PHONE SPIDERS

My good friend Anony just called to tell me there is a SALE on our favorite blue hairspray! And that right there was enough to get me to quit screening my calls and actually pick up. Wait. No, no, no. I didn't mean I screen calls. That would be rude. I meant I practice "selective answering." That is self preservation. Apples and oranges, folks.

Even in the most beautiful summer months, we don't fling our windows wide, without making sure there is a filter~a barrier~for jumping, hairy spiders. Thus, the same is true for people pests that like to torpedo into our homes through fiber optics, making us jump and slap our own bodies as we try to "GET THEM OFF! GET THEM OFF! AAAGGHHHHH!!!"

Just the other day, I went to Target to buy Mucinex for sniffer boy. They made me sign that, "I will not be making meth with this here booger drug." And that got me thinking that SURELY, if I have to sign about snot meds, there should ABSOLUTELY be a requirement for telephone installation. I've come up with my own list of the phone terrorists that would be on the "do not fly" ~or answer~ list:

The "What else can you do for me?" callers. I have to answer their ring with a pencil and paper in hand to record my next assignment. They are usually the people that load their plate up with boiled spinach and cold beans and weenies, let it ruminate in it's own turd-like juices for a few days, then carry it over to my house for me to lick clean, as they profess they're just "overwhelmed" by their own self-appointed burdens. Needless to say, the taste left in my mouth afterward is not necessarily minty fresh. I have to spit a lot when I'm talking to them.

The "I have once again made a HORRENDOUS life decision~as Satan is my master~which will undoubtedly bring me to my knees in desperation~certainly not prayer~and I want to give you a play by play of every crisis that I continue to center my life around, intermixed with weeping and pessimistic gnashing of teeth. Then I'll ask your advice and pretend you have made an enormous difference in my life, professing that I wouldn't know WHAT to do without you, don't ever, ever leave me, you are my ONLY FRIEND!...followed by a titanic brain fart of every call to action and death bed repentance, continuing on eternally in my white-trash ways."

The "I don't have any pots full and boiling over on my creativity stove, therefore, neither do you, so you have a wallet full of time to spend on entertaining me."

The "I know I was supposed to do something staggeringly time sensitive and urgent, but I forgot, so do you still want me to do it?"

These are just a few. I'm sure there are others. Feel free to add your own.

My sister used to answer her phone with a Raid list in hand~the apologies she could offer up to phone spiders for not being available to babysit their lamblike wee tots, that they "just can't take with me to The Walmart, cuz their (grimy paws) minds are just so engrossed in (destroying) fresh merchandise, and they somehow get their hands on 10-12 candy bars, unwrapping and taking a slobbery bite when I'm not looking, but I'm just way, way, WAY vigilant, so I don't get how they can be so lightening quick. But then the stupid cashier totally expects me to pay for them, but I'm like, "Um, hello? That ain't MY fault that you guys put candy at my kids EYE LEVEL. You shoulda thought about that before you filled your check-out lane with stuff that's gonna tempt them. That's YOUR fault and I ain't paying for it. Then I dump the piles of destroyed merchandise on the conveyor belt for her to figure out what to do with. Can you even believe her gall? Anyways, um, can you watch them for like, I don't know, I should be done around dinner time. But if you want to keep them longer and have them eat with you, it's totally fine. You can bring them by later."

The only thing that keeps me from tearing the device from the wall and letting it hang by it's wires, is that sometimes, on beautiful occasion, there is the sing-songy, lyrical ring that comes from a real friend. The "Hey, I was just thinking of you and wondered what I can do to lighten your load? Do you need a stack of twenties? How about a years supply of cinnamon bears and good-n-plenties? Or a gift card to Hobby Lobby? I would imagine you're still in your pajamas, as it's only noon thirty, so I'll just leave them on your doorstep so you don't have to be seen. I love you! And you're thin."

And that right there is why I am so adept at performing "selective answering."

No hairy "A" phone spiders need call me up. My Raid is ready.