I’m Not Good on the Phone — or Why Apple Tech Support Never Wants to Talk to Me Again

I’ve been saying I need to blog this story for a several years now (has it really been that long since I’ve blogged…? hm) so buckle up for a wild ride into my daughter’s favorite, most requested story about me ever: “Nice to meet you. Has my mom told you how bad she is on the phone yet?”

I know I’m not the only person with social anxiety specific to talking on the phone to strangers. If it’s someone I know and can picture, we’re all good, but in the absence of expressions and body language, I just can’t grasp what’s happening in the conversation and spend so much energy panicking and apologizing over my poor conversational skills, I make it sooo much worse. Well, I have known this about myself for some time to the extent that I was very up front about my lack of phone skills for a summer college internship as a legal secretary (the lawyer hired me anyway, because his primary goal in hiring an art student for a legal office position was to be able to pay someone $9/hr to build his new website once the $40/hr tech company connected it, so I did some filing, web design, and researching and didn’t answer the phone unless no one else could).

When I ended up marrying an outgoing guy with charisma of level 20, I would implore him to do all the phone calls like check on this with the bank, call this office and move the appointment, and so on. He’d do it, but he always made fun of me for my excuse of “You’re so good on the phone!” He’d be like, “How are you bad on the phone? Do you start to order a pizza and then throw the phone into the wall?” I couldn’t really explain it, but now….

One day, I got a weird email regarding my apple account, which I hadn’t been doing anything with in years as I had switched to Android and turned off the battered iphone 6s that I’d kept well beyond the update that would have bricked it. So I freaked out a little because no one should be doing anything on that account, so I wanted to log in and see what’s up. It had been so long I didn’t remember my password, and I still don’t know why my secret questions didn’t get me in, so I gathered my talking points and information and psyched myself up to call Customer Support.

Only… you can’t call Apple Support — they’ll call you. So I send an IM and sure enough my phone rings. BUT, no matter how I try, it won’t pick up and I get the “Oh, we’re sorry we missed you, we’ll try back shortly.” After two iterations of this my social anxiety has spiked because now of course, they think I’m being rude and not answering and they don’t know that I’m trying to answer. So I remember that I can answer calls on my computer sometimes because Google fi is great so I run into the home office where Garian is working and try to answer through my gmail, but still no luck.

My next move is to frantically find ANY phone number for anything Apple and call it and push buttons until I get a human. I get connected with someone with Apple in God Knows What Department and by now, my thoughts are completely scattered, all rehearsed openings gone, so I blurt out:

“I don’t know if you’re the right person, but tech support was trying to call me and I was TRYING to answer and it kept not picking up and telling me it would call back and I couldn’t even answer on a computer!”

The Patient Tech Guy (PTG) goes, “Um, ok ma’am, and is this the first time you’re experiencing this problem?”

Me: “That’s not what I’m calling about! But you should totally look into it… I got an email about my account and I don’t remember anything and it won’t take my secret questions even though I KNOW what street I grew up on!”

That is perhaps the most ominous opening a customer support rep can receive, but this guy may have not even been Customer Support, I don’t know, so he gamely launches into problem solving for me.

PTG talks me through trying to unlock my account, but we can’t seem to do it, so finally I’m like “I don’t even use this anymore — can I just shut it down so it doesn’t get hacked or anything?” And he jumps at the chance to help me do that and get off this painful call. The catch? He needs the email address associated with the account and I totally know this, but part of it is my first name, which I still know at this point, but it involves a lot of similar sounding letters — but that’s not a problem because I do know the Military Phonetic Alphabet…. normally.

Me: “R as in.. rabbit. E as in egg? B as in boy. E as in Edward? K as in Kangaroo…”

At this point, I’m thinking that isn’t right. What is it? is it Kilo? Kansas? I think it’s Kansas…E is ECHO!

Garian has stopped pretending to work and is watching in horror and fascination as, while I try to remember what K should be, my mouth just kept on talking and I hear myself blithely trot out,

“A as in apotheosis.”

Now my brain is going, CRAP, that’s not right! Pay attention here!!

PTG is just quiet, no doubt taking notes for sharing this around the water cooler later. I snap back into the conversation and pretend nothing happened and prepare to redeem myself with H.

“H as in….”

Half my brain is screaming “Something normal! Anything normal! Anything normal that starts with H!!!“

The other half is like “How long am I taking? Is the pause dragging on? Is he going to think I’m an idiot who can’t think of a word that starts with H and also can’t answer when Tech Support calls?”

So I yell, “…HABERDASHERY! Oh, I am so sorry…”

I put my head on the desk, I’m shaking and sweating, Garian is crying he’s silently laughing so hard, poor PTG is trying not to crack up while he says, “Um no, you don’t have to apologize…”

I ask him to give me a minute and then we soldier on through the rest of my email address, and get the account closed. PTG then assures me that since he definitely does have my email now, he will send me pdfs on anything I may want to do in the future, including undoing the cancellation, or making sure it’s closed, or literally anything, Just please don’t try to talk to us again is the subtext I’m picking up here.

