A Day on the Telephone

Yesterday I spent a lot of the time on the telephone. Mark, a man I used to work with, called; and said he had talked to our former employer’s benefit department and verified that we now have a donut hole in our prescription coverage. He also cleared up the confusion we had on how to fill out the forms. We talked for a while and Mark mentioned that his wife has a first cousin who lives in my neighborhood. He told me her name, and it sounded very familiar. A woman with that name had lived two doors away from me until the early nineties. She had moved away from Beaumont. Mark gave me her phone number, and I called her. She was my old neighbor and remembered me. Her husband had died, and she moved back to Beaumont. Small world!

I decided to stop worrying about the donut hole. As long as my health remains good, it will not cause me any problems. I cannot control the future so worrying about it will accomplish nothing. I finished filling out the health insurance forms, made a copy and went to the post office. The line was almost to the door. I found the forms for certified mail and return receipt and filled them out. The line grew longer while I was doing this. I glanced over at the automated post office machine. There was just one person using it. I walked over and read that you could use the machine for certified mail. I went up to the machine and was working through the process to mail my letter. A postal clerk came up and put more forms in the machine while I was working. She must have seen my gray hair and assumed I was a technologically challenged individual. She just took over what I was doing. The machine crashed. She stepped through everything again, and it crashed again. I sweetly said, “I will get in line.” I stood in the line for twenty minutes. When I got to the counter, the clerk seemed amazed that I had already filled out the forms. She looked them over and seemed even more amazed that the forms were filled out correctly.

I had not checked on the progress on the West Beaumont branch of the Bank of America for a couple of weeks. I still have not got into my safe deposit box since Hurricane Rita because the bank has been closed. The bank is still closed, but part of the parking lot is now open and the mobile bank has returned so at least there is an ATM again. The exterior work on the building is complete. I was able to see through the door, and they are completely redoing the interior. I asked a construction worker when the bank would reopen, and he said after the first of the year. I got a check in the mail yesterday so I am going to have to drive to the Broadway banking center to make a deposit. This is really inconvenient.

Friday when I had talked to our old human resources manager, I mentioned that I had visited Sun City Texas in Georgetown last week. He told me that Luther had moved there. I did a Yahoo People search on Luther and found his phone number in Georgetown. I called and had a nice chat with Luther’s wife about Sun City. She gave me some very good information. I wish I had made contact with them before my visit last week.

The mailman rang my doorbell and had my package from L.L. Bean, and the rest of the day’s mail. For many years we had a terrible mail person on our route. The man who has it now is a jewel. I hope he stays for a long time. The shoulder bag from Bean is really nice and was almost worth the wait.