Dont laugh. Whatever you do, do not fucking laugh. This is my mantra while the person on the other end is screaming their head off about how everyone is screwing them. Everyone. Even the pope. Especially the pope. The guy is screaming so hard that just after saying all of us people are going to give him a heart attack he starts coughing like a cholera case.
I remember not to laugh. The trick is to keep a nice steady breathing rhythm. Its funny really, when people are threatening to kick your ass over the phone, or just shrieking their heads off like banshees or when they think that them not paying hurts me personally. This guys coughing and belching out words like a sewage pipe barfing out sludge, and I care more about if Im getting the shading on my doodle down properly, holding the phone about an inch form my ear. Part of me just wants this piece of crap to drop dead right now, just so I can end the call and finish my drawing and go take a piss. Not a piss cause I have to, but just a piss so I can get away from my desk, like most of the pee breaks in elementary school when you had a math teacher who let you go to the can whenever, except this is better because I don't have to ask nobody. So this guy stops to breathe and out comes my response, almost like an automaton:
that its all well and good, but when you filled in your financial info to apply for forgiveness, your blatant and obvious falsehoods on it disqualified you. You have a rent as well as a mortgage? Can you please explain that? Look, Im not yelling at you, Im talking on the phone like a grown up. Whether or not youre older than me makes no difference that you owe this debt. If you dont feel like paying it, just tell me and Ill tell my client thats what you want, and they will take whatever steps they deem necessary to collect the balance. No need to be swearing, okay- hey cut the sasslefrass mister, have a little time-out there.
Thats my trick to end the calls with the fighters. Condescend them like youd speak to a child and theyll hang up. Hes not going to pay, simple as that. Five words, thats all he needs to say, but no- he needs to yap like some fucking punt sized dog for twenty minutes. I prefer the fighters over the religious ones though, the ones who think that Jesus or Mohammed is going to pay their bills, and Im sure I come off as a serious fucking asshole when they talk about praying to find a job and living under the auspices of the lord and I rebuff them with a curt- You know, instead of wasting that time praying, if you went out and passed some resumes to places you might have better luck, or a well your god seems to be doing a bang up job of taking care of you isnt he? Something about the whole lack of self reliance and responsibility for their own actions that just gets under my skin like a rusty fishing hook. Normally after a call that involves a conflict, I just hammer the notes on the file, every keystroke like a fist to these peoples faces, a flurry as fast as a centipede escaping after being revealed from under a rock. My minds eye just hears the thwacking sound of a steak being tenderized by a mallet, followed by the sound of chiclets being spat onto a tile floor.
I'm not the man I was two and a half years ago though. I'm not built to do this anymore. I mean, I can but it's just not something I want to see myself doing for the long term. I consider it a source of a few interesting work stories, and some debt-killing cash. My co-workers on a whole seem pretty dumb- not dumb, just not really too deep. There's a reason I spend my lunch hours sitting at my desk with my headphones on with a book now. A means to an end. Hopefully the end comes quick.
I remember not to laugh. The trick is to keep a nice steady breathing rhythm. Its funny really, when people are threatening to kick your ass over the phone, or just shrieking their heads off like banshees or when they think that them not paying hurts me personally. This guys coughing and belching out words like a sewage pipe barfing out sludge, and I care more about if Im getting the shading on my doodle down properly, holding the phone about an inch form my ear. Part of me just wants this piece of crap to drop dead right now, just so I can end the call and finish my drawing and go take a piss. Not a piss cause I have to, but just a piss so I can get away from my desk, like most of the pee breaks in elementary school when you had a math teacher who let you go to the can whenever, except this is better because I don't have to ask nobody. So this guy stops to breathe and out comes my response, almost like an automaton:
that its all well and good, but when you filled in your financial info to apply for forgiveness, your blatant and obvious falsehoods on it disqualified you. You have a rent as well as a mortgage? Can you please explain that? Look, Im not yelling at you, Im talking on the phone like a grown up. Whether or not youre older than me makes no difference that you owe this debt. If you dont feel like paying it, just tell me and Ill tell my client thats what you want, and they will take whatever steps they deem necessary to collect the balance. No need to be swearing, okay- hey cut the sasslefrass mister, have a little time-out there.
Thats my trick to end the calls with the fighters. Condescend them like youd speak to a child and theyll hang up. Hes not going to pay, simple as that. Five words, thats all he needs to say, but no- he needs to yap like some fucking punt sized dog for twenty minutes. I prefer the fighters over the religious ones though, the ones who think that Jesus or Mohammed is going to pay their bills, and Im sure I come off as a serious fucking asshole when they talk about praying to find a job and living under the auspices of the lord and I rebuff them with a curt- You know, instead of wasting that time praying, if you went out and passed some resumes to places you might have better luck, or a well your god seems to be doing a bang up job of taking care of you isnt he? Something about the whole lack of self reliance and responsibility for their own actions that just gets under my skin like a rusty fishing hook. Normally after a call that involves a conflict, I just hammer the notes on the file, every keystroke like a fist to these peoples faces, a flurry as fast as a centipede escaping after being revealed from under a rock. My minds eye just hears the thwacking sound of a steak being tenderized by a mallet, followed by the sound of chiclets being spat onto a tile floor.
I'm not the man I was two and a half years ago though. I'm not built to do this anymore. I mean, I can but it's just not something I want to see myself doing for the long term. I consider it a source of a few interesting work stories, and some debt-killing cash. My co-workers on a whole seem pretty dumb- not dumb, just not really too deep. There's a reason I spend my lunch hours sitting at my desk with my headphones on with a book now. A means to an end. Hopefully the end comes quick.
VIEW 17 of 17 COMMENTS
I think you know what I'm talking about.