Steps to starting a weirdass morning. . .


1. Guy from local chamber of commerce invites himself to our house to introduce himself and to have coffee so he can learn all about what we do.

2. Guy applies Dale-Carnegie techniques to ingratiate himself to us, including "I am fiercely interested in you" head-nod when either of us speaks. I am apparently immune.

3. Guy, working under the assumption that all self-employed people want to retire, ridicules people who don't have retirement on their minds. Shelly and I both declare that we have no intention to retire. He, being sly and wily and smarter than us, quietly reverses himself without our notice, making it clear that retirement's not the goal, no no. The goal is to have the eff-you money to do what one wants.

4. Guy continues to make it clear that he's just here to learn about what we do. Not being Dale-Carnegie-trained, I stop making eye contact.

5. Guy gives us a "fun game" to play. His idea of a fun game amounts to us writing down what we'd really like to do with our lives. Guy apparently thinks that prying into other peoples' business is a "fun game".

6. I finally state that I'm uninterested in any such "fun game" and furthermore it appears that he's trying to sell us something even though we already have what he's selling (i.e. a financial planner). I point out that the last time somebody in a suit tried to be my good pal without making his intentions clear, I ended up in an Amway seminar.

7. He makes it clear that he's not selling anything and anyway he's got plenty of clients who have other financial planners and that's okay because he's better than them. Presumably he now hopes we will hire him as a second financial planner and will soon fire our existing planner. Yeah, I'm all about spending twice as much money to hear two guys bitch about how the other guy doesn't know what he's talking about.

8. I politely tell him that I'm tuning out now, leaving him with Shelly. Good riddance because She was the one who wouldn't say no to his self-invite anyway.

9. While I'm tuned out, he tells Shelly that he's not interested in hiring us, despite his earlier claim that he's just learning about what we do and he's not trying to sell us anything. I'm rather glad I didn't hear that, because being polite doesn't come as naturally with me as it does with Shelly.


Please don't try to sell me anything. Ever. If I want something, I'll come to you.