Please hold

Hello! Thank you for calling Mr. Ohh!’s Sideways View. If this is an actual emergency, please hang up and dial 911.  PAUSE. For Mr. Ohh press 1, for the sideways view press 2. BEEP. Thank you for calling Mr. Ohh!. If this is an actual emergency, please hang up and dial 911. PAUSE. If you wish to make an appointment, please press 1. If you wish to contact the office, please press 2. If you wish to reach the nurses station, please press 3. BEEP. Thank you for calling the appointment line. If this is an actual emergency, please hang up and dial 911. PAUSE. To make an appointment with Mr. Ohh!, please press 1. To make an appointment with the nurse practitioner please press 2. BEEP. Thank you for calling the Mr. Ohh! appointment line. If this is an actual emergency, you’re probably dead because already you didn’t hang up and dial 911 when I told you to, you idiot!!

This could be an actual phone call. In fact, most of it actually was a call I made to my doctor. The only difference is the recording didn’t call me an idiot. However, it did ask me to hang up and dial 911 two more times. But I’m more merciful than the clinic’s phone system, and decided not to put you through the agony.

Nobodies home

Consequently, I hate calling my doctor’s office. But it doesn’t end there. I called the grocery store the other day to order some fried chicken. The system asked if I wanted to speak to customer service, and a list of other options. None of those sounded right. I selected customer service. After I pressed the button, it asked me if I wanted to speak to customer service, along with several different options. This time I found a better option, so I pressed that button. I kid you not, the next thing I heard was. “If you want to speak to customer service, please press 1”

Who the heck programed all these messages? Could it possibly be, The Redundant Department of the Redundancy Department? Oh, I don’t know let me think. YES!! It’s getting really stupid. I understand labor costs and all that, but at this point wouldn’t it be easier to just answer the freaking phone, get me to the extension I need, and get my butt off of their stupid phone system.

A friend of mine works at a place which has twenty phone-lines coming into the building. He has more than once monitored all the lines lost in the endless queue and not getting to anyone. He looks at such things and noticed no one was on the phone. Am I wrong, isn’t the system supposed to get people to someone? Or perhaps is their goal to give you that spare time you always needed to read ‘War and Peace’, destroy your will to live, grow a beard, and basically make you regret calling anyplace ever again?

A confusing web

You might think I’m going to spend this post criticizing the various phone systems I’ve encountered. Well, I’m not. Mostly because I just did. But this is beside the point. There’s a bigger issue, called cooperate websites. A while back I was looking for a literary agent. I looked into Writer’s Market and they suggested a few houses who focused on my genre. So far so good.

When I got to the first agency website, I had to drop down into various levels of various agents and what they’re willing to represent. Out of seventeen agents only one would’ve been willing to read my work, but he was booked and no longer taking clients. Then why the heck is he listed on the market in the first place? Also why is that agency listed as ‘Genre’ if sixteen out of seventeen don’t represent genre fiction? And that was the easy one.

The next place was so proud of the authors represented it listed the various books they helped establish. This gave me hope. False hope sure, but hope nonetheless. On this site, each agent had a page to show the books they represented. Yes, this says what they’ve done, but it doesn’t answer the question of exactly what the want. I found what might have been the correct agent to pursue, but had to go through three more pages just to find her email. There’s got to be an easier way.

I Just want one silly thing

Even dealing with the great and powerful Amazon has been a disaster. I needed a piece for my 3D printer and the manufacturer’s price was terrible. I shopped around. I put the exact thing in the Amazon search bar. It was even listed it as something folks have searched for already. I hit the button and it gave me a list of two-hundred-thirty-seven items. Number one-sixty-two, I counted, was the one I wanted. And it was the wrong color!

My Kindle, and Amazon product, stopped charging. I looked to replace it. There are nine versions of the Kindle. When I searched for it, I was given over four-hundred listings. Some weren’t even being sold by Amazon. There are other vendors out there selling the same product, not a knock-off, on Amazon. Does this make any sense to anybody?

I’m old enough to remember when technology was supposed to make our lives easier, and I’m confused. If I wanted something back then, I went to a store that had it, put down the cash, and brought it home. Now all those stores are closed. If I need something, I can’t get it now, I have to wait for overnight shipping.

This would have been a catastrophe when I was singing, and doing comedy. I can’t tell you the number of times I went to a place and needed a specific adapter or cable. Back then, I could run out and get it. Now I’d have to do a site survey, to find out everything I might need, order it online, hope it’s actually the right thing because the pictures weren’t very good, and then hope the delivery unicorn gets it to me on time. I said ‘unicorn’ because I believe in delivery trucks getting stuff to me on time as much as I believe in unicorns.

It’s the rabbits I tell you

Are things supposed to be this way? Are we being perpetually confused as some plot to have the rabbits take over? Don’t laugh, I’ve seen the way my rabbit looks at me. She’s definitely plotting something.

My older son tried to explain it all to me. He says the pages are designed for shopping and comparing, not for looking up one single item. I should be happy I’m getting so many options. But I don’t want options! Options only get me into trouble.

I tried to order dinner the other day. Delivery was going to take an hour. I selected the option to pick it up. End of story? Nope! The delivery company started charging me a hundred bucks a month for unlimited deliveries. When I disputed this, my bank said I selected this insane option, and I don’t know how it happened. I certainly didn’t want it. I don’t use delivery services.

I Hate All The Options!!!