American

Inspired American

I wrote my first official letter/email to a member of my city’s government today. Usually, I read news articles, hear news stories, and see things that infuriate me but generally feel powerless to do anything about it….so I do not do anything at all. Common really.

Sad but true.

What spurred such a tirade – such a break in character, you ask?

Some bonehead councilmember in this fine city is trying to ban the use of mopeds (“motorcycle light” is what I would call them) within the city. I will not get into all of the environmental issues or cost efficiencies associated with this viable means of transportation, as this is not the point today.

Without ranting here all over again, it was enough to anger me into action – so I carefully constructed an email that would not make me sound like a lunatic, refrained from using terms like, “big, fat jerk”, spellchecked it three times and then sent it to every - single - city council member available in this fine city.

I do not expect to get anything more than a cookie cutter version of “thank you, we care…honestly, we do – vote for me” crap that auto-responds to emails….but it felt good. It felt very good.

I am pretty sure that I just earned another badge to go on my Big Girl jacket and I feel quite American right about now. I mean….isn’t that really the whole point of being a member of the good ol’ US of A?

Uninspired American

We get phone calls at work from solicitors, sales people, crazy people, pranks and wrong numbers – more so than most.

I have gone through all of the processes: registering all of our numbers on the DNC registry, requested both live and in writing to have us removed from any/all lists currently being sold better than stock and read each piece of correspondence carefully to make sure our numbers cannot be further bought and sold for further aggravation.

I even have an extreme amount of patience for these people when they do call. I understand the need to have a job and hey, if you are working hard to pay your bills and support your family - I fully support you in your efforts to do so.

Until that last one.

Ok…..first and foremost….if anyone besides my family is reading this – please…..PLEASE….do your best to hire people that speak the language well enough to annunciate each word clearly and know the meaning of each word as it is being spoken.

I am not about go to on the “all foreigners go home” spew that makes me queasy, but I am insistent upon proper speech. If you are a company - an American company - looking to sell goods to me…..a citizen of this fine country - please hire people that can do so and be understood at the same time.

To me….this just makes sense.

Call me whacky here, but the cost savings that those companies want to associate with hiring the good fine folk from overseas must get lost on the back end of trying to sell to a group of people whom have had it up to their eyeballs with the sheer lack of communication and the frustration associated with it.

Even this alone would not cause me to become flippant, nasty, or even ill tempered with someone. Queen Bee raised me better than that….promise.

What made this last one so bad was after I had politely suggested that they stop calling because we were simply not interested - he started to argue with me.

Not just argue - he started to get personal, raise his voice, and loose all semblance of professionalism over my rejection. At first, this was quite comical due to his lack of ability to form complete sentences and really tell me off proper, but after a minute or so,……it just became flat out rude.

Look. I do not HAVE to put you through to anybody. I do not HAVE to listen to your pitch. I do not HAVE to tolerate your company calling this office five times a week….yes….I am serious….five times a week. If we were remotely interested in switching phone services, we have the internet and a big old-fashioned phone book that houses all of the contact info and/or sales information that we need to initiate that conversation.

Then the capper….he told me I was being rude by telling him “no” and asked me if my “mudder had not raised me better”.

Click.

He called back to yell at me some more.

Sigh.

I tried mom….I did. But he started it.

MichChick