telephone solicitation

[redbird]

I just got a call from the Yale Alumni Fund. She started by apologizing "for your last name", so I said "it's a perfectly good last name, there's no need for you to apologize." Then she clarified, and I told her she'd done about average on the pronunciation.

I told her I can't afford to donate, and she said "a member of your class has challenged..." I told her that if said member offered me a job, I might reconsider, but until then rent and health insurance are higher priorities. She said something about "only $25", and I explained that that's real money to someone without a job, which she should understand, given what they were paying her. At that point she said she understood, and I said "good night" and hung up.

Comments

[browngirl.livejournal.com]

s/Yale/Harvard, I had that job for three months. I hated it. I felt utterly awful, asking people without jobs to send Harvard *even* *more* *money*. Sometimes they told me what you told that girl, often far less gently.

A.

[intelligentrix.livejournal.com]

I told the last girl from the UW Alumni Ass. what my majors were, and let her infer the lack of money. Unfortunately, subtlety was lost on her and I had to be explicit. But I was gentle.

[ailbhe]

I have turned more than one salesperson away from my door with "I'm afraid you're wasting your time, I'm unemployed."

It works.

[supergee.livejournal.com]

Swarthmore doesn't get that tacky.