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The sympathy card: To me, a fate worse then the race card. Why? Because when someone pulls the race card, it’s so illogical you can’t help but laugh in their face, which makes them madder, then the situation gets even funnier. Maybe I’m sadistic, but watching someone fail so epically while I just giggle kinda makes my day.
Not the sympathy card though, not that twisted little work of f(*&. See the problem with the sympathy card is that: A) it almost makes sense (twisting reality that well is the work of a psychopath I say!) B) It usually comes with a sob story, or like today’s incident; tears AND a sob story. I don’t like listening to people cry, I hate that simpering, whiny, snot-filled sound it makes.. I’ve even mastered the art of calming upset people over the phone just so I don’t have to hear them cry (though I can’t blame them, if I got the crap beat out of me, I’d probably cry too).
On to the point!
Me: the infamous NightWatch (to quote smileyeagle)
SC: Sob-story Cow!
Me: Opening spiel
Sc: (sound of sniveling, sniffing, and blubbering can be heard) Long ranty story of how she lives in a southern state but her husband used to live in my state and he came here (NW’s state) to go hunting and had a massive heart attack (deep sobbing!) and left poor SC to raise 2 (grown-up) children all by her helpless lonesome! (May I stop here to point out she indicated that her children are both in their late teens and do not need 24/7 supervision like younger children. And also that she mentioned she was surrounded by family who were helping her out. Still tragic, but not as hopeless and bleak of a situation as she makes it out to be.)
Now as she’s getting to the point, she’s sobbing that she has lost a friend during this tragic event. She apparently lost their number and is not certain if they live at the same house anymore. Sc does however know that her friends have heard of her late husband’s passing. (The friends do live here in my state, that’s why she’s called all the way from the south).
Me: (Gathering this woman wants me to hunt down some people for her, by name, address, or possible phone number; I interrupt her at this point) Ma’am, am I correct in the understanding you want me to find out a number and verify an address for these people?
Sc: Yes! *sniffle, sniffle*
Me: Ma’am, there is a website called whitepages.com where you can look up anyone who is listed by their name, address, or phone number.
Sc: (At first she seems to be in a little shock that I didn’t work my Po-lice magic and produce instant results right down to the latitude and longitude of her long lost friends location, their current phone number, and what they had for dinner every night for the past 30 days) Oh well,uh… since..the um, uhhhh… incident I had to move and um, uhhhhhhh… well I don’t have the internet.
Me: Oh that’s ok miss, you can go to your local library and they can help you out.
Sc: (She sounds kind enough, but it sounds like the second her phone hits the receiver she’ll be cussing up a storm and making the cat-butt face) Well, alright… I guess I can do that…
Yes… Yes you can.
Alright, in case any of you are thinking I’m cold hearted/lazy/whatever. Here’s some explanation. I won’t help her find her friends for several reasons:
1) The friends already know of the death of the Sc’s husband
2) The persons the caller wants to contact are in no way related to the deceased (we’re not required to notify friends)
3) Helping the woman locate her friends could be considered an abuse of my power (my nerve-wracking job with pay check is much better then a nerve-wracking job hunt with no paycheck)
4) What if these so-called friends don’t want to be contacted by our SC. Maybe they think you’re a raving lunatic, or blame you for the death of your husband. Whatever the reason could be, I don’t want to interfere with that.
5) You know how toddlers pretend to be hurt and they cry for attention and it just sounds SO fake you can’t help but giggle? Yeah, this lady sounded like that. You knew there were tears, but you could also tell she had to try real hard to work those up, and even harder to keep it going. It just sounded fake.
Anyway, I wish I could let you guys listen to the tape. It sounds so fake that you’d probably pee from laughing. Especially when I’m just sitting there using even, nice tones to essentially tell this woman to die in a fire. She’s a poor voice actor, though I’m sure she’d fair well in a soap opera.
Disclaimer: I am not unsympathetic towards the situation of losing a loved one, and then having to pick up the pieces. It is terrible, I do know that. I also know not everyone heals at the same speed. Though I’m pretty sure after 2 months and having a very good support system, you wouldn’t still be reduced to tears just to make a call to see if someone could help you contact a friend. And really, had she just called and said, “I’m looking for a friend in the area, could you help me locate them?” I might have been willing to search whitepages.com for her. That 5 minute phone call could have been handled in under a minute, easily.
