Friday, February 22, 2008

The Opposite of Helping

Our office has an e-mail notification thingie so that when someone needs assistance, has something to sell, or just wants to say something but remove it from the context of the official office business - they use it. Here is one of them:

___________________________________________________

From: Zoom Co-Worker
Sent: Monday, XXXXX XX, 2008

To: EVERYONE
Cc: person who's life I will inadvertently ruin
Subject: Family Law Attorney


Good morning all.....hope everyone had a great weekend.....

Can anyone recommend a family law attorney who would like to help out a person I know - to help her fill out some paper work as her ex-husband is taking her back to court for custody of their XX year old - she thinks it should be pretty cut and dry - but she needs an attorney to look over her paper work...

Any assistance would be greatly appreciated.

Thank you.

***You can email this person directly at xxxxxxxxxxxxxxx

________________________________________________


As luck would have it, I know a very very good family law attorney. So I responded:

_______________________________________________________

From: Zoom
Sent: Monday, XXXX XX, 2008
To: person who's life I will inadvertently ruin
Cc: zoom co-worker who sent out original request
Subject: FW: Family Law Attorney


My friend xxxxxxxxxxx is an outstanding family law attorney.


here is the website: xxxxxxx



_________________________________________________________

And this was the response:

__________________________________________________________

From: person who's life I will inadvertently ruin
To: Zoom
Date: Mon, xxxxxxx 2008
Subject: Re: FW: Family Law Attorney

Thanks so much for this referral....but this is the fantastic attorney that represented my ex 5 years ago! She reamed me good...XXXXXXXX.....I had to file BK, had a nervous break down, and lost custody of XXXXXXXX! She doesn't represent him now.....but I highly doubt she would want to help me now!

__________________________________________________________________

WHO ELSE BUT ME ENDS UP AN E-MAIL URBAN LEGEND? All I needed was for this person to have a second break down thanks to me. I did quickly respond with all kinds of "I'm so sorry, I obviously had no idea..." And even though that's probably enough - it doesn't quite feel like enough.

There are many things I've had to apologize for in my life. Some apologies never made it to the person's ears, but among them are gems like:

* I'm sorry I yelled at your retarded kid, but he started it by pushing me.
* I'm sorry I just called your special kid retarded.
* I'm sorry I only hear what I want to hear (Mr. Zoom gets this one more than he should).
* I'm sorry I ate the dinner you made for me so fast that I got some of it caught in my lungs and spent most of the night on your lawn coughing like an asthma victim.
* I'm sorry I threw rice at you and it got stuck on your arm like that. I swear it was an accident.
* I'm sorry I asked you when you were due, but you weren't even pregnant (I did this when I was pretty young, and it STILL haunts me.)
* I'm sorry I distributed a picture of you with your pants on your head, to your co-workers, with an LOL caption on it.
* I'm sorry I cussed in front of your kid(s).
* I'm sorry I laughed at your child's bad behavior and now it is "a game" YOU are forced to play.

I bet my mom could really make this list sing.

5 comments:

Keyser Soze said...

Hhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhaaaaaaaaa!
Oh that is TERRIBLE! Poor thing!
Why?!?! Why does this stuff happen to YOU?!?!? WHY????!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

It's no coincidence that the word verification for this comment is:

AXKHH!

BostonPobble said...

My perspective? The blanket request for help went out. You responded. The woman's response could easily have been "thanks for the info" and no more. What was the point of bringing someone unrelated, innocent and just trying to help into the the goat rodeo? If an apology is due, it is *to* you, not *from* you.

That and a buck fifty... Still, it's something to think about.

And one of mine would be "Sorry I flicked my cigarette on you and managed to set your shirt on fire while scorching your hair." Yeah...that was a good time.

Anonymous said...

Are you kidding me??!

She could have eloquently replied with no thank you, that would be a conflict of interest. But nooooo, she had to drag your helpfulness down!

BTW, I'm been MIA from reading your blog (and writing in mine!). I am making up for it :)

BostonPobble said...

The more I have thought about this post, the more annoyed I am at the woman who responded. Talk about out of line and RUDE.

Want I should come send her a raspberry?

Boo On Her!

BostonPobble said...

And I just read Mrs. CCP's comment and see I'm not alone in this take so it's not just your crazy Bostonian friend. So BOO on rude woman! YAY for Zooom!