What NOT to call your Customer Service Rep.......................

I'll turn 51 on July 20th, mark your calendars, it's going to be a momentous day, because  anyone who ever knew me thought I'd never make it, myself included. While turning 51 is an accomplishment given the way I spent my teens, 20's, and 30's, in the grand scheme of things, it ain't exactly a big deal.  I have however managed to learn some shit along the way.  What I haven't managed to learn is when to shut my pie hole. Sure I can bite my tongue most times, I'm not as easily provoked as I once was, I've learned to walk away, more often than not.  But every now and again, usually at the most inopportune times, I just can't shut the fuck up. 

Two weeks ago I was at the airport intending to board a Midwest Airlines flight to Boston. I'd booked the one way flight through Expedia. I'd be picking up a truck and bringing it back for a guy, so all I need is a one way ticket. I get to the check in counter only to find that my flight was booked for the following week. I'm like 2 hours early, so I figure I can fix the mistake, there are empty seats on the plane, so it shouldn't be a problem.
Right?
Wrong.
I call customer service for Expedia and after about 10 minutes on hold I hear that increasingly familiar clipped sing song English coming over the line. The  customer service guy informs me his name is Roger, although I'm guessing it's really Roj, or some  other East Indian  name. Now, I'm already annoyed because I know when I booked my flight. So I explain to my new phone friend Roger that they made a mistake with my  flight. He  recites the standard customer service lines. "Oh, I am so sorry" and " Let me check".   After a few more minutes of holding, my buddy Roger, who sounds exactly like the guy I buy my cigarettes from at the  smoke shop / cellular store, comes back on the line.  He tells me there is no mistake, I booked the flight for the following week.  My neck starts to get that familiar heat creeping up. It's almost like  the itch you get from a visit to the barber shop after the barber shaves your neck. In my case , that itch means I'm starting to get pissed off.  I explain to Roger that I'm certain of what date I booked my flight  and that date is today.  In the back of my mind I'm thinking "Maybe I fucked up. Maybe I clicked the wrong date on that little calendar".  At this point I'm  more  irritated at myself for  possibly making a bone headed move, than I am about the possibility that my trip is going to be delayed a week. Then Roger does it, he tells me it is impossible that the mistake is theirs. He tells me there is no way I booked the flight for today.

100 percent impossible. His words, not mine.

Now that's a pretty bold statement, not to mention arrogant. I even tell Roger as much. He repeats that it is impossible that the blame rests anywhere but squarely on my  shoulders. So I  let it alone, I say, okay lets fix it. Can you get me on this flight today. Sure no problem he says. That will be 485 bucks.  Keep in mind, I only paid 155 beans for the one way flight. But there is a service charge, and fees, and the new flight. I no longer feel the burning in my neck, my entire head feels like it's on fire. What about a refund I ask. Sure says Roger, except we don't  refund. He tells me I can cancel and reschedule, again the cancellation fee is more than the original ticket.  I'm standing about 15 feet from the check in counter, my voice gets louder as I try to explain to Roger that there is no such thing as impossible, and that it is possible I didn't make the original mistake. Roger retorts that it in fact is impossible the mistake is any ones other than my own. I tell Roger  "In this country we understand that anything is possible", and I say some other shit I can't recall.

I tell Roger to give me a supervisor. I go through the whole  explanation, again. The supervisor, who is also on the same continent as Roger, pretty much tells me the same thing.  And then it happens. I forget the Supervisors name ,  but I'm sure she told me it was something American, like Sally or  Joan. Doesn't matter, by now I'm livid, I've reached that point where most reasonable people with nominal impulse control just let  it go.  I call the customer service lady a curry eating cock sucker, I refer to Roger as Haji, as in the cartoon sidekick of Johnny Quest fame. That deeply buried bit of racism and bigotry that we all, regardless of race, posses, came boiling to the surface, and I cussed out the woman on the other side of the world.  I'm not proud of it, it was wrong, I lost it. I called her and Roger shit  like they have never seen or heard in those English classes. I don't regret the cussing out part, just the ethnic slurring part. At the end of the day I was wrong as a priest at a cub scout camp out.

Jump forward a week. I'm at the same  check in counter ready to board my flight to Boston.  Turns out, I'm not  assigned a seat on that flight. In fact, the lady at the counter advised me I can no longer fly on Midwest. Long story a little shorter, I cussed out a couple of people in India, and somehow I got pegged as disruptive.
I'm still waiting to hear back from the TSA.

But did I learn anything?

When I do something stupid, I always try to come away  a little better  for it, try to salvage the wasted  time, make the moment  something less than a total loss. So I sat down after it was all over, tried  to analyze myself and that particular melt down.  I'd like to be able to tell you that I reacted like a symbol  of the angry men and women in this country who are struggling to make a living. Millions are out of work in this country, myself included. Long term unemployment, jobs being lost overseas. American corporations who farm out their business to India, or Mexico, or buy cheap shit from China, dipped in lead paint.  I'd like to be able to tell you that my bigoted rant was the result of that final straw.  I did it for all of you, the down trodden masses. Like the line from the 70's movie Network. I was Peter Finch shouting out the collective  frustration of the American people "I'm as mad as hell, and I'm not going to take this anymore!

I'd like to tell you that my intentions were pure, that I'd just reached the end of my rope.

Sounds kind of nice, noble even. But that's not the truth.

The truth is I snapped. I was pissed off to the extreme. When you get mad enough, when you allow your anger to slip it's bonds of rationality and reason, the unfettered end result is usually pretty fuckin ugly. If I could have laid hands on the  person on the other end of the line, I'd probably be locked up, or in the hospital because Roger or Sally knew some kind of Hindu Kung Fu and kicked the living shit out of me for the curry remark.

In the end I learned something, so it's not a total loss. I learned the customer service people in India are as cool as cucumbers, even when being cussed out and racially slurred in a Midwestern twang. I learned that cussing out anyone within earshot of an airport ticket counter is probably ill advised.

Last but not least, it looks like I may have to drive or take the train when travelling in the foreseeable future.

***Posting has been on hiatus around here lately. I'm going to take one last run at it, so hopefully shit will pick up to at least a few posts a week.  If I can't find  my passion for it, then I'll probably  pull the plug on this thing. So stay tuned, you will either witness a bigger, badder, M M. , or you'll watch a blog die. Which is like watching a whale succumb to the attack of Orcas. Except without all the water, blood and whales.***