While working on my latest piece of code I let myself get distracted by some new email. It was a note from our accountant that someone had called and needed me to call back. Judging from the 888 number and the long extension it was pretty obvious that it was a bill collector. I’ve made an attempt to simplify my life (keep it on a thumbnail as it were) by using my banks automagic bill payment system. I quickly leap to the website and log into my account. The payment history screen reflects that none of the automagically dispatched checks has bounced. Whew!

I dial the number and receive the automated voice of my car loan company. The extension I dial is, of course, answered by someone completely different from the name in the message. She assures me that she can help me though.

“Let me guess, you haven’t received payment yet and are wondering what’s going on?”

“Yes Mr Thoth”. Now normally I’m sure she braces for some story about long lived relatives that need some type of organ transplant. The organ needed for this very transplant just happens to be on sale at a Chiba version of eBay that uses a discreet form of shipping. The money just has to go to Nanna’s new liver. Just to make things interesting I keep thinking of Y2K. It’s one of those stories I’ve wanted to tell from a technical side and .. well.. just mess with someone’s head. I thought about “Well the world is going to end and all, what’s the point of making this payment. I could use the money to party before the fall of our entire civilization.”

“Tell you what, if the world ends we’ll just call it even. If the world doesn’t end, I’ll make two payments next month. Deal?”

Unfortunately, I didn’t tell the story and the truth was a tad more bland. But don’t quit reading yet, there’s more fun here.. no really. The money had be debited from my account, even though they hadn’t received the payment. I told her that as I spy from the view in my netscape browser, I’m done with my end of the bargain.

“Well we need you to submit proof of payment….” And then I got lost in my own thoughts as some weird variant of legalese and marketing spewed down the RJ-11 by my ear.

“Let’s do this then, I’ll get my bank on the line and you two can hash it out. Don’t hang up, I’ll be right back” A quick three way call later and the two of us were navigating my banks voice system. Now I realize that the telephone network is what Gibson had in mind when he first spoke of cyberspace… but it sucks. After listening at fairly low speeds I may add, to voice menus for 4 minutes we finally tried * to get to an operator.

They should really give us a speed control on that thing.

“Press 1 if you would like to me to talk at the rate of a lithium addict that’s slept about 5 hours in as many days.”

“Press 9 if you would like me to talk at the rate of a 10 year old who had just ingested his older brothers entire bottle of Ritalen”.

Four agonizing minutes later we arrive at someone's desk… who promptly transfers us to another department.

I was in the middle of making a really snide remark when suddenly I was greeted by a fairly non pleasant voice. It was the bill payment department of the bank. I introduced everyone and explained the again for clarification. This is where things get interesting. At least when you're pharmaceutically enhancing your day :)

I sat and thought about these huge expanses that were crossed so these two people could battle it out. Confronted by two set of strict codes written by MBA’s who probably don’t have friends because they can come up with that type of stuff. The two of them went on and on about due diligence and what procedures to follow. I had everyone on mute and played Quake3 arena. At the end of their conversation I realized that I had to quickly mute the sounds of rocket launchers, rail guns, and death gurgles in order to unmute the phone. Assurances were made that faxes would be sent and letters mailed. I was also asked to give an email address so the resolution of this disaster could be sent later. I gave them my email address and that was pretty much it. I had resolution in less than 30 minutes using the most basic of technologies (Web and Telephone conferencing).