One Moment, Please
The phone company wants my gun
November, 2006

No, dear Recorded Lady of the phone company, you listen closely because my menu options have changed. Press "1-¿ if you think I will be the one to give up first and let you keep charging me for stuff I don't need just because I have been on hold for six hours. I would rather be in my tree stand, but as a hunter I am skilled in the art of waiting. Press "2-¿ if you think I am awash in disposable income and have no need for a new deer rifle. Press "3-¿ if you want to speak to me, a dehydrated but determined hunter who is prepared to wait until the Rapture to fix the automatic leak your company installed in my wallet. Those funds have already been earmarked for the Remington 7600 pump .270 that my friend Ty is selling.

Ah, Recorded Lady, if only we had met under happier circumstances. Instead, I opened my monthly statement from your company (which discretion prevents me from naming, although its initials apparently stand for Making Customers Insane) and discovered that I am paying an extra 99 cents per month for the anachronistic luxury of a paper bill. It was this change that prompted me, many hours ago, to call and switch to online billing. I will continue to hold, because 99 cents a month adds up. Over 25 years, it comes to $297, enough to buy Ty's rifle, with its twin action bars, free-floated barrel, and quick-release four-shot magazine.

Ah, Recorded Lady, you have returned after a short interval of toothless smooth jazz. You explain that my long hold time is due to "an unusually heavy volume of calls.-¿ And yet this is the only kind of volume of calls your company experiences. You assure me that, even now, an army of customer-service representatives is engaged in hand-to-hand combat over the privilege of serving me. Meanwhile, exciting news! Did I know that I can register for a chance to win $10,000 just by signing up for DSL service? Actually, Recorded Lady, I do my lottery playing at 7-Eleven, just like everybody else.

Recorded Lady, did you know that the 7600 goes unheralded on virtually all "Greatest Deer Rifles-¿ lists? Yet it is an excellent firearm: inexpensive, accurate, and as dependable as an old rotary phone. What's more, it's a great gun for still-hunting, since it offers faster follow-up shots than any bolt action and even some semiautos. No, Recorded Lady, I do not wish to sign up for the CallManager feature that would allow me to stage miniature United Nations conference calls with nine friends and connect to satellite imaging so I can find lost garden tools in my own backyard. But thanks for asking.

The gun in question is available because of an unfortunate experience Ty had hunting mule deer a few years back in the Montana badlands. Crawling on his belly for half a mile toward a buck with a rack like a Sears dump rake, my friend at last attained the cover of a small rock. He then looked down and saw a rattlesnake occupying the very same real estate. Although the serpent showed no aggressive intent, Ty found himself unable to reciprocate. Emitting one of the louder screams ever made by a surviving licensed electrician, he levitated from prone to standing by force of will alone and clubbed to death what turned out to be a 2-foot hank of barbed wire left over from an old fencing job. The serpent was reduced to rusty powder, the walnut stock sustained extensive rock- and barbed wire-"related injuries, and the buck bounced happily out of sight. This experience soured Ty on Montana, mule deer hunting generally, and that 7600 in particular.

Here's the beauty part, Recorded Lady. It still shoots fine, and the very defects that mar its cosmetic appeal make it attractive to tightwads like me. I have always held that the first thing to do with anything new that you love is to go out and bang it against something. Once that initial ding is out of the way, you can ge