Confused, confused every time I'm lost in your arms

[austin_dern]

I haven't got a cable bill since I switched to digital cable. I don't mind, but I worry they might cut my service. So I went to a Service Centre in a mall. After wandering through lines on the first floor, I learned I was supposed to go to the second. I learned at the ``Bill Payment'' counter that since I didn't have a bill, I was to go to the reception desk and get a new one printed.

The reception line had several ``tenders,'' who were to find the people who would just be directed to another counter and didn't need the reception desk clerks. After I'd waited, next in line, behind the two people taking up the reception clerks' time with extremely complicated phone bill problems, one of the tenders asked what I needed. I told him I needed my bill, and he pointed to Bill Payment, and I explained I needed a bill. This he understood, although as I explained this to him the clerks finished their current people; one clerk stepped away, and the person in line behind me jumped ahead to the free clerk, and launched into a phenomenally complex cable modem issue.

The next tender who visited didn't distract me from the next free clerk. They had my address right, so don't know why I didn't get the last two bills. They have my last name slightly wrong -- they dropped a letter -- but they've never had my last name right, so it can't be that. Anyway, they printed out my current bill, then (why not?) crossed out the amount and wrote a lower amount in, in pen, and I went to Bill Payment and paid. I returned home, simply happy to be alive.

Trivia: The United States Navy around 1840 had no rank higher than Captain, but allowed squadron commanders the title Commodore. Source: Sea of Glory, Nathaniel Philbrick.

Redcoats and Rebels: The American Revolution through British Eyes, Christopher Hibbert.