Everyone has the right to be stupid, but some abuse the priveledge.

Sweet Saskatchewan Lobster. As coat rack is my witness I am not making any of this up:

The Girl lost her wallet. We think. There was one place that it might have been so I said I would call the lost and found and see what was what.

I went online and found the Lost and Found number. I called that number.

I got transferred, because apparently the lost and found number on the site is actually just a general number, despite being called the Lost and Found Contact number.

Told the person I was transferred to what I wanted. Was transferred. Again. Because the number I was transferred was still not the elusive L&F.

The phone rang on and on, and finally the man that made the last transfer was back. Very mystified and apparently asking me why they might not be answering the phone. He was a little irked with me in fact. After all, the computer he was looking at SAID they were in. Where were they?

Having convinced him – maybe – that I had no idea where they were, I asked for their direct phone number. A number that is a secret, since he couldn’t tell me what it was. I don’t know why, and I didn’t want to ask, so I left it there. He suggested I call him directly in half an hour. Maybe then there would be someone in L&F.

About twenty minutes later I called him again. And indeed it was him, the exact same guy. Who proceeded to say that he couldn’t help me, I’d have to call L&F directly. And then he gave me the number. Acting, the whole while, as though we hadn’t JUST TALKED.

I called the number. Except….it wasn’t L&F. It was a totally different area of the company, and the woman who answered the phone had no idea why I’d called her. She suggested that perhaps I should go to the web site and get the correct phone number for L&F. I said thank you and hung up. Why did I not call her several different kinds of stupid? Well, partly because she had not, after all, given me her phone number to call. And maybe she was having a bad day and didn’t know the loops I’d already been through.

I called Bozo back. Told him he’d given me the wrong number. He was...puzzled. His only comment was “hmmmm... oh…really?”. I assured him that yes, indeed, really. He said he would transfer me to L&F. Which he did. No answer. We had another discussion as to why I thought that might be. I suggested that perhaps he could leave them a message with my phone number. Or he could let me call them directly and leave my name and number and a message.

Silly me – I’d forgotten about the secrecy involved with the direct number of L&F. And he didn’t think he’d be “allowed” to give them a message. His solution was to keep trying them, over and over again - with the occasional return to me stating that they were still mysteriously absent - until someone answered.

In time - a very long time or perhaps it just seemed that way - I got someone in the L&F department. Only to find that no, there was no lime green animal print wallet anywhere. I’m counting this as a cosmic test of my patience. A test to see just what it would take to make me cry in frustration. I must have passed the test because I didn't cry. I don't think whinging in a blog counts as losing my patience.