Please Enter Your Number & Stay in the Line

By Keith Fisher

Have you ever wondered how the human race survived in a world without microcomputers, credit card numbers, and cell phones?

I have heard of a time when we were all people, before the George Orwellian society reduced us to a series of numbers. We should have seen it coming when the phone company gave out phone numbers that would ring eight or so houses in an attempt to reach the one person who wasn’t home. Perhaps we should’ve resisted the government when they issued nine digit social security numbers.

Recently, I was the butt of a joke. I choose to call it a joke. Otherwise I would run screaming into the night because of the loss of my mental faculties. Do you know how to dance to the digital Loonie Tunes?

The company I work for switched health insurance carriers at the first of the year, coinciding with my wife’s visit to a doctor. She gave them our health insurance card and they billed it to the old insurance. Without the correct insurance card they sent me the bill.

I couldn’t ask the insurance specialists at work to help because I now work Graveyard shift and they go home before I wake, so I called the insurance company.

I had to find their phone number and was put on hold. I had to give my SS number, my address, birth dates, and my company’s new name, (because they changed the name). They gave me an insurance card number and promised to send a new card to my address. (Wasn’t that nice?)

Armed with an insurance card number, I called the billing department for the doctor’s office and had to leave my phone number because the whole department had gone home early. I called back and got an operator and had to give her all my wife’s information, they also wanted MY information and discovered the records show that I still work at my old job. I corrected it and they wanted to know the name of the insurance (not just the company name).

It reminded me of the time I tried to convince a credit card company that the number they called was my private cell phone number. And no, I wasn’t the person who was on their records. And no, I don’t have a capital one card. And no, I don’t want one.

Small wonder that in this day and age, we all stress out. With all the numbers and passwords we must keep in order to function today, it’s a miracle we can remember the difference between a noun and verb. Let alone diagram sentences.

So if I use a password in my writing instead of an adjective please forgive and remember there are no periods in an email address. Uh . . . “I” before “E” except after uh . . . In order to verify your Identity, please tell me your mother’s maiden. You need a minimum of five characters for a pass . . . go or collect $200.00 . . . please enter the last four digits of your social security . . . In order to assist us in serving you, please enter your account number followed by the pound sign.

Do you remember the Porky Pig cartoon character? Bbbbb that’s all folks.