Roundabout

I feel like I'm on some kind of ghastly/ghostly roundabout. I was stuck on it in July 2017, then everything improved. Six months later I am stuck on it again.
I think roundabout is the right term because it is certainly NOT a merry-go-round.
Late June last year I was ill with pneumonia. In my post entitled FELLED of June 30,2017 I wrote about my getting sick and my very frustrating experience with Kaiser.
Exactly 10 days ago, January 8, 2019 I awoke with a sore throat. A sore throat for me does not bode well. It seems like that is my first warning sign of some kind of impending illness. I immediately prepared gallons of hot water with lemon, ginger, and honey, and took my Chinese pills which I swear by. Despite this I began to cough, and cough, and cough. Then came the congestion in my head and nose. Not too bad, as everyone and their mother has either flu or a bad cold. I did not have a fever and was not felled, so I knew it is not pneumonia. For 10 days I didn't contact my doctor. However, yesterday morning with no sign of this cough and congestion abating I thought it wise to tell my doctor. I sent off an e-mail and immediately received the form letter response that she is out of the office.
Roundabout -- deja-vu --here I am again, stuck at the same spot. I reacted like anyone who has been totally traumatized by a previous similar experience, I did not want to pursue the matter. However, I rallied and called to make an urgent care appointment.
Roundabout -- deja-vu --the nurse said she could not find any same day appointments, but would get a message to my 'provider's office' and someone would call me back by the end of the day.
Roundabout - deja-vu -- here I am, stuck.
I went off to my art class with my phone in my pocket. I apologised for my coughing and sneezing to my feloow students and told them that if they don't want me there, to say so. They were most accommodating, but asked me not to kiss anyone. I had to restrain myself.
Toward the end of class my cell phone rang - it was a medical assistant from another office. She said I needed to go for a chest x-ray and then she could make me an appt. with a doctor if I wanted, or I could wait for my doctor to return.(????? WHAT) I thanked her and told her to definitely make me an appt.
So this is where the medical system is quite phenomenal - I went for the x-ray and miraculously there was no one else in the radiology department. I had the x-ray and the results were sent to the doctor's office in 10 minutes flat. It would have been even less time if I could follow instructions and put on that 3 -armed robe quickly before the x-ray. Does anyone else find some difficulty in donning these items? I seem to have some visual impairment - it is most difficult for me to follow illustrations.
I went to the doctor who saw me punctually. She was a lovely YOUNG (they are all so young) woman who actually used a stethoscope to listen to my lungs, then she looked at my throat and ears. She told me the x-ray results were fine, but prescribed antibiotics, and expalained to me the reason I should take them. This is how I remember doctor's visits in the days before computers and all things digital and electronic.
I really don't know whether doctors know how palliative it is to actually look at and touch a patient.
So, that experience on the roundabout was definitely an improvement.
However, I had an issue with my landline and had to call ATT and this experience has proven to be deeply traumatic in the past. After two frustrating hours of replying to questions on an automated voice machine, and also trying to chat online with a technician, all to no avail, I had begun to wail into my cell phone - "person, human, agent", on and on. Despite my pleas the dam machine always had more questions so it would know who to refer me to - I kept on sobbing, tearing out my hair, coughing, spluttering and repeating "agent" until eventually a human answered. I do believe he actually understood the problem, and eventually admitted that it seems to be a problem with their lines and it was not my fault for not rebooting the gateway (I had done so) or my insinuations that the problem was on their side.
So, this was Thursday night - I now have to wait until Monday morning for a technician to come. The up side is someone will come (I still have hope) and solve the problem. Of course if it IS my fault, I will have to pay $99. If it is on their side, I wont pay.
My trauma comes from when I moved, over a year ago. ATT had informed me that it would be no problem and their service would fix my landline and internet on the first day. Needless to say - one month later it was resolved.
So, anyway, these are the reasons I feel like I am on a roundabout - it stops during summer, then stops during winter.
I do know that these are first world problems and frustrations, but they do niggle.