Hold It!

Some days you have to fight to hold on, even as you’re on hold. The scene: a small office, an injured worker, a secretary. Pleased to meet you. I’m the secretary.

Me *dialing the Insurance Company (referred to in the future as The Defendant) listed in large print on our official Insurance Policy, and assuming a pleasant, yet professional Secretary Barbie voice*: Hi! I have a Worker’s Comp case here. What do I need to do?

Insurance Professional: We don’t handle that. You’ll need to call our claims administrator. They can tell you everything.

Me: Okay. How do I reach them?

Insurance Professional: Call this number, ask for Brandon. *Amy ponders the fact that this sounds a bit like a clandestine drug drop, but decides to play along for the sake of the employee, who is beginning to swell. * "Oh, and you’ll need an Injury Report Form," the Insurance Professional whispers confidentially.

Me: How do I get one?

Insurance Professional *Amy imagines her waving a hand vaguely into the air in the approximation direction of Brazil* They have a website. . .

*Amy Dials New Insurance Professional*

Me: Hi! I have a Worker’s Comp case here. This is a very small office and we’ve never had to file a claim before. I’m supposed to ask for Brandon.

New Insurance Professional: It doesn’t matter who you talk to. You just need to file a claim.

Me: Okay, How do I do that?

New Insurance Professional: I’ll find someone in claims. *Amy makes mental note to apply for job in insurance industry.* You need a claim number. *Puts Amy on hold. No music. No cheerful voice. The sound of a phone echoing in the distance continues until Amy considers retirement and begins to create an online advertisement for her replacement.*

New Insurance Professional comes back on line: You need to verify your policy number. *Amy does this and is rewarded by the ringing phone of doom for another few hours. My fingernails now need trimming and I could use a hair cut and leg wax.*

Another New Insurance Professional comes on line: Hello. (No cheerful voice. No “How can I help you? She sounds as if she’s on an IV Valium drip.)

Me: I have never had to file a Worker’s Comp Claim. I need a claim number.

Another New Insurance Professional: We don’t give out claim numbers.

Me: That’s fine. I just need to send our employee to the doctor. What do I need to do? (Amy is thankful the patient is not spouting the spurty kind of blood. So is the patient.)

Another New Insurance Professional: I don’t think we give out claim numbers. I’ll ask my supervisor.

Me: I just need to know *Amy interrupted by her arrival once again on the Insurance Hold System which equates with Dante’s Seventh Level, the one populated by people who could not pass the Wal-Mart Greeter test. This time, however, she is serenaded with music from Casper the Friendly Ghost. Okay maybe it’s not Casper, but it’s not Mozart either.*

*Amy organizes pencil drawer, stacks post-it notes according to color, and alphabetizes contents of candy dish. Just as she tears page off calendar and resets clocks to daylight savings time, her old friend comes back on the line.*

Another New Insurance Professional: Yeah, we don’t give out claim numbers.

Me: That’s fine. What do I need to do to get this employee seen by a doctor?

Another New Insurance Professional: You can call in the report.

Me: Should I do that now or later?

Another New Insurance Professional: Yes.

Me: So I need to call you later?

Another New Insurance Professional: You can. Or you can do it now. * Amy holds phone away from ear. This kind of stupid might just seep through the phone line. Just my luck, to avoid swine flu and get struck down by this. *

Me: So I can do it now?

Another New Insurance Professional: If you want to. Whenever. At your convenience.

Me: So I can send our employee to the doctor and then call you?

ANIP: If you like.

Me: Do I need to ask for you? *Please, God, no* What’s your name?

ANIP: Beelzebub *This is not entirely accurate. I changed names to more accurately describe the situation.*

Me: So she can just go on to the doctor.

ANIP: Well she needs to go to an Urgent Care Facility.

Me: So she doesn’t go to her own doctor? How clever of you to mention it.

ANIP: Yeah.

Me: I don’t have a claim form.

ANIP: Well you can just call. . .

Me: Got it. Thanks so much for your assistance.

* Amy terminates the call and considers terminating the Insurance Professional but is leery of being placed on hold indefinitely and doesn’t think she can hold out much longer. *

Employee: So what do I do?

