To Serve You Better

No question, we live in the golden age of b.s.

I remember when this first really hit home with me. It was some years back and we were staying in a high-rise hotel. Maybe you're like me and are old enough to remember when hotels had ice machines on every floor. Well, on this occasion, a card in the room announced that, to serve me better, ice machines were now located on the third, seventeenth, and twenty-ninth floors.

I've learned to dread those words "to serve you better". They're the modern equivalent of "duck and cover". You know a load is incoming; you're just not sure how big or which directions it's coming from.

It's not just "to serve you better". Companies also tell us our call is important to them. We know it isn't. If it were, they'd answer the darn phone.

And have you ever noticed that the ones with the worst customer service (insert name of phone company, bank, or airline here) waste bazillions on advertising telling us how great their service is? Why don't they spend some of that money on actually improving customer service instead?

Of course it isn't only companies. During elections, politicians shower us with promises we know they won't keep. Once elected, they do pretty much what they condemned the previous guys for doing when they were in office.

The common thread here is that we know we're being lied to. In fact, I'm sure that they know, we know. They just expect us to be good sports and play along. To believe our teeth will be whiter, our clothes brighter.

And that's what really riles me. It's not that I object to being fed a steady diet of b.s. (well, OK, I do). It's that I'm expected to smile and agree it tastes like chocolate pudding.

I was in a local grocery store a while back. You probably know the one; it's famous for its supply chain problems. In layman's terms: it never has the specials advertised in its weekly flyer. Anyway, hope springs eternal, and I went in looking for three items in the meat department. I didn't see any of them in the display cases, so I enquired of a friendly fellow behind the counter.

They did not have any of item A, he cheerfully informed me. Ditto for item B. Beginning to feel a little like John Cleese in a cheese shop, I asked about item C, with predictable results. His smile never wavered. "OK?" he chirped.

"OK?" I spluttered. "Why would it be OK? You haven't had a single item you advertised that I was looking for." I was beginning to work myself up into a fine state of Cleese-ness.

But then I saw his face fall and I felt bad. Like I'd told him his puppy was ugly.

So maybe it's better if we just play along. I mean, where's the harm? And it does seem to give them so much pleasure. Seems mean to spoil their fun.