The Tramp's Story, Part XI: Only the Insane is Absolutely Certain

Con’t from previous post…

Turns out I’d spelled Maria’s name wrong. Her last name has a K in it, see, and when she spelled it for me the first time we spoke on the phone, I misheard that letter as an A. You’d almost think she might have pointed that out to me when I hand-wrote it the wrong way on the cover sheet to the fax I’d sent the week before – considering it is the first letter of her last name and all, and the resultant spelling was somewhat bizarre – but I guess that level of detail is beyond the ken of a multi-billion-dollar, post-bailout, Fannie-Mae-backed mortgage corporation. I mean, really, don’t these people have enough to do?

This time she sent me an email, asking me to have My Lady write a letter for my file. She said it should be on letterhead (which My Lady doesn’t have, because she’s just a Lady). It should say when I was hired (that's easy: sometime in 1999 -- or was it '98?). Should explain that I'm a 1099-contracted employee (which I’m sort of kind of not). And state my job title explicitly (I do not have one).

So what I did is, I made it up.

I created some letterhead for My Lady on my handy-dandy home word processing machine, whipped up a hundred words on a sheet of it explaining that I surely was her 1099-contracted employee, had been for at least a decade, and that the job title I use on my 1040 form is “Writer” (and that part there is even true). Then I stuck it in my bag for her to sign.

Ha! You thought I was going to say I signed it for her, didn’t you? Eh, I probably could have. I’m not going to pretend I didn’t think about it. After all, I wasn’t going to be seeing her for another couple days, and this damn thing has been dragging on for long enough. But no. She’s too savvy, My Lady is. And even if she wouldn't catch me, she's too kind. I knew there was nothing in that letter she’d object to, but I also knew I couldn’t live with myself if I signed her name.

So I waited two more days. I brought it to her. And she signed it. Then I called Maria to report that I’d be faxing it along.

“Great!” exclaimed Maria K---. “But do you think you could fax it to this other number? The one you used last time in is my boss’s office, and she’s gone on vacation for a week.”

Sure. Because naturally a multi-billion-dollar, post-bailout, Fannie-Mae-backed mortgage corporation doesn’t have communal fax machines for folks to use. They’re all in bosses’ offices, of course. And everybody knows that when a boss goes on vacation, she locks her office and swallows the key. Along with her secretary. And what’s left of my mental health.

Two people, six names, three email addresses, three fax numbers.

2-6-3-3

Holy shit.

Have I gotten myself involved with the Illuminati?

If I don't post the next installment in two days, you'll know who to blame...