The eye exam went smoothly enough, though I did so poorly on the left eye peripheral vision test, they made me take it again with my glasses on. People are always surprised by how much worse my left eye is than my right. After the exam, I went back out to the lobby to pick out frames. I found a pair I liked, then sat down with one of the opticians to find out how much it would cost. She started in on her usual spiel, glancing down at the prescription as she spoke. She did a little double-take, and looked closer. "Plus four?" she said. "We don't have that in stock. It'll need to be special ordered."
I asked her how long it would take; seven days, she said. I explained that was no good, because I would be out of town in seven days. She just sort of looked at me blankly. I reeled off a bunch of questions. Would any other Hour Eyes location have this type of lens in stock? No. Are there any Hour Eye franchises in the Chicago area? No. Finally I just asked her to write down the prescription so I could go to the LensCrafters elsewhere in the mall to see if they had plus four lenses in stock. She wasn’t very happy about that, but she did so and I was on my way.
It turns out that I really needed new glasses very badly. I don't know when my last eye exam was, but my eyes have worsened considerably since then. Things are much less blurry now! I'm in favor of that.