Welcome to our regular Saturday feature “What Aggravates Me”
By Comedian John Knight
My wife came home from work very excited the other day.
“I think I know what’s wrong with you!”
She had been listening to the local Pittsburgh sports station on the radio in the car. She heard an advertisement for something called “Irritable male syndrome.” Apparently, as men get older, the drop in testosterone can make us become cranky and moody. It’s equivalent to female menopause. The difference being when you look up menopause, “irritable bowel syndrome,” doesn’t come up first.
I couldn’t talk to her at the time because I was on the phone with Verizon. I think this is the third time I’ve written about my two year plan being up. The strange thing is, I haven’t been writing this column for even a year yet.
This had been going on all week. My plan was about to expire and I wanted to get a new one in place before it went up a thousand dollars a month. I had called a few days earlier. After punching in all the numbers and codes and secret information, I was put on hold.
“Hold time is currently between seven and nine minutes.”
At minute eight, I was cut off.
“If you’d like to make a call.”
After swearing at the phone for five minutes, I made another attempt. After going through it all again, I finally got a woman on the phone that I could barely understand. I wasn’t about to start over from the beginning again, so I just made her repeat herself often. You would think if you’re job required speaking, you would learn the language in which you had to speak. That wasn’t the case here.
It was a futile effort. She kept putting me on hold telling me she was trying to find the best plan. Either that or she was trying to raise enough money to become a man. Like I said, it was hard to understand what she was saying. After forty-five minutes, I gave up.
The next night I decided to try Verizon.com. Again, I had to punch in codes and passwords and finally got to the plan they said was the best for me. It was actually fifteen dollars a month lower than what I was paying. I put it in my cart, checked out and then then I saw what my new monthly bill would be. Not fifteen dollars lower, but twice as much!
That’s why I was on the phone when my wife came home. I was trying to get an explanation. This time the girl was much easier to understand. I’m guessing it was still India, but at least she could speak the language.
“Sir, you have what we refer to as a grandfather plan.”
“What did you call me?”
“No sir, what I mean is, you’re paying for equipment and services that you haven’t needed since 2011. Do you want to continue with these services?”
“Not if I don’t need them.”
“Why have you been paying for them up until now?”
“BECAUSE YOU’RE THE FIRST ONE THAT TOLD ME, I DIDN’T NEED THEM!”
“Sir, there’s no reason to shout.”
“If you were me, there would be. You would think a major corporation like Verizon would feel bad charging people extra for things they don’t need.”
Sarcasm must not be big in India like it is here because she didn’t grasp that at all.
“So, I guess I should be getting a big refund check for paying for something I wasn’t using all these years.”
“Sorry sir, it doesn’t work that way.”
“Yeah, but if I owed you money.”
“Exactly.”
Now, that time she got it.
I no sooner hung up the phone and my wife was trying to get me to take the “irritable male” test online.
“I know why I’m irritated and it has nothing to do with my testosterone level.”
My wife doesn’t give up easy and kept asking me questions.
“Would you say you’re angry, most of the time, frequently…”
“Right now!”
“I’ll put frequently.”
Later that night, after I failed the test and watched the Pirate’s game, I decided to watch an HBO show on demand. A box came up telling me I had to subscribe. I had just straightened everything out with my plan and HBO is part of it. I figured it wouldn’t cost me anything, so I clicked on subscribe. Another box came up telling me I already subscribe to this channel and it would be available shortly. I tried three times and it never was available. I told my wife what was going on and she said,
“Why don’t you call them?”
I don’t need to take a stupid test.
Follow John on Twitter @jknight841