Me: Hold on.

Not Working

I’ve been watching the deal Conan O’Brien made with NBC and I’m not afraid to say that he’s an inspiration. He’s gathering millions of dollars to leave his show and not be the Tonight Show host. He might be allowed to take a late-night seat as early as September, but until then he’s hauling in big bucks like a half-ton hauls manure, not to work.

I’ve decided that for my next career move, I'm going to not be a secretary. I thought about not being a late-night talk show host, but there appears to be too much instability in the field. Not to mention competition for the unavailable openings. And I could use some of the secretarial experience I've saved up during the last 20 years fighting the copier wars in my new position of not being one.

There also appears to be a lot more people interested in where you'll be doing your "not a late night talk show host" work as opposed to people who are interested in the activities of your "not secretary" work, who are mainly the people who call on the phone to offer you insurance or sell you a copier or ask you to change your phone service. As far as not being a secretary goes, I'll make less money, but I feel there will be less stress in not filing than in fretting about career advancement opportunities that are not available in television. I’m not sure how long you have to be Conan before you get to be Oprah, and I don’t want to find myself lying around the house moping about the whole thing.

I thought about not being an accountant, but I really don’t care for higher mathematics. I don’t even like to carry in the groceries, much less a carry a one over into the tens column. That’s just too much responsibility for me.

I could not be a waitress, but what if I didn’t drop the Lobster Ferragamo in somebody’s lap? I’d probably end up not getting fired and not going broke and not losing my house. I’d never get over it.

So before long, late night TV will be back the way the good Lord and NBC intended, Conan O’Brien will be cashing his unemployment checks, Jay Leno will be in his old chair, and David Lettermen will be cashing in on the whole deal.

Meanwhile there are worse things. The late-night talk show brigade could not be the head programmers at NBC. Come to think of it, neither should the folks who really are.

Perhaps they could all get jobs not working in Homeland Security.

Keyboard Quandary

There are days when everything in my life zips along like waxed skis on new snow. Then there are the days I search aimlessley for my gifts and talents like a doggie dumpster-diving for a lost ham bone.

“Accounts Payable?”
“Trial Balance?”
“Bank Reconciliation?”

None of these terms were on my final exams in English Poets or American Contemporary Literature when I graduated from college. I really didn’t see the use to indulge in them now. Except I was deeply interested in getting paid.

I attended a small Southern university and graduated happily with a degree in English and a cunning little sticker on the corner of my diploma that represented a prestigious honor society whose admiration I welcomed, but whose meetings I never attended. These accomplishments, along with the fact that I knew somebody that knew somebody, and that God mixes miracles and humor like Michaelangelo mixes paints, got me a job as secretary-in-charge-of-everything at a local church. Excited by the opportunity to serve as editor-in-chief (a colorful term meaning entire staff) of the church newsletter and to support my grocery addiction, I accepted the job offer without further exploring the job description.

This zeal for employment accounted for my present distress. Seated at a one-horse computer, I desperately searched my remaining little gray cells for some clue that would translate the foreign language my instructor was speaking into something easier to understand, like Gullah or Swahili.

Motivated by greed laced with liberal splashes of panic and terror, my hand went from adding machine to keyboard as I computed the totals of the numbers he read out to me and then entered them into the database. Back and forth went fingers more accustomed to creating exhilirating expository essays concerning Yoknapatawpha County. Adding machine to keyboard. Keyboard to adding machine. I indulged in the prayer of the selfish. “Please God, at least don’t let me look stupid.”

Suddenly, in a turn of events that provided definitive proof of instantaneous answer to prayer, the computer malfunctioned. None of the numbers I typed showed on the computer screen. I pounded on the keypad. The computer had rebelled! I was free from electronic oppression!

“The computer won’t take this information.” I turned in the chair to see what miracle my mentor would supply. “It won’t accept the numbers.”

“I think,” he said slowly, moving my hand from adding machine to computer, “it will work out better if you’ll use the computer’s keyboard.”

I learned my lesson. Be careful what you ask for. God is the ultimate practical joker.