Scammers EVERYWHERE!!

This year has been filled with scammers in my life.  And no, I'm not just talking about my cat who comes up and acts like he loves me just so I'll pet his furry fucking body. And no, I'm not talking about Nigerian princes trying to unload their fortunes on me to protect them from evil governments and rebels of said governments.  However, in my war against technology (and yes I realize I'm using the internet to post a blog against the evils of itself), the scammers have found more and more ways to get ahold of me.

I had someone offer me a job to wrap my car in advertisement for a nice little sum.  It was for Bud Lite Lime.  Now for those who know me, they know I'm cheap and will pimp out an endorsement for just about anything if you're willing to pay me.  So a few days later, I get a certified letter in the mail from Drummond Corporation- which turns out to be a coal-related company in Alabama.  Inside are two checks, both from Seminary colleges, one in Michigan and the other in Pennsylvania.  The checks are literally identical in appearance, and amount.  The only differences I find are the check numbers, the account numbers, and who they are from with their addresses.  Even the damn signature is identical.  One being a Puritanical Seminary and the other a more Evangelical type, I find it odd that they would hold with the same guy in charge of their finances, nevermind some Puritan organization pimping out alcohol.  Why not just say the Puritans are asking em to enlarge my penis to have sex with busty married MILFs at bigcockbangers.com or some damn website that goes against everything they hold to be holy?

Once I received the checks, I was asked about them through text, and then to deposit the checks into my bank and forward a Western Union money order off to some lady in South Carolina, who is the party responsible for coming out to wrap my car in the advertisement.  And the texter is using a California number.  Now, maybe Americans are in fact getting dumber, and this wildly tangled web of shit is such a boondoggle that most wouldn't see through this whole charade, but I was brought up when education along with a healthy dose of common sense was instilled in a good portion of us kids early on.  I had a nice back and forth with this lady and even gave her the confirmation number for a Western Union transaction.  She said she was having problems tracking it. I had given her a 10 digit code, much like seen on googled pics of western union confirmations.  I told her the tracking number corresponds to a phone number and she can call that number and confirm it for herself.  I don't know if she ever tried it or not, but after I gave her the number to the FBI's switchboard, and I never heard a peep from her since.

On another level of scams, I have received calls from all over the country from Pretrial Intervention Services, or some other variation of a like name.  It seems, unbeknownst to me, that I owe a check cashing place a LOT of money.  Thousands of dollars even.  I'm not entirely sure how they got my information, but they did have a healthy (or rather unhealthy) portion of some pretty specific financial and personal information.  They knew who my debtor was, and how much I owed total, but they couldn't tell me the original transaction amount or any of that business.  But despite their not knowing that, I was definitely in need of a lawyer, or I was going to need to settle up before this went to trial and ruined my social security (I'm not sure how they intend to ruin my social security yet, I figured that was a politician's job), and ruin my job!  I informed one, that my current job already ruined me, and that it was already such a leech of a job that it couldn't possibly be ruined further.

The first thing that has intrigued me about these callers is that all of them have been Indian (the dot not the feather), or Pakistani or some other similar ethnic variety with a heavy accent. After literally dozens of calls from a variety of offices around the country, I have yet to run into one person on the other end of the line that has anything other than a very generic Americanized name, first and last names both.  Some use celebrity names, mostly of some pretty famous athletes including Michael Jordan!!!  Man, that guy was such a great basketball player, and been a pretty good businessman from most accounts.  The economic collapse of 2007-08 must've really hit him hard.  It seems it has caused him to genetically mutate into an Indian accented customer service representative in Ohio.  I feel kind of bad for the poor guy.  His finance manager really sucked! 

Anyways, the this last week I keep missing calls from the San Francisco Bay Area.  I take the time to listen to the voicemail.  I was hoping to hear from someone in the 49ers or Giants organizations to let me know I was getting a portion of one of the stadiums named after me, and some other perks for being such a good fan over the years.  No such luck in the end...it was some Indian lady leaving me a well read response to call back to discuss my legal troubles.  Since I never bother to call back, they keep calling.  The other day I managed to answer the phone.  The lady (Her name happened to be Amanda Jones) wasn't so smooth in her delivery when she has to talk to me in person.  I told her that despite my legal troubles, I still regard myself as important enough to be spoken to in a more professional manner.  She told me to call back to her advisor's office at 415-513-0133, which just happened to be the same number she was calling from.  I guess business is a little bad for them that she didn't have the kind of phone that allowed her to transfer the call to the advisor personally so I could clear these matters up.  After missing yet another call while I was at work, I took a few moments to call back.  I reached Sam Watershead.  Sam also has an Indian accent.  I guess Sanjay Gupta was too busy to make the call, so at least I know I was talking to a real down home American kind of businessman. 
It seems that despite the fact that they call me from San Francisco, my case is being filed in Los Angeles County. That is quite a few hours drive between the two.  They had no reason why the debtor has NEVER bothered to contact me prior to such an important legal and financial matter would go to court, just that they had written the debt off as uncollected and warranting the spending of several thousands of dollars to haul me in for a judgement of a few thousand bucks.  Now, I'm no lawyer, but we do have a law school up here in the fancy little town of Des Moines, Iowa, and I do happen to know a few finer points of law.  For instance, in a civil judgement on a financial matter which had to have been contracted by me while residing here in the Des Moines area, they would be forced to go through my local Polk County sources, and that I would be served notice of any such impending court dates.  Sam seemed impervious to this and asked if I had a lawyer ready to go.  I said that I did not, mainly because Cash Advance America (my supposed debtor) wouldn't give me enough money to retain a lawyer, and that since I wasn't in any arrears I probably wouldn't need one anyways.  He asked me how we would resolve this matter then if I wasn't prepared with a lawyer.  When I asked if this was the part where I send him some money and he makes it all go away, he kind of hedged his bets.  So, it appears that Sam Watershead (If that's his real name! His real name is probably Peggy), wasn't a COMPLETE moron when it comes to interstate banking fraud, but he was completely unaware that I was the kind of guy who can put on a lot of bullshit to make me sound a lot smarter about matters than he can ever hope to be.  Guess I hadn't been toking enough of the marijuana joints and slobbering over my Cocoa Puffs enough to be taken in by his stupid ruse.  In fact, I just kept belching out more and more information on legal matters, financial regulations, etc etc, he finally decided, after trying and failing to "calm me down", to hang up me.  I felt pretty satisfied with my efforts.  I'm nowhere near the creative phone comedian as say Tom Mabe, but I did alright.

