Right after I wrote that entry last night (about the mystery of the cash-only Tracfone card), I realized that curiosity was going to eat away at me. So, I sent a comment to Rite Aid corporate headquarters via their web site.

Early this morning, I received an email reply. It thanked me for my comments, and informed me that they were being sent to the regional manager.

At the very end of the day today, I got a phone call at work from Phillip. He told me that there was a voicemail from Rite Aid, and that I should listen to it. As soon as Phillip hung up, I listened to the message. The regional manager had called a little past eleven this morning.

When I sent my comment last night, I started it with: "I'm writing to you, not with a complaint, but with a curiosity question." That part seemed to have gotten lost when my comment was passed along. The manager who called seemed to think I was angry with Rite Aid. He apologized at least eight times during his very long message.

Here's the district manager's answer: The manager of the store I'd gone to yesterday was on vacation, and the substitute manager must have misunderstood something, because it's never been Rite Aid policy to require cash only for Tracfone airtime cards. I am welcome to use a debit or credit card anytime I wish. There is something in the store - something I didn't quite understand, some kind of American Express card, or something - that does require cash to purchase, and the district manager offered that as a possible source of the misunderstanding. He promised to talk to the staff and make sure they understand the policies. He told me that the store manager may wish to contact me when he returns from his vacation. The district manager finished by saying that he hoped I will continue to be a Rite Aid customer.

Well, I am very impressed with Rite Aid's public relations. I hope that the mistaken idea that I'm an angry customer doesn't get anyone in trouble, and this talk the district manager has will not be a scolding.

I am a little baffled by what happened at Rite Aid today. It didn't annoy me - it just kept me thinking about it for the rest of the day. I walked over at lunch today to buy two things at Rite Aid: a Tracfone airtime card and shoelaces. (On a side track, why is it so difficult to find brown shoelaces in this city? Neither of the two QFC stores between work and home have any, and I bought the last pair Rite Aid had.) Above the Tracfone rack was a tiny sign reading: "Cash purchases only." That was OK with me, since I wasn't planning on using my credit card.

At the cash register, my sale was rung up, and as I started to swipe my debit card, the cashier stopped me by reminding me that Tracfone airtime cards can be purchased with cash only. Misunderstanding her, I explained that it was a debit card, not a credit card. The cashier explained that she meant what she said - only cash can be used. She wasn't rude about it at all - in fact, she was a little apologetic. "I know it doesn't make sense, but that's the rule." She added that I could use my debit card for the shoelaces, if I wished.

I paid for the airtime card and shoelaces with paper money, and thought about it for the rest of the day. What on earth? I know it's a Rite Aid policy, not a Tracfone one, since I've used debit cards at QFC & Fred Meyer (aka Kroger), Safeway, an ATM, and probably other places I can't remember right now - and, if I wanted to, I could use my credit card to buy airtime from the Tracfone web site. I wonder, though: Is the policy specific to that store, or to the chain?

What's the point of the policy? Until it's validated at the cash register, the Tracfone airtime card is useless, and after it's validated, it can't be returned, so why is a cash purchase better than anything else? I can't return a bottle of root beer after I've bought it, and yet I can purchase it with a debit card.

Here's my guess: Some Rite Aid executive, somewhere, who has never been in a Rite Aid store, thought it would solve some perceived issue.

I may have been awake at 01:02:03 04/05/06. I kept waking up all night, it seemed.

I have had jobs that I've been afraid to call in sick from - the fear being that it would make it that much more tempting to do the next time. My present job is not like that, yet. I've been at it for about nine months, I estimate. I didn't want to call in sick this morning, because of what I might miss. I had to, though. I was wiped out. My head was congested. It's not good for the patients for me to go into work sick. I haven't left the apartment at all today.

I'm riding the aftershocks of whatever illness I had last weekend. I no longer feel ill, exactly - just tired and generally grumpy. That's not the best condition to make a necklace, but I felt inspired when I got home.

I'm still learning the art of necklace making. The most difficult part of making a necklace, for me, is the clasp mechanism. The starting clasp tie-off is a whole lot easier than the last. Making a necklace, at this point in my learning curve, is a lot like playing a level of Diablo II. It's rather easy until the very end. It's like the difficulty jumps suddenly from 3 to 60.

I got through my necklace this evening with relative easy, then got frustrated by that final tie-off. I kept trying and trying to do it, failing each time. Even with Phillip's help, I just couldn't get it. Eventually, I failed enough that I destroyed the necklace and started over again. The second time went better, and after several wrong attempts, I got it finished pretty good - not professional quality, for sure, but good enough for my skill level.

The necklace looks great, I think.

Excuse of the day: Patient calls to reschedule the appointment she didn't show up for last Monday. I don't mention the fact that she's no-showed for at least five Monday appointments in a row, but the patient does. She also offers an excuse for missing those appointments: "I keep forgetting to re-set my clock for Daylight Savings Time."

Yesterday was our eighth anniversary. We went out to dinner at Galaria's (which is one of our favorite restaurants - as well as the site of the former Cafe Minnie's, which was where Phillip and I first met each other in person). We'd invited Colin and Martin (but Martin couldn't make it) and Kurt and Lori (but Lori couldn't make it). It was a nice little dinner, just the four of us.

Yesterday afternoon, Phillip suggested some geocaching - specifically a Did Not Find of ours up north. After we found it, I suggested a couple of caches in the Arboretum - one of which was on our DNF list, the other one was new to us. We found both of those. The one that was a DNF before had been on our list for a very long time, even though we've searched for it just once. It wasn't until we got home and prepared to log our find that I did some research and realized just how long ago it had been since we'd logged a DNF on that Arboretum cache: ten months! May 29, 2005, to be exact. It was among the first geocaches we'd attempted. I'm not sure why we got around to a second try only yesterday. (Part of it, I think, is that it's a multi-cache, and neither one of us is thrilled about multis.)

I started having a sore throat Friday afternoon. It made concentrating during yoga class difficult. My throat was still a little sore yesterday, and I went to bed as soon as we got home after dinner. It hid me full blast this morning, as well as some body aches. I skipped church and blew off Writers' Group.