Oh people's brains, where art thou?

You know those safety labels that look like they came from another planet?

Planet Retardation.

Labels like "Warning: Do not iron clothes on self" on an iron.

Or "Warning: May contain peanuts" on an airline peanut pack.

Yeah. Those labels that make your mind boggle.

At first, like everyone else, I pondered "What kind of idiots would need these warnings in the first place?".

Then I started to work at the call center.

On one of my earlier shifts, after excruciating six hours of endless pain and agony, I finally look at the monitor and I see:

Calls waiting: 0
Oldest call waiting: :00

* GLEE! *

The moment I alt tab out to read some news...

* ring *

Un-glee.

>TSG: [ISP name] at your service, TSG speaking.
>Customer (aggressively): Yeah, hello. Tell me, how can you be [Company motto here] when your internet is so freaking slow?

You are afflicted by Blood Boil.
You are afflicted by Disgust.

Strike one: If you actually have to call us, don't start a call with an aggressive tone. There's a 99.9% probability the representative doesn't know or care about your problem. That'll just make you sound stupid.

I surely don't. In fact, don't ever call me.

Chances are I'll cancel your content IDs, hang up on you, blacklist your phone numbers as telemarketers, report your credit card as stolen, log on your account, download 2girls1cup or some child porn, flag myself as unavailable and go to the bathroom to vomit my intestines out.

Not from 2girls1cup. From the fact you disturbed my peaceful idling with a retarded issue that in 90% of the cases stems from your own retardation. Seriously.

That not to say there aren't any serious issues. But in 2 months' work on a full time job scale I've only encountered one. You'll read about it eventually.


Strike two. Don't ever quote the company motto. We hate it even more than you do.

You know these stupid quirky mottos that try to sound smart but end up sounding moronic in a jingle that makes you want to defenestrate the guy next to you?

We got one of those. Our motto is particularly annoying.

I wished I could flag myself unavailable and go empty my intestines (the regular way this time) but, alas, rules are rules.

>TSG: So how does this come to pass? Tell me what you're doing and how this slowness is expressed.
>Customer: Yeah, I got a [Package size here] internet and I'm downloading at [50% of package maximum speed here].

You are afflicted by Enrage.

Strike three. Never, EVER, use the word "Internet" as a noun. There's "the Internet" for you. Instead of saying "I has no intarwebz halp", say "My connection to the Internet was lost, giving me [Error number here]", or "I'm connected to the Internet but unable to surf the web".

It'll keep my agitation level below 9000 and won't make you sound like a mouth-breathing retard who should've been aborted or euthanized.

>TSG: Okay, so let's head to our speed test site where we can ascertain the cause for this, as this is obviously not valid.
>Customer: No.
>TSG: Why not?
>Customer: I don't trust your speed tests, I want us to do it my way.

You gain Homicidal Tendencies.

Seriously. That's just like going to get your car fixed, and telling the mechanic "I don't trust the way you handle my car, we'll do it my way."

But no, I have to be nice because this call is obviously getting recorded. Eventually, someone might just look it up in the archives and TSG would be no more.

>TSG: Our speed tests are 100% reliable and we use them on a daily basis. If you would just...
>Customer: I said no. Do it my way.
>TSG: So where are you downloading from?
>Customer: microsoft.com

Since this is the first time I had an "uncooperative customer" (Read: Retard), I had to consult a senior TSG. These seniors are there for us to help us whenever we get temporary Down's Syndrome and unable to continue without advice.

After "consulting" (read: doing the same as a customer, just to a senior TSG), I got a plan of action.

>TSG: Okay, here's what we'll do. Open up a download of the same file concurrently.
>Customer: Whoa, it downloads at [75% of package max speed here]! Did you do anything?
>TSG: No, the download speed limitation stems directly from Microsoft and has nothing to do with us.

At this point I was quite agitated. So the senior came over my shoulder and began actively listening.

>Customer: So you didn't do anything? How come my download speed's changed? You definitely did something there. Don't tell me to do your speed test because I don't trust it. I'm not going to do it, period.
>TSG: [Customer name here], if you remain uncooperative, the only thing I can offer to do is log on your account from here, conduct a speed test and tell you the results.
>Customer: The only way you get my authorization is if you postal mail me the results on official corporate paper.
>TSG: I'm afraid you're in for disappointment. (slightly agitated) Not only am I unauthorized to do such things, our speed test are easily conducted by phone. (enraged) Also, I find it personally offensive to be treated as deceptive because I'm here for you and I get paid to solve your problems. (calmer) Now how's your downloads going?

And for a good freaking reason too. I don't think anyone likes hearing "I don't trust you" in their face. Metaphorically speaking of course, but it's close enough.

I should also mention that the senior TSG put him on speaker phone so he could hear the details too. He kept silent with the exception of giving me some tips on what to say every now and then.

>Customer: Oh what the hell, why am I not getting [Package max speed here] on both files?
>TSG: Because this is how ISP works. You get a max download speed and the sum of your concurrent downloads cannot exceed it.
>Customer: [ISP name here] sucks, I'm disconnecting from you.
>TSG: You can ask any representative from any ISP, not just me. You'll get the same answer everywhere and I'll tell you again: The sum of your download speeds will not exceed [Max package speed here]. This is regardless of your package size and of the infrastructure you choose to use, cable or DSL. You'll hear this from any TSG from any ISP in [Country name here].

I couldn't take this crap anymore.

>TSG: Could you wait a minute please?

I was almost passing out of laughter. So I put him on hold.

>STSG (to me): This is so retarded. Let him wait and chill for a minute or so.

After 10 seconds the his number is gone. Which means he hung up.

>TSG (to STSG): Dude, he's going to disconnect from us. Did I do something wrong?
>STSG (to me): No man, good freaking riddance. One less retard to deal with.

* GLEE *

Glance at the monitor:

Calls waiting: 0
Oldest call waiting: :00
Number of idlers: 50% of center

* ULTRA-GLEE *

Not only he delivered content ID cancellation on himself, I got reassurance from superiors that we really hate those kinds of morons.

Now to log his account and download horse porn, 2girls1cup, etc...


I actually felt a little better after that call. Not to say I didn't have to empty my bowels after it, at least they got emptied the usual way.

Now, back to playing Bubbles...
...
* ring *

Un-glee. But that's a whole another story...