Not the sympathy card though, not that twisted little work of f(*&. See the problem with the sympathy card is that: A) it almost makes sense (twisting reality that well is the work of a psychopath I say!) B) It usually comes with a sob story, or like today’s incident; tears AND a sob story. I don’t like listening to people cry, I hate that simpering, whiny, snot-filled sound it makes.. I’ve even mastered the art of calming upset people over the phone just so I don’t have to hear them cry (though I can’t blame them, if I got the crap beat out of me, I’d probably cry too).
On to the point!
Me: the infamous NightWatch (to quote smileyeagle)
SC: Sob-story Cow!
Me: Opening spiel
Sc: (sound of sniveling, sniffing, and blubbering can be heard) Long ranty story of how she lives in a southern state but her husband used to live in my state and he came here (NW’s state) to go hunting and had a massive heart attack (deep sobbing!) and left poor SC to raise 2 (grown-up) children all by her helpless lonesome! (May I stop here to point out she indicated that her children are both in their late teens and do not need 24/7 supervision like younger children. And also that she mentioned she was surrounded by family who were helping her out. Still tragic, but not as hopeless and bleak of a situation as she makes it out to be.)
Now as she’s getting to the point, she’s sobbing that she has lost a friend during this tragic event. She apparently lost their number and is not certain if they live at the same house anymore. Sc does however know that her friends have heard of her late husband’s passing. (The friends do live here in my state, that’s why she’s called all the way from the south).
Me: (Gathering this woman wants me to hunt down some people for her, by name, address, or possible phone number; I interrupt her at this point) Ma’am, am I correct in the understanding you want me to find out a number and verify an address for these people?
Sc: Yes! *sniffle, sniffle*
Me: Ma’am, there is a website called whitepages.com where you can look up anyone who is listed by their name, address, or phone number.
Sc: (At first she seems to be in a little shock that I didn’t work my Po-lice magic and produce instant results right down to the latitude and longitude of her long lost friends location, their current phone number, and what they had for dinner every night for the past 30 days) Oh well,uh… since..the um, uhhhh… incident I had to move and um, uhhhhhhh… well I don’t have the internet.
Me: Oh that’s ok miss, you can go to your local library and they can help you out.
Sc: (She sounds kind enough, but it sounds like the second her phone hits the receiver she’ll be cussing up a storm and making the cat-butt face) Well, alright… I guess I can do that…
Yes… Yes you can.
Alright, in case any of you are thinking I’m cold hearted/lazy/whatever. Here’s some explanation. I won’t help her find her friends for several reasons:
1) The friends already know of the death of the Sc’s husband
2) The persons the caller wants to contact are in no way related to the deceased (we’re not required to notify friends)
3) Helping the woman locate her friends could be considered an abuse of my power (my nerve-wracking job with pay check is much better then a nerve-wracking job hunt with no paycheck)
4) What if these so-called friends don’t want to be contacted by our SC. Maybe they think you’re a raving lunatic, or blame you for the death of your husband. Whatever the reason could be, I don’t want to interfere with that.
5) You know how toddlers pretend to be hurt and they cry for attention and it just sounds SO fake you can’t help but giggle? Yeah, this lady sounded like that. You knew there were tears, but you could also tell she had to try real hard to work those up, and even harder to keep it going. It just sounded fake.
Anyway, I wish I could let you guys listen to the tape. It sounds so fake that you’d probably pee from laughing. Especially when I’m just sitting there using even, nice tones to essentially tell this woman to die in a fire. She’s a poor voice actor, though I’m sure she’d fair well in a soap opera.
Disclaimer: I am not unsympathetic towards the situation of losing a loved one, and then having to pick up the pieces. It is terrible, I do know that. I also know not everyone heals at the same speed. Though I’m pretty sure after 2 months and having a very good support system, you wouldn’t still be reduced to tears just to make a call to see if someone could help you contact a friend. And really, had she just called and said, “I’m looking for a friend in the area, could you help me locate them?” I might have been willing to search whitepages.com for her. That 5 minute phone call could have been handled in under a minute, easily.
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