Dear dimwit on the phone

Dear local cross country parent,

While I'm glad you felt compelled to call us and leave us a message today because we were at your son's meet Monday afternoon, no, I can not complain that the home team at the meet didn't send results in to the major daily paper in our state in time to make their publication deadline.

Why you would call us for that reason is beyond me but I'll think about that the next time I buy a pair of Nike's at Foot Locker and complain to their store manager that Champs sports doesn't have enough of a selection and, as such, insist that he should ask them why.

 

Reminds me of when I worked for a weekly many moons ago and did a feature on a couple of volleyball players. After it ran in our paper, the coach asked me, "Can you get that in the Bigtown Bugle?" Sure thing coach, I love working for free and giving away stories to competitors. But both kids did get D1 college scholarships: One in basketball, the other in track and field ... two sports where I didn't do features on them!

 

Phone call from Saturday afternoon, during the Kentucky-Ole Miss game:

Me: Sports, this is KYSW.
Old Lady: Yeah, my name's so-and-so, and I'd like to leave a comment that Mike Hartline is an awful QB ...
Me: :headdesk:
Old Lady: ... and he cost us the game today. He shouldn't be starting. And I think that head coach should be fired and demoted to offensive coordinator.
Me: OK, thanks.

Click.

Seems a bit racist, no?

 

Some old lady called to complain a few weeks back that she couldn't find the gubernatorial debate on TV. I told her I couldn't help her, but she persisted. I told her, "Ma'am, I understand your distress, but you wouldn't order brisket from a bakery, so why are you calling us?" Then she gave up.

 

I wouldn't be too harsh on these people. I sometimes fear that if we didn't provide information about what's on TV, no one would read us at all.

 

Yeah but with digital cable, who needs to ask what's on TV?

Just hit the guide button.

 

So that's why my brisket's always come coated with icing.

 

Tell it to the thousands who call every week asking what channel TBS or ESPNU or whatever is.

 

Thank goodness I never have to deal with those calls. I would go insane.

 

More of a "Dear dimwit sending me an email" sort of line, but...

DDSMAE: Yes, I did get your anonymous letter complaining about waste and corruption on a local development project. In fact, that's what sparked our story. Thanks. We indeed did look into your claims.

But, when your claims prove to be unfounded and it's uncovered that you are actually a rival developer who lost out on the bid to do the project (mainly because you have a track record of FAIL and fraud)... no, I'm not going to print your anonymous criticisms.

First, they're incorrect. Second, you're a proven huckster with a personal axe to grind. Third, that does not make me a "liberal Democrat TOOL" and a "puppet."

It just makes you an asshole.

Kindly fuck off.

Yours sincerely,
Killick

(P.S. - Your "I'll sue you" hysteria is particularly funny. Sue me? Why? You're mentioned neither specifically nor tangentially in my story. Good luck with that.)

 

I felt bad but what do you do? This is a school that lets their varsity outfielders eat potato chips while they're fielding. I don't think athletics are a priority.

 

Dear everyone who's called to complain about anything in my paper for the past two months,

If you don't leave a name or a number, I don't give a flying fuck what you think. And I'm not going to think about it any longer than the time it takes to hit the '7' key to delete your message.