October | 2016 | You Just have to Laugh….

I have been fighting against “old lady shoes” for quite some time now. Okay, I’ve just been fighting the ‘old lady’ thing altogether. But I love shoes…high shoes, shiny shoes, fancy shoes, boots, sandals…you name it. I can’t get enough of all kinds of shoes. I think for two reasons. One, I like looking down at pretty things, and two, my feet are really skinny. It’s so dysfunctional, I know. And you’d think most people would hate that because all shoes don’t fit. But I like using the word skinny sometimes when I’m not ordering a Cinnamon Dolce Latte.

Yet, the gods of comfort are beckoning to me. And not in a nice way. The other thing I love to do is travel. And every shoe-loving woman will tell you that travel and shoes are like oil and water….unless you find the perfect vinaigrette…. which I think I may have at my new bff shoe store…SAS shoes.

A while ago I told you how I dutifully took my Mom to get her standard shoes at SAS, and

much to my surprise, I found a pair of adorable patent leather flats that seemed too good to be true…super comfy and shiny and fun! I loved them right away. Six months later I took Mom back for summer sandals and again I was chomping at the bit to go across the street to the fun, funky shoe store as soon as Mom got her feet squared away for comfy walking.

And lo and behold, there in the SAS store were these candy-apple sandals that felt as yummy as a treat at the county fair. I plunked down my credit card and decided I would

give them the ultimate test………I took them right out of the box and off to a walking trip in France.

My feet never felt so good…at least I didn’t notice they felt bad, what with all the French wine and croissants. No, it was better than that, I could walk on the beach, go shopping, see the sights and not once did my feet hurt…and they were pretty, and shiny!

I was re-thinking the ‘old lady shoe’ prejudice.

Then I got an email from some lovely gal named Taylor at SAS shoes.

“Would you like to review our new fall shoe called ‘HOPE?

Would I????

These beauties came just in time for a quick trip to NYC to spend time with our daughter and meet the new boyfriend. This was a big risk. I can be pretty cranky if my feet hurt. There’s no way to get around NYC without walking for blocks and blocks. So I put on my new burgundy suede HOPE shoes and off we went. I should have told the new boyfriend to HOPE for the best. Boy, did he get lucky!

I do so love SAS shoes. My arches were happy, the color is so ‘in’ this fall, and museums didn’t leave my feet hopeless. It was such a beautiful “Autumn in New York….” day that we even walked the 20 blocks home from lunch because we were enjoying the day and each other so much. I think my daughter and the new boyfriend are now a fan of SAS shoes!

In that former blog, I decided that SAS must not just mean San Antonio Shoemakers, but also Style and Sass (that’s my new name for them!). So, yes, I got the HOPE shoes for free to review them, but the other SAS shoes were on me. Now, SAS shoes will always be on me….to rest from my 4-inch heels and remind my feet, I really do love them!

“You Just Have to Laugh…..and wear comfortable cool shoes!”

I called the hospital today. Well, more accurately, I called the hospital billing department. The billing department is no longer in the hospital. The hospital is in Pennsylvania, where I live, and where my loved ones go to the hospital when they have a problem, medically.

The billing department is in Tennessee, where nobody, who goes to my hospital, lives or goes to if they have a problem medically or otherwise. Okay, maybe that ‘s not true, maybe some people go to Tennessee if they have a problem with say, country music, and want to see if it’s them or the music.

By putting the ‘billing department’ in Tennessee, it prevents all of us in Pennsylvania from actually going to the billing department to talk about a problem. That way no one has to discuss these problems face-to-face. So much easier, said no one, ever.

I called Tennessee today, and although the gentlemen was very nice, the problem was apparently unsolvable.

“I want to know if this bill, which started out at $4500 and is now magically down to $500 has been paid? ” I queried, for the third time in three months.

“Well, ma’am let me see. Now before I answer that question, even though you’ve given me the account number, can you give me the address on the bill, the date of birth of the patient, the date of the bill, the services rendered, the patient’s blood type and the name of their cat?” he asked ever so politely.

Okay, he didn’t ask for the blood type or the cat, but why not? My question is, why in heaven’s name do you put an account number on the bill if it means absolutely nothing in terms of information? Do you make more money by keeping me on the phone? Are you tracing the call just to make sure I’m not in Tennessee, but that I stayed in Pennsylvania where I belong?

We do-si-do all around the information, until we’re both exhausted and wish we had taken more square-dancing lessons, and finally, he says:

“Please ignore that bill ma’am the insurance company has agreed to review it.”

“Okay, but I have an estate to settle, so can I assume that the bill will be no more than the $500 you currently are requesting?”

“No, you cannot.”

Here’s where I want to find a cat, maybe a tiger or a lion, and release it into the wilds of Tennessee with the scent of this insurance company on its nose like a barrel of catnip.

“Um……….why would that be?”

“Well, what if the insurance company decides to take back all the payments they already made? Then the bill would be more.”

“Why would they do that?” I asked, “Medicare paid this over a year ago and this has been your fault for not properly submitting the balance to the other Medigap insurance carrier.”

“Well,” he replied, “we don’t know what they will do.”

‘Cause you don’t know what you’re doing……that’s really what I wanted to say.

But since he told me to ignore the bill, I’m gonna’ do just that. Probably forever.

“You Just have to Laugh…..”

You Just have to Laugh….

by Cathy Sikorski

Monthly Archives: October 2016

Shoes, Glorious Shoes…….!!!!

Sometimes You Just Need a Lion on Your Side…….

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