My own private opia

I've had a tear in one of my contacts for the past couple weeks, but I've been putting off going to get it replaced. No reason, really, I've just had other stuff to do. But yesterday's episode of Higglytown Heroes prompted me to make an appointment. On the show, Wayne's glasses broke, preventing him from watching a meteor shower with his friends. Someone special saved the day though (as someone special always does) — the featured hero was the optometrist (OK, so this really had nothing to do with convincing me to go to the eye doctor, but I found the coincidence amusing).

At my checkup, I found out that my sight has worsened in both eyes. My left eye went from -6.5 to -7.0 and my right eye dipped from -6.5 to -7.5. This is the first time I've had a different prescription for each eye, so now I finally have to pay attention that I put the right contact in the right eye.

As I was waiting the requisite hour between the time of my apointment and the time I actually got to see the doctor, I considered heading back out to my car to get my coupon book. I had a feeling that there might have been a coupon in there for the Wal-Mart Vision Center. However, since most of the coupons in the book have proven useless, I didn't bother. For instance, the Wal-Mart coupons include "Free Cookie" (something Bruno's does every day), "Free Balloon" (another something Bruno's does every day), "Free lifetime rotation with purchase of tires" (something Wal-Mart already offers without a coupon). I figured if there was anything for the vision center in there, it was probably something like 5% off an exam, and I didn't bother going out to check.

So I have my exam, I pay the $50 exam fee and the $30 fitting fee (What the hell is that? Just tell me it's $80; don't try to fool me by saying an exam is only $50.) and I go home. At home I flip through the coupon book to find a coupon for "Free vision screening." Shit. "Vision screening" better not mean the same thing as "eye exam," or I just wasted $50. Knowing Wal-Mart, it's not the same thing, but it's probably best for me not to think about it just in case.