I get off the phone and spin around to Garian and point at him and say “THAT’S what I mean when I say I’m not good on the phone!”

He has never made a fuss about handling the phone calls ever since.

A Case of the Mondays

I had a premonition this morning. You know, an inexplicable prompting from the universe. It was this: I was going to wash my hair this morning, but I felt like I would want to more later. There was no reason for this, as we weren’t planning to swim or hike or mow or anything, yet I listened and decided to just have a ponytail today.

And then…

Flash forward to me straddling a chain link fence, hanging from one toe and my pants, gasping for breath in the hot soup that passes for air around here, desperately trying to unhook my pants and not lose my shoe while keeping just the right angle on the dog leash I’ve looped around my neck to keep it from tightening because of course it has swung into a tiny space between the fence and the pole and gotten caught and is now potentially going to strangle me if I fall. At some point, while I am muttering curses and disentangling myself and determining that the shoe on the wrong side of the fence can be a not-right-now-problem, I catch a SPIDERWEB in my MOUTH and I don’t even have bandwidth to freak out about it. FYI, spiderwebs may look like cotton candy, but that shit is STICKY like the stringy bits off duct tape.

Meanwhile, the escape artist doofus-dog who utterly refused to return to the yard (which has led to my predicament) trots up and plops down with a concerned look on his face as if he’s thinking of going for help after witnessing this display of absolute ineptitude.

There’s a hot trudge through ditches and arguments about not chasing bunnies before we get home and I realize that because I went over the fence, we’re locked out. Minor problem comparatively, so while traipsing back through the backyard I find the weakness in our security system. It’s naturally in the blackberry patch, which is ripe with berries, thorns, mosquitoes, mud, the odd ant and probably poison ivy. I really try not to look too hard for poison ivy, because maybe if I don’t bother it, it won’t notice me.

The fence repaired, I now definitely need another shower and can feel smug about not having wasted any shampoo this morning. Thanks, Universe. Happy Monday, I guess.

Worst use of the premonition ability ever…

Quote of the Year

Umm, so 2020, am I right? 5 more hours before we find out if humanity can get it together to learn the lessons of this year and start building towards a brighter future or if we’re going to devolve into further chaos and idiocy, purging the earth of our presence… The thing that I uttered which inadequately sums up this year, but paints a pretty clear picture of many people’s experience is…

“…and I had looked into the Norwegian study when doing the initial research before even buying my coffee filter of course, but I just assumed I was immortal.”

said in a Zoom meeting, naturally

What is your Quote of the Year? Said or overheard by you? Say in the comments and have a…

Happy New Year.

First Rant of 2017

I just saw a magazine cover with a beautiful artisan-looking pizza with fresh veggies and all — looks yummy, right? The headline was “Guilt-Free Pizza”. Trigger angry rant…

Why are you implying that pizza comes with guilt? Pizza is food, not cheating on exams or spouses, not embezzling from charity, not lying to get out of jury duty. Yes, healthy pizza is good for your body, but if you choose to eat greasy, meat-laden monstrosities with cheese-stuffed crust and indigestible consequences, you own that choice. Own it hard and make no apology.

If you “know you shouldn’t”, then don’t. Easy as that (OK, sometimes it’s difficult, but ultimately, you control your body’s movements. Refuse to guzzle that dish of gravy. You have will power). You better make good food choices for your children, and you’d better model good eating habits for them, but if you are an adult, YOU choose what you eat and when. I’m sick to death of this culture of “oh, all the food I want is Bad, so I have to self-flagellate every time I enjoy a meal and say I just couldn’t resist.” Stop it. I will give zero quarter to that talk. I will straight up ask you if the box of chocolate put a gun to your head. No? Then it seems like you made a fully-informed decision to eat them.

Let’s not “resolve to eat better” this year. Let’s resolve to take responsibility for our choices (how about all of them, not just food choices?) and stop pretending we are slaves to desire and circumstance. Then guess what? When you have the power and responsibility over your own life, you tend to take that responsibility more seriously. You tend to make the choices that are better for you and then, when you start feeling better, those good choices are reinforced. And when you occasionally want to gorge on truffles and wine? Do it. But don’t lie to yourself and everyone else about who made the choice. “Tonight I was sad and wanted to eat my feelings and get buzzed while I watched reality TV to make myself feel better about my life. And it was everything I hoped it would be. No regrets.”

Then, another wonderful thing will happen. Stupid cultural messages designed to make you feel powerless and guilty about your life choices will not be able to inspire vague impulses to spend money on things you don’t need. You’ll see “guilt-free pasta/dessert/cocktails” and laugh and laugh. Because society and magazines and water-cooler-talk have NO POWER to make you feel bad about your food choices — only you do.

 

Taste Tester

The other day, Garian was mixing up one of his delicious margaritas and the Spawn naturally found this whole pouring, shaking, glass-embellishing process extremely fascinating. By the time he tucked the lime on the edge of the deep blue glass, she was begging for a taste. I envy those who have not yet met the gut-wrenching gaze of her huge, pleading hazel eyes, as she says “Peeeeeese? It’s so bootiful…” The adorable is almost too much. But we are good parents and that won the day, so Garian finally let her just lick some salt and lime juice off the edge of the glass while he explained that it was a grown-up drink and she probably wouldn’t like it. She stared earnestly at him and replied, “But I might like it. You should let me try.”

