Do Not Call

One of the many joys of moving is contacting everyone that has your old information and giving them your new information.  Some of it is easy like family, friends and utilities.  Some of it falls through the cracks like the Do Not Call registry.  Grrr.  All in all, I'd rather have notified them and forgotten some family members.  Just one or two.  Okay, six or seven.  No more than twelve.  Fifteen tops.

It never occurred to me till we began getting inundated with calls from every telemarketer and solicitor in the universe that I had not registered our new number.  I had forgotten exactly how freaking annoying those people can be.

Mostly, I rely on caller ID to cut down on the aggravation, but some of them are tricky little devils and a regular old phone number comes up.  Double Grrr.

First of all, they call you by your first name as though they are your best friend.  Like last Saturday.

"Hello, Ann?"

"Yes," I answered hesitantly trying to place the voice.

"This is Susie Snowflake.  How are you?"

"Um.  Good.  How are you?"  The name rang a dim bell somewhere in the back of my mind, along with where I had left my reading glasses and the other cordless phone.

"Do you recognize my name?"

Crap.  I know eight kajillion people and I remember about three on any given day.  Where did I know this woman from?!  Okay, I was going to bluff.

"Sure I do," I responded brightly, all the while thinking, 'I'd like to buy a vowel please, Wink'.

"Then you know I'm running for local office and would like to talk to you about my platform and donating money to by campaign."

Double crap.  That's where I knew the name.  It's on one of those posters that spring up like mushrooms by the side of the road every fall.  Why oh why had I answered the phone?

As luck would have it, we actually had company, so I was able to shut good ol' Susie down without even lying.

Other people are harder to get rid of.  Like the people who want you to use their health care program.  They don't even let you get in the ambulance before they chase you.

Every month, without fail, we get the call.

"Is Tim there?"

"No, I'm sorry, he's not at home, can I take a message?" Yeah, which I will write in the air.

"We just wanted to let him know that we are offering...blah, blah, blah...yadda, yadda, yadda..."

"He's not interested," I break in, hanging up and going back to doing something more interesting like watching my toenails grow.

One woman didn't let my total lack of interest or civility stop her though.

"Are you his wife?" she pressed, "Because we can offer you programs also, like weight loss and exercise."

Wow.  Really?!? I didn't realize that I qualified because I sounded so fat and out of shape over the phone.  Yes, please.  Sign me up immediately.

It has gotten to the point where sometimes I can't contain the snarkiness. 

Once, after I said I wasn't interested, the guy actually had the nerve to try and shame me into giving money to him by getting snotty.

"You really need to do this.  It's not like I'm asking for a lot,"  he insisted.

Hey, great sales technique.  I'm sure you'll go far with that attitude.  You know, I wasn't going to give you anything, but since you put it like that, here's a blank check.  You just add as many zeros as you want.  Riiight.

Then there was the woman from some phone company who called at dinnertime and I cut her off with "I'm not interested."

"What is it exactly that you are not interested in?" she snapped at me.

Okay, the gloves are off.  You've poked the tiger and now you must die.

"Anything you have to say," I snapped back.

"So you 're not interested in saving money?" she just wouldn't give up. 

I can't figure out why I just didn't hang up, but something inside me snapped.  Maybe low blood sugar due to the fact that she was keeping me from my dinner.

"No.  I hate saving money,"  I shot back.

"You dont' want to save 30% off your current bill?  Do you like throwing money away?"

Okay, if she was going to be ridiculous, I could be more ridiculous.

"I love throwing money away.  In fact, I try to find the most expensive phone plan I can and that's the one I take.  And just in case you ever get a job soliciting for a gas, power, water or insurance company, I overpay on all those bills also, and I think it's great!!!"

She actually slammed the phone down, but I didn't care because we both knew that I had won.  What, exactly, I'm not sure, but I'm guessing she won't be calling back any time soon.

For the repeat offenders, I have developed other tactics for discouraging them from calling.

Tactic 1:  "Is Tim there?"

"Tim who?"

"Tim Sinclair."

"Can you spell that?"

"S-i-n-c-l-a-i-r."

"No, the first name"

"T-i-m."

"Jim?"

"No, Tim. T-i-m."

"Sorry, you have the wrong number."

or Tactic 2:  "Is Tim home?"

"Who's calling?"

"An annoying solicitor who will suck valuable minutes out of your life that you will never get back." (Well, maybe they didn't actually say this, but this is what they meant).

"He no longer lives here."

"Well this is the number we have."

"He used to live here, but I threw him out for cheating on me with my best friend's husband."

Pause.  "Oh.  Do you have his new number?" (And yes, this conversation actually happened.)

So I gave them the only number I could think of off the top of my head:  Red Top Cab, and wished them a nice day.  Hehehe.

Can't wait till we are back on the registry.