American medical system fail.

Well, I'm having surgery tomorrow - so I asked the doctor's office if I could get the prescriptions that I'll need for pain today since I live by myself, and it would be easier for me to get them filled while I'm still feeling like a human being. "Sure, just come by the office. They're narcotics, so we can't call them in".

Why not? I realize the need to control distribution of drugs that are frequently abused (such as what they gave me), but I don't see how me going all the way to the doctor's office (which is pretty far out of my way), picking up little slips of paper, and then presenting those slips of paper to a pharmacist achieves that goal any better than this Utopian system:

Doctor prescribes medication, via a secure website (or some other electronic means), accessible to all pharmacies in the state (or country, for that matter). Pharmacy gets prescription , verifies my ID, fills the prescription, and I go on my way. No pointless trips to the doctor's office, no little slips of paper to lose/be stolen/whatever, and all in all a better experience for the patient. Instead of being an affair that takes 2 hours out of my day, it could take the 30 minutes that it took for the prescriptions to actually be filled.

OK, I'm done complaining. Hopefully I'll be out of commission no more than a few days from this surgery.