Ever regret teaching your child to think positively?

We do encourage her to try things and she is far from a picky eater, so I have let her try a drop of coffee before, knowing that the bitterness would reinforce the rule she already knows well: that she can have coffee when she’s 18. This morning she asked again to taste my coffee and I reminded her that she didn’t like it. She persisted, so I said, “Well, all right. You can have one sip.” She broke into a sunny smile and said, “Oh, thank you! It will be awful!”

Sometimes I just don’t know about that kid.

Wild Sunday Night

Our little spawn is in a great mood today — she’s playful and exuberant and ‘helping’ around the house a lot. During dinner, she requested some of Daddy’s milk. He gives her a drink, during which she looses a remarkable belch and then remarks, “I burped in Daddy’s milk!” She follows this up with her most charming grin.

Daddy says sarcastically, “Oh, good. Just what I always wanted.”

The Daughter then goes into peals of manic laughter, through which she gasps, “I CWAZY!!”

Any attempt at teaching table manners tonight is now completely abandoned. But we’re kind of proud that our two year old grasps sarcasm already and has good comic timing. Sometimes you just roll with the antics and enjoy it.

First World Problems For Today

Ketchup

Shake it up – check.

Squeeze it ever so gently. No ketchup.

Squeeze it slightly harder. No ketchup.

Squeeze it slightly harder. No ketchup.

Adjust grip to two hands and squeeze it ever so slightly harder. No ketchup.

Squeeze it slightly harder. ALL THE KETCHUP.

Updating Adobe Flash Player

Computer: Your Adobe updates are ready to install.

Me: Ok, ok, I’m in the middle of this… Just do it.

Computer: Yes, ma’am! (smirks evilly)

Computer: Your update install is complete! See what I did for you?

Me: (swears and uninstalls McAffee Security Scan.) Every. Damn. Time.

What are your First World Problems today?

Whine about them in the comments and I’ll be sympathetic with a minimum of mockery…

The Hungry Ghost

This is why a lot of people create things I think… There are more of us out there than you may suspect. Putting a face on your demons helps you visualize yourself defeating them. We all play out these stories in our heads — if you can get yours out in some constructive way that can resonate with others, I think that’s progress.

S.C. Houff Blogs

Its not a demon.  Demons imply free will and choice and there isn’t a choice.  Demon also implies that it can be exercised and removed like a tumor.  That isn’t even close to it.  We refer to it as the Hungry Ghost.  In the Hindu religion when a soul dies with anger or through some sort of tragic incident like suicide it becomes a ghost that follows people who are going through similar situations and starts to consume its krama. There is a hole in the ghost that it tries to fill with that person.  There is an incomplete creature that attempts to eat away taking someone down with them. It often destroys the soul of the person that the ghosts attack.  When I started writing again after a year’s hiatus I envisioned it as such.  A wraith that would sit on the edge of my bed with its black…

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Weird Conversations With Your Baby

Filed under “Things I Never Imagined I’d Say to My 1-yr-Old”…

The following dialogue occurred after the Spawn managed to get hold of Lords of War and mix up 4 decks. We always pick up our own messes, so while we were sorting things back out, it sounded like this:

Me: No, that’s an Elf, so it goes here. Yes, the Zombie does go with the Undead — good job!”

Squeaker: Mm-HM!

Me: Yep, the Banshee goes there and it’s a good bet that anyone in green holding a bow will be an Elf… More Templars… How did you even get these?

Squeaker: Mama drink coffee!

Murphy’s Law

It’s been kind of a rough week, so since I didn’t have a ton of time-sensitive things to do today, I blocked out some Me Time. Dropped The Daughter off at her grandparents’, took a nice long shower, and decided to try some new henna hair treatment. Now, I’ve done henna before and it’s messy, so my best hack for not ruining clothes or towels draped over clothes is to apply hair coloring in the buff. Therefore, post-shower, I’m humming along, glopping this baby-poop colored and textured substance happily onto my head, and just when I get it spiked into some really interesting formations… the doorbell rings. The doorbell. I mean, who does that anymore? It’s too early for mail or UPS, I’m not expecting anyone, so it must be the dreaded Pop-Over Visit or someone selling something. If I could have been sure that it was a salesman, I’d have gone and answered it in my birthday suit, my hair all caked in goo, and explained that now was not a good time. If they still went ahead with their pitch, then props to them for poise. But… it could have been a neighbor. We have some new ones next door whom we’ve not frightened off yet and we do like them. It could also have been Girl Scouts — it’s cookie time, you know.

So, hilarious as that choice would have been for somebody, I remained in the bathroom ’til whoever it was went away. They didn’t leave a package or note, so the mystery remains. I hope it wasn’t Publisher’s Clearing House. Oh, well.

What’s the most ridiculous get-up you’ve ever gone to the door in?