Friends. Let's just admit that it's been awhile since my last confession/post. Life, it appears, cycles. And like those bits of laundry that fall between your washer & dryer -- sometimes you miss a cycle or two.  I'm not going to apologize, because I'm a professor now. And being a professor means never having to say your sorry.  You instead say, "I've been working on a bunch of projects."

Ya'll, I've been working on a bunch of projects.

But, one issue above all has brought me back to the electronic typewriter: "Why do products like ass cream require the pharmacy to call your doctor for refills?"

It's fucking insane. I mean let's think of the logic here. First off, said person, let's call him Matt for simplicity's sake, has a burning ass, fiery enough to make a doctor's appointment. Then in said doctor's appointment with Matt's 50-year-old female PA, Matt proclaims his ass to be flammable. I will save you the details, but this fictional Matt character may have complained of blood and hemorrhoids. At least that's the word on the fictional street.  Then Matt, having declared his rectal pain, got to watch said PA search the internet for the best creams for said issue.

*It is here, I must add, that Matt lost a bit of faith in his PA. I mean, he can google his symptoms to find the recommended cures. He can also look at the doctors' reviews of said products and corresponding side effects. Sitting there for 5-10 minutes watching her search on the computer felt a bit bush league to Matt. But I digress.

So, with no inspection of the area of said problem (I can't be sure if that was a good or bad thing -- probably bad in terms of treatment, good in terms of emotional comfort), Matt was sent on his way with a prescription for the most commonly used product for such an ailment that also had the fewest  reported negative side-effects.  In summary, the process of procuring my prescription was awkward and uncomfortable on a variety of levels.  But, this isn't even where my real issue lies.

Inevitably, unless this Matt kid has been crying bloody wolf-anus the whole time, that cream is gonna get used up. Probably sooner than later. And, in reality, this is the point at which our story begins, when there is no more gel left to soothe the savage butt.  Matt, inevitably, has lost the box that the cream came in. So he has to call and talk to a pharmacy assistant to get his refill.  It just so turns out that Matt's first "real" job in high school was, in fact, working the front desk of a pharmacy, so he has a particular soft spot for the CVS folks.

I, I mean Matt, tells the young man on the phone that he's lost the box for his medication, but he needs one of his solutions refilled.  Matt can't remember the proper name for the cream, so the young man just lists the creams/solutions on his drug roster.

"No, no, no, Rectiv?  Yea yes. Pretty sure it's that one."

IT'S CALLED FUCKING RECTIV. Really. REALLLLLLLL subtle. Why don't you just call it the "This Person's Ass is a BURNING RING OF FIRETIV.

This is one of the first pictures that came up when I googled "Rectiv" and it is an accurate representation of what it feels like you're shitting out when you go to the bathroom pre-Rectiv

The young man Matt just declared his anal issues to responded, "Oh there is no refills on that one, so I'm gonna have to call your doctor for a refill. It usually only takes a day or two."

FULL FUCKING STOP

*This is the exact moment I swore to change doctors.  Why the hell would you prescribe a thirty-something patient ass cream and not allow for refills.  On Rectiv. In what world could I (I can't pretend any longer!) take advantage of those refills. When you hear about patients hoarding drugs or going to the ER to try to and scam pain pills, is there another subset of this community that just chronically complains of anal pain in order to fill bathtubs with Rectiv for the coming Hemorrhoid Apocalypse?

Most likely she didn't give me refills to prompt a return visit for a post-mortem regarding my posterior. I was not interested in this $20 discussion. For that price I could get one or two more bottles of Rectiv -- if I had any god damn refills.

Next issue.  Why does ANYONE have to call for refills for ass cream. To my knowledge, no one gets high off of ass cream. At least not this kind of ass cream.  I'm sure some genius has stuck a whipped cream container up their butt in an attempt to get high on anal whippets, but that is NOT the kind of ass cream we are talking about.  In my mind, anyone who has seen a physician, and that physician has said "you need ass cream," should be on the fast track to buying prescription-strength ass cream monthly for the rest of their natural life.  Or at least for a year. Has there ever been a case of someone who needed ass cream the first time, but then came back to the doctor with the same exact issue when the ass cream ran out, and THIS time it would be a huge detriment to have that same salve. Ass cream worked last time, but this time if you use that same cream it's gonna give you ass cancer.  No. That is not a thing.

No touching Tina!

You may not know this, but ass cream users don't need to apply it all the time.  I mean, sometimes they do. But, not like alllllll the time.  They use it as needed. Which means that the very moment a person calls for their ass cream refill, their pain in the ass is at its crux. We are talking upside-down volcano-style pain.  The person's ass hurts so much, he or she is prompted to call for medicine. And it is at THIS moment, when the patient has the least patience, that the "day or two" delay begins. Two gutt busting days where that person's ass feels like it's trapped in purgatory with the devil poking his pitchfork straight up towards your large intestine.  All because of those Rective scavengers and their bathtubs of ass cream. Ass cream.

Ass cream.

Ass cream.

Free the fucking ass cream.