'Walk-In' service. What a joke.

I blew a tire last night on the highway. Ever notice tires blow only at midnight or when the husband is away or when you are deadly tired and forgot your cell-phone??

Anyway. It actually happened near a convience store with the only working pay-phone in the entire state of Texas, maybe even in the the whole south-west region. What luck! Although some very nice drunk people offered me rides home and even to change the tire for me (I had visions of bloody missing fingers) I chose to wait for a friend who was not drunk to pick me up.

Today after finding a very nice person to put the donut tire on, I went to my most favorist store in the entire universe---WalMart Supercenter where I bought the tires two short months ago, so they could repair the tire.

Ever since I wandered the isles for over an hour looking for a bucket I have just LOVED that store. Two helpful, but clueless clerks later, one who stated that it was his life mission to find me(!), a valued custumer a bucket, we located the bucket in the hardware section and I've loved the place ever since.<sarcasm button off> But I digress.

I know what you are thinking. You're saying to yourself "Kelly, what does this have to do with walk-in service being a joke"?? If you'd quit interrupting me I'd tell you. Walk in service really does not mean ***walk-in service***. Oh no. What it means is that the business does not have to bother with pesky little things like making APPOINTMENTS. What it really means is, when you drop your car off at the walmart-bigger-than-3-football-fields-super-center, they can hold you hostage for hours upon hours because they don't make appointments, so therefore you have to wander the store in total and complete boredom because approxamatly 350 people got up earlier than you and beat you to the auto portion of the super(!)-center.

In desperation you start buying things to relieve your boredom. It is a capitalist-pig plot to trick clueless consumers out of money!!!

I've noticed this disturbing trend of "walk-in" service happening all over the place. Recently I ran into it at the Veterinarian office.

Me: "My dog is very sick, throwing up blood, hasn't eaten in days"!

Receptionist: "well, we have no appointments available, but you could come in on a walk-in basis".

Me: "Oh? Is the waiting time long".

Recept: "well, it depends on how many people are in front of you".

Me: "That tell's me a lot. Thanks"!

Beauty shops are all about "walk-in" service to. I went to a beauty shop three days in a row recently, getting there before they opened. But no matter how early I arrived, on average, 3 little old ladies were sitting patiently waiting for the shop to open. They of course always wanted PERMS which meant the waiting period was at least 3 hours. I haven't seen any thing like it since I camped out for The Eagles reunion tickets. I got to a point where I considered trying to buy one of them off so I could get my 20 minute trim.

With the way things are going, I'll probably be boring my Grandchildren with "back in my day" stories. They'll probably roll their eyes and say, "yeah, like their ever was such thing as appointments" and not be able to imagine anything other than a 4 hour wait for one flat tire repair.

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