February 25, 2010

One year ago this month, Mr. Frugal and I entered into an agreement that we would no longer use plastic, pay cash for everything and run like hamsters to get out of debt.

I’m pleased to announce that we are oh so close to the end of step one. (I try not to think about steps two through seven.) Not only have we paid off an impressive chunk of pointless consumer debt, we haven’t used the credit card for over a year.
 
So Mr. Out-of-Town calls me this morning.
 
“Hey! I just paid off your last credit card. I need you to call them up and close the account, pronto. Can you do that today?”
 
I was thrilled to comply, since closing the account means no more plastic temptation. (Hey, the debt might go away, but the temptation? Never.)

“Thank you for calling customer service,” says the nice Indian man on the other end of the line. He sounded so happy, and to think it had only taken me 14 minutes to connect with someone on the other side of the planet.
 
“Hi; I need to close my account,” I say.
 
“Can I have your name?”

“Annie Valentine.”

“And the password on the account?”

Password? What password? I never set up a password.

“Um ... Parker?” Hey, it’s a shot in the dark, but come on, if I set it up then I’m sure I can remember.

“No ma’am.”

“No? Are you sure? Well, how about Sampson?”

“No ma’am. It starts with an ‘I’.”

An ‘I’? Are you kidding me? I’m sorry, but there’s no way in customer service Hades that I ever chose a password that starts with an ‘I’. There’s our mothers’ maiden names, my dead dog, the city I was born in, that hot guy I kissed in high school …

“Look,” I say to the guy. “I don’t have any passwords that start with ‘I.’ But I’m me, I swear it! I can give you a ton of passwords; you’d be amazed at some of the passwords I can pull out. I just want to close the account. Is this really such a big deal?”

“Sorry ma’am, but I need the password to access the account. Do you have any pets?”

“Pets? Our dog is dead (and thanks for the reminder), and his name didn’t start with an ‘I’.”

“How about —”

“Look, I just want to close the account. What about my birthday? Or the name of the doctor who delivered me? I can give you my driver’s license number, my social, anything. Tell me you can help me here, because I swear there’s no password in my brain that starts with an ‘I’.”

There was silence on the other end of the line.
 
“Hold a moment,” he finally says, “Let me talk to my supervisor.”

Another 10 minutes of digging and comparing and way too much personal information later, I was home free, account closed.
 
I walked upstairs to see what the kids were doing.

“Hey Mom,” says Harry, my 6-year-old. “Did you feed Indie today?”

Indie? Indie, as in, our fish? The one with a name that starts with an I? The pet who’s name starts with an I?

Man, pregnancy makes me so stupid.

See more at Annie's blog at regardingannie.com