It was a day filled with outrageous grievances. Today I saw my doctor for the first time since he sent me off to have Katie's Wild Ride with the gastroenterologist. I was looking forward to seeing him and fully prepared to have him shower me with praise for losing 30 pounds. I fully expected he and his physician's assistant to gather the reception staff and do a congo line singing my praises.

He, however, said nothing about it.

You're not the first man to disappointment me, Doc.

I kept waiting for him to get to that portion of the chart, but he said not one word about it. He did however ask me if I was a slut and if he needed to check for HIV. I'm sort of paraphrasing there.

After he left, the physician's assistant brought me some paperwork so I asked her what my weight was compared to last time because BY GOD SOMEONE WAS GOING TO ACKNOWLEDGE IT. She said she'd have to get the chart from the doctor and indicated it would take a few minutes to do that, implying that she really didn't want to do it. I told her I was okay with waiting.

Alas, still no congo line. Oh well.

On my way to work, I stopped by the Apple store to pick up a couple things for work. For this purchase, I was given a nameless Visa gift card. After one of the über-geek helpful employees got what I needed from the back, I was being checked out next to a man who was buying an iPod shuffle.

Our transactions were being rung up at the same time. We both handed our cards for payment at the same time. Only, he was then asked to show his ID to verify his credit card. The cashier inspected both to see if the names match. My card has GUEST SHOPPER embossed on the front and has the activation sticker still affixed to the front of the card, and yet I was asked to show nothing. I kept looking at the customer, then the two clerks, then the customer, then the two clerks, thinking someone must notice what's going on here. I mean, it's so blatant.

Oh wait. Did I mention the other customer was black? My bad.

When I called Thomas to relate this, I left that little piece of information out too. ("Brian, I don't see what the big deal is." "Um, isn't this what you do for a living? Isn't this like your bread and butter Captain Diversity?")

I wondered why the customer didn't notice this or say anything about it. Thomas said, "Probably because he's used to it happening."

Sad, but probably true.