But of Course Sir, I'll Bring the Car Around Immediately.

For the last week Mark has been reminding me that he had a doctor's appointment at ten in the morning on Monday. So yesterday morning, after walking the dogs at six thirty, I put it into gear so that I'd be ready. I ate my breakfast early, Corn Chex with a banana. I took an early shower and put on my taking Mark to the doctor clothes. By eight I was ready so I let Mark know that the bathroom was all his. Yes, I was early, but Mark's doctor is halfway across the city and it takes nearly an hour to get there during the morning rush hour. It was almost nine in the morning when I inquired if he was ready, "Mark, we have to go soon. Are you ready?"

"I'm still in the shower....   Oh, and the doctor's appointment is at eleven twenty, not ten....  sorry."

Fine. I got Mark to the doctor at ten fifty in the morning. A little early, but I was tired of waiting around. Unfortunately my waiting was just starting. We sat in the waiting room for about thirty minutes before somebody came out and called Mark's name, so I told him that I would wait down in the car. One hour later I was awakened by the car telling me that it was turning itself off to save the battery. I went back inside, and there was Mark sitting in the waiting room.

"I haven't seen the doctor yet. They just wanted to take my blood pressure earlier."

So I sat down with him and waited some more. They called him in and thirty minutes later he came walking out, "Now I have to go for lab work."

Again, I told Mark that I would wait in the car. By the time we were pulling out of the parking lot it had been four hours since we left the house and we still had to get Mark some lunch, he had fasted all day. After lunch he had to run into The Gap. You never know, there might be something in the store that he positively had to have. And just when I thought it was all over he told me we needed to stop at the Jewel supermarket. Five hours, five damn hours of my very valuable retirement time wasted.

Mark is perfectly capable of driving himself to all these places. He just doesn't want to. He keeps telling me that he's terrified of driving in the city, but I think it's something else. Like his way of punishing me for ripping him out of his warm and familiar Florida, and dragging him to Chicago.