Our story so far: Pre-Middle-Aged-Woman's 37th birthday. Wrong
numbers ringing the phone off the hook. Phone calls for Bayer
Pharmaceutical somehow mis-routed to Pre-Middle-Aged-Woman's home
phone. Making martini garnishes out of lemons. AT & T can't help, Sprint says it's my problem, and the drug company is the only one being nice to me. Oh yeah, except for Marilyn Monroe. And the guy who thinks birthdays are religious holidays.
So, we had some really funny messages, not to mention a great story to tell for the next, let's see, umm, eight years so far. And after about 36 hours, apparently, word got out that there was a much more effective way to reach Bayer Pharmaceutical.
All done but the laughter, right? Right?
HAHAHAHAHAHAHAHA! No.
About four weeks later, we got the punchline. In the form of a bill from Sprint for over $400. You know, for all those calls to my 800 number, which I didn't need or have. You know how when you call tech support now, you talk to someone named 'Trevor' who obviously grew up in southern India? And he's really polite, but not necessarily very helpful? Well the difference between 'Trevor' and the Customer Service people at Sprint was that whole 'polite' thing. They were mean to me! And still not helpful! And kept insisting that I owed them a truckload of money.
So after sending letters, and making dozens of phone calls, it was finally determined that: I had enrolled in their long-distance service. Part of the deal was a "phone card" that we could use at payphones (remember payphones?) in an emergency and it would be like a collect call without the exorbitant charges. Except that instead of a phone card, Sprint just assigned me an 800 number. Never mind that "letting me know about it" part.
Plus, although every one of these calls they were billing me for was an incoming call, and that they came from all over the country, they insisted that I pay for them. "Not their problem" was their whole attitude. And then I remembered...
Cindy, the nice lady from Bayer Pharmaceutical. The one who asked if there was anything else she could do for me? Yes! And she did. She took care of the bill, because while $400 is a big honking deal to me, Bayer executives regularly spend that much on gold-plated toothpicks. Or something.
One other thing...my absolute favorite columnist is Susan Ager, who writes for the Detroit Free Press. And as all this was unfolding, I sent her an e-mail giving her the lowdown. And she wrote her column about me sometime later that month. I was famous! I'm sure there's a copy of it here somewhere. In the file where I keep all the "Famous Person" stuff.
Some birthdays are just more memorable than others, ya know? Happy Birthday to Me. Amen.
