Okay, Not to be Over-Annoyed... BUT

You know how my pediatrician's office has been short on vaccinations since Jack was born? And they initially said they would call me when they came in or I could go to the Pasadena Health Center for like 15 dollars a shot. Not bad... I wanted to go on the list instead though. Of course - the list got chucked when there were NO hib shots for oh you know 10 months.

SO after being rebuffed by my own doctor's office I reluctantly call up the city.

And I go today.

My appointment is on the second floor at 2:30.

I get there at 2.

I check in with security on the first floor.

I follow a maze of signs to the elevator and go to the second floor.

I ask someone in order to figure out what window I'm supposed to go to. Its a wide open waiting room with a little stand up baby toy there. There is a mom and daughter there but no one else. It's not looking too bad.

I fill out paperwork and sit back down.

The other people get called.

Great.

I get called... and sent to...

Another waiting room twenty feet away.

A smaller one.

With fifteen people in it.

The nurse tells me with a straight face that there is ONE person ahead of me. Naive as I am I think hopefully that all these other people (except one of them) are being sent out to other departments.

Five minutes later the nurse sends in another mother/baby and says the same thing to them. I don't know how she lives with herself.

I start to get a bad feeling when I notice that everyone else has large yellow and white paperwork with them.

I hopefully think - maybe they had to pay in a different way then me. Maybe they'll let me pay when they call me.

Luckily I had pretty much given up on that hope after seeing several people get called - go the opposite way of the screaming behind the door where babies were getting shots and then come back varying times later with their snazzy paperwork.

Jack is wonderful but melting down is something he's seriously considering every five minutes or so.

An hour and a half later (I kid you not) they call my name. I don't get excited because I know I'm not close to out of there as many of those snazzy receipt holding people haven't been called since they came back.

In the office with administrators they tell me which shots Jack is lined up to get. I ask a question (since Jack was supposed to get the hib shot at 2 months and every two months after, do I continue that schedule even though he's almost 10 months) - bad idea. They don't know the answer so they just keep reading the same two lines of explanation at the bottom of the immunization chart hoping that that will make it sound like they sort of know the answer. It's FINE I insist, I'll ask a doctor, its not applicable to TODAY's issue... which is how do I get OUT OF HERE?

They give me a snazzy yellow paper... I have my credit card out hopefully.

Naive again.

No, no, I need to take this snazzy yellow paper go back DOWNSTAIRS next to security to the general cashier - wait in line and pay there and then he will give me my fancy paperwork.

I sigh and think - despite my anxiety this morning - I would be in tears by now if this were last year. I've come a long way. Jack, poor baby, is NOT happy and thinks I'm being completely unreasonable - I did not bring the wrap because I didn't think I'd need it... you see why it pays to be PESSIMISTIC?

I go DOWN the elevator, back through the maze of hallways and find - oh good - there are four people in line at the cashier. The person at the front is a pregnant woman arguing with the cashier about her birth certificate. Jack screams.

Luckily the three men in line have pity and all start making googly faces at Jack who appreciates this quite a bit. This seems to be a male bonding thing as they all translate Jack's screams into various comments about having to wait in line.

The woman, after taking a slow (challenging?) look towards the mob behind her eventually walks out.

The next guy has obviously done this before - shoves exact change and forms through the window and doesn't wait around. The next guy shoves a whole BUNCH of forms thru the window and too much payment which is fairly quickly sorted. The next guy could have started arguing because the policies were ridiculous but mercilessly let it go.

I went up there the same time that the phone rang... it was a personal call. He took it. He got disconnected... sucks for him.

Oh, but don't worry, they called back... and he took the call again.

I did get my snazzy paperwork though and I didn't cry or even get filled with rage.

I went back up to my small waiting room - had no way of knowing or checking on whether or not they'd called my name in my absence (there is no window in this waiting room - only a sliding wood door that cautions people from approaching).

Jack takes the rest of his bottle (another mercy - my water bottle was hot from the car) and goes to sleep. Poor guy. He is awoken only when the needles go in.

He thinks this is rude.

But he gets over it in time to flirt a bit with the nurse.

The nurse was great actually. But every other part sucked pretty much.

I'm supposed to go back in two months - the nurse confirmed that my doctor's office isn't making it up and the hib is indeed at a shortage.

I'm trying to find another way to get the hib without going through this again... because it was dumb.