Over the weekend, the Holy Trinity was out bowling at an alley in Heaven, and the Holy Ghost says, he says, “Hey, you know who we haven’t inconvenienced in a while? Alan Scaia!”
So naturally, I get a call from my credit card company this morning asking if I had spent $753.26 at Tom Thumb.
Listen: sometimes I get a little crazy at the store. For instance, Kroger sells Skyline Chili, but it comes in a can and the hot dogs just aren’t exactly the same. Still, though, I buy Skyline Chili a couple times a year. That costs more than regular chili, but I’m almost positive it’s less than $750.
Once, in college, I recall a couple of associates and I declaring it “Taco Night” while we played cards. We didn’t have fix-ins for tacos and we had already started drinking, so a young lady who would later become a nurse insisted she drive us to the store herself. As I recall, that evening would end with none of us making tacos and just putting the fix-ins in a bowl and calling it a giant salad.
More recently, Loyal Scaiaholics will remember my trip to the WinCo distribution center.
I have never, however, gotten $753 crazy.
“I really just needed you to say ‘yes’ or ‘no,'” the woman on the phone continued.
I was glad they caught it. I asked if a bill that big sets off some kind of alarm. She said the gentleman (or lady. Ladies can be hucksters nowadays, too. More on that in a moment.) messed up the expiration date or something, and that’s what tipped them off. Then they noticed that it was a $753 charge, and when they reviewed my history, they found that I usually just shell out $40 a week on Pringles and Mountain Dew when I’m at Tom Thumb.
It’s possible I’ve embellished the conversation a couple of times there.
How do you spend 700 bucks a grocery store? Was the scam artist a 1950s housewife stocking up for Thanksgiving dinner?!
The clerk who had called walked me through the process and said that happens all the time, so they’d be able to cancel the charge. She said the next time I logged into my account, it may show a message about a suspicious charge, but they’ve already taken action, which, I assume, involves showing up at Tom Thumb’s house with a baseball bat and threatening to hit him in the knees unless he forgives the 700 dollar bill.
Her explanation got me to thinking though, and I really did ask this at the end of the call: “I get American Airline miles on each purchase. Do I still get the airline miles?”
I’m sure the clerk could hear the facetiousness in my voice as she thanked me for my time and hung up.
