I was a receptionist in a Calgary office back in the late 70s when we smoked cigarettes at our desks and had drinks at lunch. We used little pink phone message pads back then, where you would record the name and number of the person who called and then put a little checkmark beside the prompt that best describes what the receiver of the message was supposed to do about it. ‘Telephoned’ is one of the prompts, which seems self-explanatory. ‘Called to see you’ and ‘Wants to see you’ are both listed, which sort of say the same thing in my view. ‘Please call’ seems to capture the necessary response perfectly, although there is a ‘Will call again’ box, too. If they are going to call again why would you fill the darn thing out to begin with?
I hated those little pink ‘While you were out’ pads then and I still do. Back then I would inject humour anyway I could to reduce the boredom of the person who was about to be saddled with the nagging pink slip. A subliminal message on the message pad, if you will. Sometimes an overt one. A fellow used to call with a name that is quite unique when heard out loud. He was Bob LaBlanc, which is pronounced blah blah blah, which is precisely how I recorded it.
Did you know they still sell those little pads, only the modern version comes in a choice of different colours. Still the same pre-determined response prompts, though. I know this because I went out to find one in November when my MLA didn’t respond to my voicemail and I wanted to be sure he knew my views on the use of his government’s notwithstanding clause. I still haven’t heard from him all these months later and I’m thinking that when he read it he only saw blah blah blah and tossed it aside.
Well, I’m trying to get hold of him again. This time to make very clear my objection to his reckless encouragement for Albertans to sign the petition calling for a referendum on whether Alberta should separate from Canada. I want to be sure this person knows he doesn’t represent my views on this matter, and many others.
I’m off to hunt down a new message pad that reflects more closely what I’d like to say. I hope it has little checkbox choices like: ‘I’m not sure that whoever voted for you wanted you to lead them out of the country’ or ‘Do you have any solid info outlining what the outcome would specifically look like to an individual – what would they loose and what would they gain’ or ‘Beyond all the whining, do you have an actual plan’ or ‘WTAF’.
Blah blah blah.