Wednesday 26 January 2011

Phone gonads (and my lack thereof)

I need phone gonads :(

I completely suck at calling any kind of customer service line. I used to think it was because I was being kind and sympathetic to the person on the other end of the line. I would think 'It's not their fault X went wrong, they just have got a crappy job in a customer service department, I shouldn't be horrible to them'

It turns out, its actually just because I'm a massive pussy who doesn't like confrontation.

Today I had to call up Vodafone to get my PAC code as I got a new contract with orange (YAY! new phone!).

I'd checked online first about what upgrades vodafone would offer me and I checked in phones4u where I brought my original contract from and their upgrade offers where shit compared to the shiny new contract offer I had found online.

Anyway, when I called up Gemma, the customer service rep I got through to, asked all the usual security questions and then asked me why I was leaving Vodafone. I said I'd found a better deal else where.

I thought she would leave it at that, but instead she just got really shirty with me and the rest of the conversation went as follows

Gemma: Well you didn't check with us first!!
Me: Uh... sorry, well I checked online, and I went into phones4u where I got my phone from...
Gemma: You are aware phones4u are not vodafone?
Me: Oh, uh, yeah... I checked on your website as well, sorry.
Gemma: Well we reward our loyal customers so you will miss out on that loyalty bonus by leaving vodafone.
Me: Oh, um, uh, I'm sorry

What the fuck is wrong with me that I turn into a quivering wreck on the phone?

I should have pointed out that if they valued me that much then they would offer me their best upgrade deal online, instead of making me ring up and haggle with them. I got my new contract online without having to speak to some pushy salesman (which if you haven't guess I'm also not very good at) and it was a lot cheaper than what vodafone were offering online (£28s for an 18 month contract compare to £30 for a 24 month contract and loads more "free" minutes & texts).

Also I'm really not sure what Gemma was trying to achieve by being such a bitch, like I'd suddenly go 'Oh you made a good point by being aggressive and insinuating I'm a moron, I'll cancel my new contract and stay with you!

Of course if I wasn't such a blubbering wimp, I've have said all of this at the time, but instead I just stammered a load of apologies and hung up feeling like a failure.

A quick Google search for a visual aid for this post has lead me to the perfect product for me:


Shame I didn't get an iphone.

Wednesday 12 January 2011

Old Sofa

A while ago I posted a list of horrible things I do to my boyfriend. Since I posted it, I've added a few more things to the list including buying a lighter that gives you an electric shock and leaving it out for him to use and trying to trap him (unsuccessfully) in the bathroom.

Tonight in a stunning display of my creativity and opportunism I successfully managed to annoy him again and as a result amuse myself greatly.

Our sofa is pretty old and beat up now. Its actually a sofa bed, but the metal supports in the bed snapped in half and now every time have guests to stay (and force them to sleep on our broken sofa bed) the sharp pointy edges of the bed tear the sofa open and its ended up looking like a pack of rabid dogs with knives have gone to town on it.

Thanks to one of these massive rips (and my destructive nature) I’ve been absentmindedly tearing out chunks of the foam stuffing and shredding it up.

Until last week I needed the sofa, as despite having its insides hanging out, I didn’t have any other alternative. My apparent disregard of my own property deterred me from forking out for a new one, so I’ve been stuffing the shredded stuffing back into the hole I made like nothing had ever happened.

Fortunately, my mum just brought a new sofa in the January sales (£500 for two leather sofas, she is really pleased with herself), so I get her old one! Since I’ll be getting the new sofa this weekend I decided to put the shredded foam to good use.

So when matt came and put his slippered feet up on my lap, there was only one logical course of action. And that was to secretly fill up his slippers with as much foam as possible before he noticed.

I began stuffing tiny bits in and first as I was worried he would notice that his slippers were swelling up, but he didn’t seem to notice so I started shoving larger and larger chunks in.

I was sure he had noticed because every time I caught his eye he would give me a knowing smile. But when you are trying to annoy someone a smile isn’t the reaction you are going for so I kept stuffing until he said something, or as it turns out until I ran out of foam. Eventually he just got up off the sofa. I still thought he knew but was trying to be a ‘bigger person’ and just ignoring my slipper stuffing antics.

But he carried on walking around all evening with half the seat cushion on his feet, so long in fact that I forgot what I had done and completely missed the big pay off when he actually took the slippers off.

All I heard was a stern ‘BECKY’ shouted from the bedroom before he marched through and threw the foam pieces in my face.

It turns out that he hadn’t noticed at all, he thought I was just rubbing his feet like a nice normal girlfriend. And when I confronted him about the smiling, he said I had been smiling at him in what he thought was a kind and loving way but was actually a mischievous, evil way.

Although I missed the visual glory of the conclusion of my trick, I’m going to grant myself a few bonus points for causing my boyfriend some emotional pain of the realisation that he cannot tell the difference between my look of love and my look of mischief. Not to mention my cunning use of resources available and my quick thinking. It may have not been the most elegant in design but it will certainly bring a smile to my face for the next couple of month.

I mark myself B-.