prescription drug provider to have my pills mailed to me. This would require only slightly less paper work than Congress puts out every month. It would also require trips to my doctors to get written permission and instructions for the pills. Doctors don’t write prescriptions for free.

I was about ready to start the paper work when I thought of a little drug store on the square in Blanco. I went by there and they were happy to get my business.

Now let me give you an example of how this has worked out. This morning, before eight o’clock, I called the drugstore and told their robot I needed some pills. Before three this afternoon, a nice lady in a little truck brought my pills to my door. I have never in about a year placed an order with the little drug store that has been filled later than the next day.

I’m not going to tell you the name of the drug store because I fear that if their business gets too good they will grow to the point where they no longer can take care of their customers..

Bigger is not always better.

John Raven