"They'll know we're not here to buy anything but we just came to eat," lamented Marilynn. She looked around a bit, and I wondered if she was serious or not. "Do you want to pick them up and eat them like madmen in the car?"

"Let's just eat there. What do they care, anyway?" I replied. I mean, we're spending money, they have tables, and the ambiance of the place is so wonderful... well, two out of three ain't bad.

This didn't stop us from asking one another at least four times if there was anything we needed to buy while we were there. We didn't get anything, though. I mean, after all, "24" came on last night, so we had a strict deadline for coming back home!

The hot dog wasn't that impressive tonight. We've figured out what the difference is.

Sunday when we got hot dogs, the wieners were crisp, and the buns were warm and fresh, but that's because they fixed them fresh at the time we ordered. Last night she took a few out of a steamer and handed them to me. The buns stuck to the wieners, and the wieners, while tasty, didn't have that pleasant snap that we remembered.

So, like everything else with a Sam's Club or Wal-Mart establishment, volume of sales affects everything. If they're selling lots (like on Sunday afternoon), you get really good ones; last night they were just so-so.

And so ends the hot dog obsession.

Last night between hot dogs and returning home for mandatory Monday television, we dropped by the pharmacy to pick up her prescriptions. The problem is that they wouldn't let us have them, or at least not for the reasonable ten dollars each that her prescription drug plan allows.

"Your coverage comes back expired," the lady at the pharmacy explained, which didn't make much sense, but I suspected (as did Marilynn, I think) it had something to do with her short-term disability coverage running out.

Today Marilynn is finding out what the issue is with work, insurance, and disability coverage. What she's learning is upsetting her, and I here I am at work not making matters any better. From what I hear she's headed back to work, but her hours will suck slightly worse than what she had before, which is hard to believe. To make matters worse, this will make it hard to continue physical therapy where she had been going.

What it almost seems like is that they're playing games with her, which is quite bastardly. Either she can go on and get well but then she gets very substandard pay and her benefits lag, or she can go back to work and stop doing as much physical therapy. It's times and hard decisions like this that make me wish that she had her benefits through me and we had the wherewithal for her to just quit. Unfortunately, we don't.

However... I'll be working on her resumé tonight. Know anybody who needs a bright little monkey to work for 'em in the West Houston area?

restlessmind