Wednesday, August 13, 2003

Annoyance #1

CSO: Jen, may I borrow your white out?

ME: I don’t have any in my desk, someone took mine. I’ve been meaning to get some out of the vault, hold on.

I get up to go get white out from the vault. Yes, we keep our supplies locked up. Yes, I work in law enforcement. That means that supplies regularly disappear, didn’t you know that cops are the best worst thieves? As I am the supply orderer, I keep them locked up so that I know when I have to reorder stuff. So neatly stacked in the vault along with seized jewelry & fur coats and government checks are the toner cartridges, copier paper, pens, tape, and white out.

***Pause to answer phone while typing this post - Annoyance #2 will follow***

CSO: Oh, don’t worry about it. I have something I can use.

Then why did you ask for white out if you had something you can use? I still got the white out from the vault for the next person who asks.

Annoyance #2

Phone rings, I answer: US Marshals Service.

HER: Could you give me the number to the Atlanta Marshals office?

ME: inwardly huffing a rather large sigh. Sure, hold on.

There’s a long pause while I search in our phone directory for the number.

It’s 404-DONT-ASK.

OK, that’s not really the number, but as I’ve said here many times, I am not Directory Assistance. Please, look in other places for the number before you call a field office of an organization for the number to another field office of the same organization. There’s a wealth of options out there: Dial “0”, internet yellow pages, etc.