A Believable Excuse

It’s January 10th, just two days away from the universal day that most people give up on their New Years resolution. My resolution, to not buy anything that is not a consumable has been going strong. I have tracked every penny I have spent in the last ten days and have lived up to my word. I am assuming that getting Shay’s teeth cleaned counts as a consumable, at least it is not something for me and that is the whole point. It did make up more than fifty percent of my spending so far this year. I am hoping not to have too many of those kinds of expenses.

In looking at my spending habits from last year I found somethings I have no need for that I could cancel. For Christmas Carter wanted a bathrobe from a site that gave you free shipping if you joined their club. The club had a monthly charge that entitled you to a few free things, but you could cancel it at anytime.

I called them up to cancel my membership. The first girl I spoke with asked me why I wanted to cancel.

“I am not buying anything for the whole year,” I explained.

“What do you mean you are not buying anything?”

“I am 57, I don’t need one new thing.”

She could not comprehend what I was saying. More likely that was not one of the choices in her script and she did not know how to classify my cancellation. She transferred me to another person. I was more than a little perturbed by this, but I was certain this new girl had the same script as the first.

“Why do you want to cancel?”

I decided to give her a completely different answer and see what happened.

“I am entering a convent and as a nun I will not have need for your products.”

Dead silence. Dead silence for a long time.

Without saying anything she transferred me to someone else. Now I was having fun, but I also wanted this task to end. Rather than getting mad at the third person I gave a completely new excuse that I thought was timely enough.

“Hello, can you please tell me why you want to cancel.”

In my nicest, most downtrodden voice I said, “I am a federal government employee who has not worked for the last 19 days and I have no pay check in site. I can’t pay my mortgage, or my house insurance or my dentist bill. As much as I love your clothing, I need to feed my children so I have to cancel everything I can.”

“Oh I am so sorry. Of course I have just canceled your membership for you. You are not the first government person who has called. They just changed our system with that as a reason for canceling.”

I thanked her and hung up. HA! I said out loud. I knew the first two agents couldn’t cancel me because I did not give a standard excuse!