How the Sprint Guy Stole Christmas

Late this morning, Eric left on a solo shopping trip to get my Christmas present while I stayed at home and did some work for my class. An hour or so after he left, I started to get hungry and made a mental inventory of what we had in the house for lunch. And came up with nothing. So I tried to call Eric to ask him to pick up some lunch on his way home. But after a single ring, a pleasant voice interrupted to tell me that my account could not be validated. I was instantly pissed. I pulled up the checking account online. The bill was paid, just a few days ago. I dialed *2 to talk with customer service and was told that because the account is in Eric's name they couldn't give me any information without his password or the last four digits of his social security number. Which he wasn't around to give me.

After speaking rudely to the woman on the phone, I fumed for a few minutes and then realized that I probably knew where Eric's social security card was. So I found it and called Sprint back. And the woman I got this time (a different one, thankfully) asked me to check the device number under the battery of my phone, which I couldn't since I was on the phone. "Did you get a new handset?" she asked. "No, I've had the same phone since we opened the account." "You didn't go to a Sprint store recently? Because the account is showing a device number swap for that line." "No, not at all. That doesn't make any sense.... Oh wait."

Pause.

"Shit."

"What is it?" she asked.

So I told her about how my boyfriend had gone to get my Christmas present today, and, well, I was pretty sure I'd just figured out what it was. She asked what kind of phone I had, and I said, "I don't know, a dinosaur phone. It's a Sanyo." She confirmed that I had indeed just figured out my Christmas present and apologized for ruining the surprise and advised me to act surprised when he gave it to me. Which was impossible because I knew he wasn't planning to give it to me until Christmas, and I wasn't about to go two weeks without a phone.

When he got home a few minutes later, I told Eric the story and he was bummed because he had confirmed and reconfirmed with the guy at the store that we could set up the new phone later, after Christmas. And we could. But the guy forgot that for us to get the upgrade discount I was due for, my line would have to be associated with the new phone. And my old phone would be automatically disassociated from that line.

So the surprise was ruined. But the important thing, in case you haven't heard, is that I have a new phone. I can call people on it. And it takes pictures. And it fights AIDS in Africa. (No, really.) And it's pretty. See?