Interplay

How do you laugh a lot, get exercise (over 4 hours on our feet and pacing), spend more money than you should, and entertain others all in one trip? It's simple: just go eyeglass shopping with Leon and I. We both needed dark glasses (cataracts are on there way because we don't wear dark glasses anymore, oops), progressive lenses for everyday AND safety glasses - now that is potentially 6 pair of glasses and more money than we have to spend. We actually had to take a lunch break in the middle of our shopping to regroup and then grab coffee and a muffin afterward to have energy to get the hour or so back home.

Add to our usual banter with each other an optician (male) with his own banter, another female willing to jump in occasionally, then interruptions as we said, "go wait on that customer", and just plain cutting up - like telling the male optician (who was dressed very stylish) that someone else must have dressed him that morning if he thought the glasses he said were sophisticated weren't really just plain gaudy!

We actually had fun, the four of us bashing each other -- until he told us the total cost for just three pair -- and that was with a discount. I think that is why an overwhelming exhaustion came over me as we walked out the door -- either that or that I had been "on" and wired the entire time we were there. Let's suffice it to say, we had so much fun, the female employee said we needed to come just hang around the store to keep them all entertained.

We left having ordered Leon just two pair of glasses, trying to save taking out yet another mortgage on the house. He got one ugly pair of safety glasses (being practical) and had to settle for his second choice for everyday glasses because they came with magnetic dark lenses and saved him the cost of a third pair. (And trust me, talking him into getting safety glasses instead of just putting the sides on his normal was quite a feat for me to pull off! I pulled the, "You are supposed to wear them for work anyway; we took the Community Emergency Response Team (C.E.R.T.) training, what if there IS an earthquake, do you want to have to fight those goggle things over your glasses while you are trying to help people? And you can even wear them in the yard so your good glasses don't get ruined. . ." I think it was the C.E.R.T. that tipped him to my way of thinking because during the practice drill the safety glasses over our glasses was a pain!)

I left ordering one pair that I fell in love with. They popped more than I would normally choose, but I was in a want-to-be-different mood and had tried on nearly every style in the store, many more than once -- LOL. I, too, had to settle. I found a pair of safety glasses that looked like normal glasses and the tag said clip on dark lenses were available. . . but the optician was not so sure they really would be. So, who knows.

Of course, they may just pass the glasses through the door at us when we go back to pick them up. . . or offer to mail them!