And just for the record, I'd like all of my readers to call the above listed number in San Francisco and see if you can talk with Sam Watershead, or whatever his nom du jour may be that day.  Let me know who you get to speak with and see if they might try to harangue you into court somewhere if you dont find a way to settle the matter ahead of time.

Idiot Flips His Lid, I Lose A Day Off!

I have recently begun receiving Saturday and Sunday Nights off. While we have almost completely lost overtime in the Patrol Division of my security company, it is nice to at least get to be home on those days when my wife and kids are home for full days. Saturdays, like any first day off for a 3rd shifter, are long. I get home at 8am, and rarely bother with a nap, so that I might be able to do something here at home, and then go to bed that night like a regular person.

This last weekend was no different. I did catch a short nap, sort of, as I went in and out of consciousness with a football game playing on the TV. No big deal. Sunday I got up, went to church, came home, watched football and was hanging out while waiting for my wife to make supper for the family. At about 6pm, the phone rings, and my caller ID says its my boss. Part of me holds out hope that he's just calling me to tell me some really great story, or ask me some dumb question that even someone of my diminished mental capacity can answer.

"What're you doing tonight?" is the first question. This very question almost verbatim every time he calls me, is code for "I have work for you tonight."

So he offers me 3 options. Option #1 is to tell him to take a flying leap, I'm staying home tonight. Option #2 is to work 8pm to 6am patrolling Wells Fargo Properties. Option #3 is to do my normal patrol route on the 8pm-8am shift, and the guy who would have worked it, will do the WF patrols. Naturally, knowing the pecking order around here, I tell my wife what my boss is telling me. She immediately authorizes the 8p-8a shift. It was almost too quick. I suspect she holds weekend keggars after the kids go to bed whenever I have to work. Her new promotion has had her dealing with a few stressful situations (which cause amusing snafus with the voicemail setup at her work!!), so maybe she really is going to blow some of that steam off...right after I get my butt to work.

So, I agree to work, as a good husband who listens to his wife would do. Then I think to ask, what's up with the Overtime I'm being offered here. I would've said no, but with the Holidays coming up we need the money (read: my wife needs the money to go buy the gifts, and attach my name to them later).

From what I understand, (and mind you I only have half a story, as a lowly little peon in the company) is that some guy calls up on a blocked number to Wells Fargo, on the same line for local area customers, as opposed to a general national number, and starts wigging out. Apparently Wells Fargo appraised his property and he didn't like the figures. And I guess this warrants telling them essentially to "eat shit and die" (or something similar), and "they're gonna pay for this", along with, "this will be the kind of shit that you'll see on CNN" (again paraphrasing similarly aligned comments).

Some companies just dismiss anything and everything coming from the outside world (read: customers), and other companies hear a few keywords and freak out. I guess, and this is my opinion, that Wells Fargo deemed this as a threat along the lines of a big shootout or a bombing of buildings or something. So they call up our company, who does their security around these parts, and ask for extra protection at all their buildings in the metro area. We have guards in all these buildings, buildings that have cameras all over the place, and many have roving patrol presence anyways, but we have now stepped it up. More patrolmen, including patrols from our esteemed manager on duty, are there to save Wells Fargo from any doomsday prophecies being carried out by an irate customer over a phone line.

So naturally, my boss knows I like to have a little overtime, and he knows that whatever role I'm in, I'll do a good job. (Proof is that I was Rentacop of the Year, 2 years in a row....a made up award upon which I'm one of the few permanent voting committee members!) I enjoyed the opportunity to make some more money and see my paycheck almost approach the point where the boss actually pays me, instead of me giving him $15.47 contributions for the pleasure of laboring for him. But at the same time, I kind of hated to give my day off up, especially since I had gotten up before 9am, and wouldn't see any chance for sleep until after 8am the following morning.

So Black Sentinel since you requested it, that's my story. You may have some idiot readers at your blog, but I have to put up with the potential for idiots who honestly think they have time for shenanigans in the real world (which make me actually have to work and pay attention at the same time, which is blasphemous thinking in my book!), when they should be busy reading and leaving stupid comments on OUR blogs!!!