I lie for my own entertainment

[dsrtao]

I spent 26 minutes on the phone lying to a marketing research survey person from Ottawa.

They called me, and because it was a Canadian number, I knew that the Do Not Call list wasn't going to apply. (Strange how US laws don't apply to Canadians.) So instead I adopted a hybrid Canuckistan-Minnesotan accent and went forth.

He wanted to know how I felt about banks. At the beginning he asked me to list all the banks I could recall, so I gave him some easy ones, some local ones, and some ringers. Later his questions involved Sovereign Bank, which I hadn't mentioned at all. Hrm. So when he asked me to describe my feelings about Sovereign, I told him that it smelled like shit.

(Also, my usual bank is an ATM at 7/11, banks don't care about people, they care about profits, and I don't go to Citizens' Bank because the clerk said something nasty about my umbrella.)

Near the end I had trouble not precisely quoting "If I Had a Million Dollars" (Barenaked Ladies, a band with which I presume every Canadian is familiar) and revealed that I had a Ph.D in Sociology.

Annoying telecritters do NOT fall under my "I must tell them the truth before they leave my presence" rule.

Comments

[metahacker.livejournal.com]

Sounds like you might have been the highlight of his week. Of course, who knows where the call center was...they might not get the references.

[dsrtao]

Ottawa, according to caller ID, and he had a definite Canadian accent. Not that I can distinguish Ottawan from Torontonian from Vancouverite, but definite broad vowels.