For today's opening laugh I shall post without credit the telling of one man's response to bureaucratic inertia. This guy in my hero. Really. laugh

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I had to select a new long distance plan from Verizon about two weeks ago. About a week ago, I get an email from Verizon asking if I will be home next Saturday (today). I call Verizon and ask why I have to be home to get my long distance switched to a new plan. They made a mistake, I am told, and had called for a Fios installation. Don't worry, I'm told, everything is taken care of, no one will come out to your home.

Just this past Friday, a guy pulls up in front of the house in a small Ford pickup, gets out, looks at my electric meter, goes back to his truck and returns with a signal generator, which he clips to my Comcast cable and begins to mark out for something. I go out and ask what he's doing, and was told he's marking out for Fios. I explain the long distance thing to him and are told that he had a work order to mark out. I tell him to forget his work order and leave. After 45 minutes of talking on his cell, he leaves.

This afternoon I look outside to see a guy in my yard marking out AGAIN. I stayed inside today, battling the beginning of a cold or some such snot producing ailment, so I happened to have a Popsicle stick in my hand. I grab my hat and coat, along with a piece of foil and tell my wife to watch the fun as I head out the door.

I walk towards the guy from his left side. He's busy reading his meter and painting racing stripes on my lawn, so he doesn't see me until I'm next to him. I stand there with my Popsicle stick in front of my face, one leg of my sweatpants pulled up as far as possible, one slipper on my foot and one off in my hand, my hat sideways on my head, and my best mentally disturbed look on my face. The guy looks up and says a nervous "hello".

He gets a quiet "ooh" from me.
He says hello again.
He gets a mentally disturbed smile from me.
An obviously nervous guy now stands as far away from me as he can, and continues to mark out the path of the wire. Finally he asks what my name is.

I tell him that I'm "imbizible" and chuckle my best mentally disturbed chuckle.
"Invisible he says, why can't I see you" he asks.
"This is my magic Popsicle stick. It makes me imbizible" I say, as I wave it wildly in front of my face. "And it's imbizible, not invisible. What, do you think I'm stoopid?"

You can read the "oh crap" look on this guys face with your eyes closed.

I let him work for a minute or so undisturbed, but always watching me, then reach in my pocket and take out the folded piece of foil. I remove my hat, then mould the foil to my head. He watches this out of the corner of his eye, but says nothing. As soon as the foil is moulded to my liking, I start to rock from foot to foot sideways, saying "oh boy oh boy", just loud enough for him to hear me.

The guy stops marking out and gets on his cell phone and calls someone. He tells them that he don't think he can complete the markout today, and will tell them why later. He hangs up and smiles at me, then tells me that he's done.

I go into phase 2, and start talking to an "imbizible" person standing next to me. I ask them questions about what the guy is doing, the weather and whatever comes to mind. I reply to the silent replies of the invisible person and have quite a good, but one sided conversation going.

"Uhh..that's a nice hat you have there" he says.
"Not a hat" I say in an angry but quiet voice. "It keeps THEM from reading my mind."

"Who is THEM?" he asks timidly.
"You can't see THEM, they are imbizible" I say as I chuckle my best mentally disturbed chuckle. "They will come tonight and take me away to their planet, just like they do every week. Would you like to come with me tonight?"

The guy starts stuttering and trying to walk backward at the same time. As he's doing this, I'm arguing with the imbizible person standing next to me. I keep step with the guys retreat towards his truck, so that the action is close to him. He finally grabs all of his tools and starts almost throwing them in his truck. He gets in the truck, locks the door and gets immediately on his cell phone.

The only thing that came to mind was for me to take off my sweat pants and wave them at the guy, so that's what I did. He did a double take when he saw me waving the pants and took off in quite a hurry in his truck.

I guess I wasn't inbizible after all.

My wife says I'm crazy


BD

I am..........disturbed.

Concerning the difference between man and the jackass: some observers hold that there isn't any. But this wrongs the jackass. -Twain