update: the two week reprieve.

Thanks all, for commiserating with me yesterday and for the offers of housekeeping and bounty hunting. Truly appreciated ;-)

Here's what happened yesterday afternoon when the poor delivery/pick-up dude arrived.

I answered the door in my wheelchair, said hello, while the guy shuffled through his paperwork and announced he was there to pick up a return. I said, "Yes, I know..." and rolled backwards to where I park my crutches and grabbed them. Meanwhile, he was scanning the room, I guess looking for the other (non-existent) wheelchair that would take the place of the rental I was returning.

He said, "Aren't you still using that?"
I mean, ummm yeah...it would probably still be warm from my buns as he loaded it on the truck. So I explained, yes...I still use it. Everyday.

I think right about then I might have gotten a wee bit misty-eyed, but not to influence the guy, I swear. It honestly was a natural response to literally having my legs kicked out from under me.

The poor guy just kind of stood there with his mouth hanging open for a few seconds and then said, "I...I....I can't do that to you. " So I began to explain about the insurance snafu, and he opened the front door, started to slip out and said, "I'll just say I came and you weren't here," and tried to leave. But I said no, because (get this Sara) I've pulled that routine twice already, and I can't keep up that schtick forever.

He said he was going to step outside and make a call, and when he came back, he reported that they were giving me two weeks to sort things out with TheBigBoxInsuraneCompany (rhymes with Meiser), and that someone would call me from his office about the billing stuff.

Then the guy just stood there with his mouth open catching flies again, and then his eyes got all watered up, and he said, "I just can't take it. That just aint right."
And he turned around and left.
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Now meanwhile, I would like to add (just so you don't think I'm sitting here wearing a hat that says "Victim" on it) that I have in fact been trying to fix this situation both from the insurance end, and from the equipment-ownership end.

The insurance snafu all began in June, and the mess created a lapse in coverage. It's very complicated, but the general gist is that in June, I needed to change coverage, and one department told me to apply for Plan A, while another department later, in mid-August, denied my application and informed me that I never even qualified for Plan A. Getting that straightened out took until the last week of Septmeber, and during that time, the Durable Medical Equipment stuff got very messed up.

It's almost fixed. I just got off the phone with my doc and his nurse (whom are both great, even given the fact that they work for TheMeiser), and it's almost straightened out. Couple more days, and a couple more rounds of phone calls probably.

Meanwhile, I have also been looking for a cheapie replacement chair that I could just outright buy, because yah...I do pay a small co-pay on the rental, and over time it will add up to the cost of the chair.

TheMIG has been helping by calling around on Craigslist ads for me, but it's very difficult to find exactly what I need when most of the fucktards advertising don't know diddly-squat about wheelchairs. They're probably just cleaning out dead grampa's garage. They don't even seem to know that wheelchairs come in more than one size. They don't know dimensions, details, brandnames, etc...hell, some of them are even selling "transport chairs" thinking that they are actual wheelchairs (transport chairs don't have the big wheels on them so you can push your own self...they only have four small wheels and therfore you have to be "transported" with an assistant pushing from behind).

The wheelchair I use in the home has a 16" seat and is a hemi chair (hemi basically means lower to the ground, at 17"). Most chairs we are finding advertised have 18" seats (which won't fit through most of the doorways in my house), and are adult standard (which means 21" from the ground, and then I can't use my one good working leg to help me scoot around...and I use that alot). The hemi chairs (or chairs that are somehow adjustable to become lower) seem to be more difficult to find used.

Also, the CL people here in the Bay Area seem to think the chairs they have are gilded thrones or something. The chairs on CL are all "just like new!" and the sellers are asking for well over $150 in most cases. Considerring TheMIG just found an on-line store I can buy the same clunker I have now NEW for $165, that's not making sense. There is a used one for $85 I'm checking out this weekend, hopefully. And yes, I have scanned garage sales, but that's been like looking for a needle in a haystack. Or a needle in a pile of needles, maybe.

So I'm cool for a couple of weeks, and hopfully the solution will be reached before the guy has to come back out and I make him cry again.

You can still come and bring casseroles if you want.
Not because I need it.
For the company.