Why I love Caller ID

           I’m of the belief that just because I have a telephone the world doesn’t have the right to call me up any time it feels like it. This is why I’m glad I have Caller ID — it tells me which calls to answer and which calls to ignore. Okay — it doesn’t exactly say “Ignore this call” or “Answer this call” — it says things like “Delivery Notice,” which I know isn’t really for me because I don’t know anyone named “Notice,” and I’m not usually expecting a delivery of any kind.

           Sometimes I get a call from “Unavailable,” which is really a coincidence because I am too. The other day I got a call from “Alert.” I ducked under my desk for that one. Every once in a while I’ll get a call from myself, which I totally don’t understand. Still, since I know myself I always pick up — and there’s always a dial tone. That I don’t get. I’ve never avoided talking to myself, I’ve just never done it on the phone and I’d love to because I’d be interested to see what I want.

           One call I got was from “Opinion Counts.” I ignored that too, mainly because my opinion has never counted. I also ignored one from “Member Rewards” because I’m not a member of anything, so how can I possibly be entitled to a reward, assuming there even is one? And if I have a real fan in this world, someone who calls me a lot, it’s “Toll Free Call,” who almost never has the same phone number, but I get it because he’s a real rascal. Or she.

           Sometimes I’ll get a call from an entire state — New York, for example, or Florida. I do know people in both states, but not everyone, and I’m sure they all don’t share one number. Not infrequently will I get a call from “Anonymous,” who for some reason wishes to remain anonymous (unlike everyone else). Okay — I actually admire anonymous for his/her/its candor.

           I did register to be placed on the no-call list, and this has cut down on the calls somewhat, but too many are exempt. During election season the calls are insane, which is enough to make me sour on democracy. And charities are allowed to get through, which is unfortunate because after I pay my phone bill I have no money left.

           These days, if you do answer one of these calls, more often than not you’re going to find you’re being called by a robot. A word of advice: don’t feel guilty if you hang up on them. I assure you — they have no feelings. If they did, they wouldn’t have called in the first place.

I think twice before I pick up a nickel

           When I was a kid, picking up a penny was not a problem. Back then it worth the effort to bend down because I could do a lot with a penny. I could buy a piece of bubble gum or a piece of hard candy, and if I had five of those little copper beauties I could buy a small Coke or a Snickers bar. If I had nine cents in my pocket and saw a penny lying on the ground, I’d have it between my fingers in a heartbeat, because that penny was the difference between wishing I had an ice cream cone and actually having one — vanilla fudge, thank you.

           As time went on, the cost/benefit ratio of bending down to pick up a penny became increasingly unfavorable. At a certain point in history, a single penny could no longer buy anything, so there no longer seemed to be much point in picking one up. But that doesn’t mean I stopped picking up pennies. Old habits die hard, and unless a truck was bearing down on that penny I’d make the effort — for old times’ sake, if for no other reason. I was a slave to tradition.

           By a certain age, however, common sense overruled nostalgia, and if I saw a penny lying on the ground I’d leave it. It’s one thing to be able to bend over. It’s another to be able to straighten up again. After that, I’d only risk picking up a penny if my total at the checkout was $12.01 and I needed one to avoid getting 99 cents in loose change. Before I handed over a twenty I’d look around to see if there were any stray pennies waiting to be picked up. There were times when I’d even find one.

           Eventually I quit doing that too, until the day I stared down at a heads-up penny on the ground by the ATM machine. I’d been seeing the same penny for over a week, and because I felt bad for that forlorn penny, I decided to pick it up. Besides, it was heads up, and who can’t use a little extra good luck? And it wasn’t long before my kindness to that lonely penny was rewarded — that evening, when I checked the lottery numbers, I found that I’d won $253 on a Cash 5 ticket. Well hot dog! Unfortunately, it only worked once.

           These days not only do I leave pennies on the ground, I think twice about picking up a nickel — and when I mentioned that to my friend Bruce in Ingles, he said I ought to write a column about it. Next time I saw him I told him I took his advice, and he said, “You’re kidding.” Hey — does it look like I’m kidding?

The usual, obligatory income tax column

           According to the Columnist’s Handbook, come April a columnist is obliged to write a column about income tax, April 15th being the deadline for filing and for a column. The entry makes suggestions like “Say something funny about going to the post office at 4:30 p.m. on the 15th,” or “Make something up, like ‘the dog ate my receipts.’” It even suggests you “tell some of your favorite ways to cheat on your taxes.”

           I’m sorry, but I don’t think there’s anything funny about income taxes. Paying taxes is our solemn duty as Americans, and we should take them seriously. I know every patriotic American does too, without complaining. Well except maybe corporations that hide money overseas, or get the kind of discounts we ordinary folk can only dream about.

           Saying something funny about going to the post office at 4:30 on the 15th? I wouldn’t know. I always mail mine off the first week in February, that’s how anxious I am to make sure I’ve got my share of Congress’s salaries and expenses covered. After all, they work so hard and they deserve every nickel.

           And make something up? Like what — how my accountant tells me to roll over a two-dollar lottery-ticket prize? Not even the convenience store clerks think that’s funny.

           As for telling someone my favorite ways to cheat on my taxes is concerned, are they crazy? I might as well invite an IRS auditor over and tell him to “Make sure you bring your handcuffs.” Besides, I wouldn’t dream of cheating on my income taxes any more than politicians would dream of cheating on their spouses.

           When I first started paying income taxes, I used the short form — which, in those days, was an IBM punch card. Remember those? Today the short form is as long as the long form was back then, and ever since I started having income from writing and various other legitimate endeavors to report (sometimes reaching as high as four digits!), I’ve had to fill out a bunch of other forms as well — Schedules C, SE, ASAP, TGIF, and Forms 8829 and I H8TAXES. Shakespeare wrote a play about it once. He called it Much Ado About Nothing, and that pretty much describes my financial impact on the economy.

           Like Christmas, Memorial Day, and Thanksgiving, April 15th comes but once a year, and I think we should celebrate it as an important holiday. In fact, maybe we should have the day off — paid, of course — and Macy’s could have a parade and stores would have sales. I think if we found a way to celebrate April 15th, we’d have a better attitude about paying taxes.

           Okay, probably not.