What follows is a note—OKAY, A SHAMELESSLY BITTER AND VENGEFUL RANT—I recently sent the kind and wonderful folks at Discover.com, mostly because I so desperately needed the cathartic benefit I was sure to gain from the process. Needless to say, I felt compelled to share my tirade publicly and as a result, I am now feeling slightly human-ish. Thank you for listening….
Dear Discover.com:
Are you people kidding me?! I just spent an inordinate amount of time fishing through my purse for an inane pile of names, numbers, correct spellings and whatnot in order to register my account. Further, I’ve wasted even MORE valuable time since you automatically logged me out. Twice. I am now RETYPING the wretched thing AGAIN, thank you very little.
What I desired was really very simple. Truly, it was. I merely wanted to select one of those fancy-schmancy new designs for my current card, which is perfectly fine, mind you—yet DREADFULLY DULL in comparison to the new ones splashed ever-so-seductively across the pretty advertising flier I received this morning. Flags aflutter in the breeze. Sparkling city skylines. Sun-drenched beaches. Blue skies. Palm trees. You name it. There were 150 choices in all. Each had its own special appeal. Each was fabulously doused with color. Each whispered unremittingly, “You need me….”
But it was all for naught.
After painstakingly jumping through all the hoops you laid before me and providing you with buckets upon buckets of information you will probably never need, I learned that I CANNOT, in fact, have a grand and glorious new design because mine is just a stupid gas card—destined for a lifetime of that which is woefully plain and uninteresting.
Humor me, if you will, Discover Card people. What possessed you to plant the silly notion in my head to begin with? Don’t taunt me with the wonderfulness of things I cannot have. That’s just plain mean—like waving George Clooney’s handsome mug before me. And that online registration process—oh, the agony! What I endured was nothing short of mind numbing, never mind completely unnecessary. What ever happened to mail-ins for such foolishness? Honestly, do you think we’ve forgotten how to use stamps and drive to the post office?
All I ask is that you use a little common sense in the future. Apparently, you (or some mechanical representation of you and yours) are aware of the fact that I HAVE A GAS CARD and that its design (for some dark and mysterious reason) cannot be altered. EVER. So don’t include with my statements those happy-schmappy little fliers that sing the praises of switching to a new design. I beg of you.
It’s simply more than I can bear.
Sincerely,
Planet Mom
(An otherwise satisfied customer, yet not so much today)
Copyright 2007 Melinda L. Wentzel
Planet Mom 