I never answer any call that displays “Unavailable” on the caller ID. But it’s tempting. Sometimes I actually wish I knew who he was just so I could stab him in the eyes and steal his children to give them a better life. If you don’t want anyone to know your phone number, then move to a sheep station on the Falkland Islands and become a shepherd for the British government. Of course, it may be just some automatic dialer trying to sell me sparkplug insurance on a car I haven’t owned since the Reagan administration. If you’re too lazy to dial your own sales calls, just get your belly fitted with a feeding tube and a colostomy bag and lie down and watch “The View” for a few years. It will add meaning to your life.
Clearly, these calls are originating from a dimension in which meaning does not exist. There is no way Mr. Unavailable can truly want me to answer the phone. He always calls when I’m on the pot, having sex, or praying. Only women can utter intelligible phonemes in those situations, anyway. Okay, I’ll admit Mr. Unavailable is probably only interested in my current address and credit card information, anyway. Those are easy enough to manage on the pot or praying. Even during sex if it’s an emergency. But I want people who ring my phone to be interested in me. The real me. And, as I said, there is no way Mr. Unavailable wants to know that. Who, for instance, wants to hear that I long to strap him to the belly of the hippopotamus in the Topeka Zoo?
"That's illegal," you say. No it isn't. It's only a thought. A desire. So far, thought crimes are still confined to fiction. Anyway, since Mr. Unavailable is probably nothing more than computer software there is nothing illegal about imagining his body being quartered on a table saw by that weirdo with the wood chipper in Fargo. The real crime is that FCC-regulated communication lines are being used to disturb and disrupt the vital workings of my home and personal life. I won't complain too much. I know hundreds of people whose lives have been permanently disturbed and disrupted by things such as polio, cerebral palsy, car crashes, childbirth, and Michael Moore. And there is nothing to be done about those, either. So, I'll just be a "half-full" kind of guy here. The only way to stop Mr. Unavailable from calling is to stop pooping, praying, and having sex, and I’m not about to do that.
Wednesday, June 16, 2010
What Does Mr. Unavailable Really Want?
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6 comments:
I like the wood chipper scenario.
That's probably the most memorable shot from that movie.
I tend to answer all calls as the "withheld" #s as they flag up as here can often be from non-commercial organisations - it is the "international" calls that are invariably the phone equivalent of spam emails - I have developed various ways of dealing with them.
Love that profile pic, Gerald. And I really enjoyed that picture of the tractor you posted recently. Why is it that old tractors get deep into our souls? I don't understand it. But I love it. I once had a girlfriend who had little tractor figurines all over her home. She was a city slicker. Not a farm girl at all. But she just loved tractors. I'm not that crazy. I like the old rusty ones like your photograph.
I finally decided to answer all Mr. Unavailable's calls. I answer the phone, immediately hit the mute button and just set the phone down somewhere. Let him figure it out from there. Feels great!
Oh, yeah, it's tempting to keep them on the line. Maybe tell them jokes. "Why did the telemarketer cross the road? To try to sell the chicken something it didn't need! Hahahahaha!"
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