I know telemarketers are just doing their job... but I kind of hate their job.

We recently dropped caller ID (I know, how 1990s of us!) in order to save a few bucks. Which means I have to blindly answer our home phone. Which means I've had the, uh, pleasure of speaking with many telemarketers lately.

I immediately know I'm talking to a telemarketer when they butcher our last name. Which, to be fair, it's not the easiest name, BUT, they manage to make a very French-looking name sound Italian-- now that's talent. While that's not a big deal, not taking no for an answer and being snotty to me is what gets my goat.

Last week, we got a call from the cable company we already use. They were basically trying to upgrade our service (i.e. increase their revenue) and tried to make it sound like the deal of the century. In a bored voice, the guy described how he was calling to generously offer three free months of extra movie channels.

"No thanks," I said.

"But you get blah blah blah for only blah blah a month and at the end of three months, you get a rebate of blah blah," he said.

"No thank you, we don't want any more channels," I said.

"But these are basically free," he whined.

"No. No thank you. We're not interested," I said firmly.

And he had the guts to sound hurt. You make me say no three times before you'll give up and I'm supposed to feel bad about hurting your feelings? I don't think so.

A few hours later, we got a call from a breast cancer organization (I had never heard of) asking for a donation. The woman not only called me by the Italian version of my name, but told me I sound beautiful (that's flattering, but doesn't work with me... plus, how does someone sound attractive?) As she went through her spiel and tried to get me to pledge a donation over the phone, I politely asked if she had any literature she could send me to look at.

"You're not going to send it back. Can you just make a pledge now?" she asked.

"Uh, no. I don't choose where I make donations over the phone. Do you have a Website?" I replied.

It took me asking twice more for her to give up getting my credit card info over the phone and actually give me the Website. Which, it turns out, didn't actually exist.

I might start letting FunnyKid answer the phone. He says "hi" and "no" perfectly and when dealing with telemarketers, that's pretty much all you need to know anyway.