30th June, 2008 (7:01 pm)
The Day With the Snarky Tosser
- Wake up. Shower. Put in contact lenses.
- Rub eye accidentally. Rip lens.
- Spend fifteen minutes trying to locate lens in back of eye.
- Find lens. Pull it out. Realise there’s 1/3 of it still missing.
- Frantically search for said missing piece across duvet and/or my person. It’s not there. Start hunt within eye. Not there either.
- Eye goes bright red. Decide to leave it for now as no longer in pain.
- Go to work.
- Get to work. Helpful colleague informs me of story where, once upon a time, right, there was this guy, right, and he, like, totally ripped his lens, right, and it got lost, right, and it got stuck, like, totally in his eye, right, and then the eye grew over it, right, and he, like, totally went blind or died or something.
- Panic.
- Decide to get an optometrist to check - just to be sure. There’s one near work.
- Leave work. Lose pay. Head to optometrists.
- Get to optometrist. Optometrist is not there. Get relocated to another different optometrist.
- Different optometrist is also not there (honestly, I need to be a fucking optician - they do nothing). Am told he’s ‘running errands’. Wait.
- Wait some more. Make small talk with Impossibly Irritating Receptionist.
- Impossibly Irritating Receptionist finally calls MIA optician after twenty-five fucking minutes. I ask the price. She says he probably won’t charge.
- Ten minutes later, the wanderer returns. Snarky Optician takes one look at me and barks to know what’s wrong. IIR tells him. He sighs - like my being there is possibly THE most annoying thing on the face of the planet, like I’m dogshit - and then informs me that ‘it’ll cost me’. Um, fine, I say - I don’t expect you to see me for free or anything. He curls one side of his lip and then ushers me into the ‘examination’ room.
- Examination room looks like something out of the fucking 1940s.
- Snarky Optician takes my details - cue his outrage that my usual optician is Specsavers. Outrage is temporarily tempered when he learns that I live TWENTY FUCKING MILES AWAY, therefore making his 1940s shithole considerably inconvenient for me. Apparently, even Snarky Optician’s can’t hold that against a person.
- Snarky Optician spends ten minutes checking my eye. No lens is located.
- He tells me that the usual price for a ’sight test’ is twenty-five quid. ($50).
- I have coronary and swallow urge to tell him that Specsavers is half the fucking price at eleven quid.
- He tells me that he’s going to cut me a deal - he doesn’t expect me to pay all that. I sigh with relief. He bestows me with the achingly generous discount of £5.
- I pale. He wants TWENTY POUNDS for a sight test I didn’t have - for TEN minutes fucking work? I swallow second urge - this time to punch him in his smug fucking face. But what can I do? I’m not his patient - which he reminds me when I question the price. Sorry - you should’ve gone to Specsavers he says, not looking remotely sorry at all. He then proceeds to accompany me out, as though I’m going to do a runner.
- I contemplate doing a runner.
- SO informs IIR of price. She gapes and is clearly embarrassed. I hand over my debit card, stony-faced. SO passes IIR my new ‘patient record’. I tell her not to bother, I’m not a fucking patient of his and won’t ever be back again.
- Realise I’m a pussy and don’t actually say that latter bit.
- Exit shop, all shaky and wobbly with rage. Stupid, impotent rage that I don’t direct in the direction it deserved. Fight angry, embarrassed tears short walk back to the office.
- Feel shaky and wobbly for rest of day. Have probably grown ulcer as result therefore.
- Now hope that lens is, in fact, still in eye so that when I do go blind, I can sue his pompous little arse. TOSSER.

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Comment by Amelie — 30 June, 2008 @ 9:49 pm
I call name and shame. That’s disgusting.
Comment by Pauline — 1 July, 2008 @ 12:37 am
Yikes, that doctor was an ass. Is your eye still irritated?
Comment by Tanya — 1 July, 2008 @ 9:15 am
Ugh, this is the reason why I won’t consider contacts.
Sorry for the disgusting treatment you were subjected to, surely there is someone you can report him to?
Comment by Claire — 1 July, 2008 @ 4:54 pm
£11 for a Specsavers eye test? - must be cheaper over in your neck of the woods - tis £18 for a Specsavers eye test here. (My non-Specsavers eye test was £32!)
Comment by Vixx — 1 July, 2008 @ 7:14 pm
I would if I knew what the damned place was called, Amelie!
Claire: Well . . . I may be twelve months out, but it’s around that price I think?! Least it was for me!!
Tanya: Yeah, I know! But if it helps, I’ve been wearing lens for 16 years and have only done that twice!
Pauline: Hello! No, it’s much better today, thanks. :)
V xx
Comment by sharon — 2 July, 2008 @ 9:52 pm
Wow. I guess that advert is right. You really should’ve gone to Specsavers ;)
Actually I think I might go there too if it’s only 11 quid for an eye test.
Comment by mary — 3 July, 2008 @ 10:14 pm
Aww you need a hug! I have so done that before, thought I lost a chunk of lens in my eye AND been freaked out by co-workers “experiences”. I’m glad is everything okay and I hope he … gets like… I don’t know… a really irritating thing like jock itch. Yeah! *shake fist* That’ll show his ass!!