One of the things I do at Job 1 is answer phone calls related to beer distributors.  Specifically, company-owned distributors (of which there are 13 {I think}, but we only support 8 so far), which are generally huge and themselves supportive of thousands of retailers each.

Sound thrilling yet?

I always tell people that I have a boring corporate job consisting of looking things up all day.  Which is essentially true.  When people call, I look stuff up.  Sometimes I transfer calls or send pointy e-mails when someone isn’t up on their job, but in general, I am a cube monkey.  A glorified receptionist.  That’s my life.

The company-owned distributors we support are in Southern California, Denver, Kentucky, Oklahoma, Boston, and New York.  I know no one thinks of Kentucky or Oklahoma and pictures explosive population growth, but SoCal, Boston, and New York?  They are a lot of work.  Aside from a bit of a clusterfuck when California came on board, everything has been relatively easy.  Even Boston, home of the bean, the cod, and people who always sound angry even when they’re not because that’s just how they talk, wasn’t too hard.

But New York.  Goddamn.  New York.

First, I love New York.  I’d live there if I could afford to (as it stands, St. Louis makes my standard of living comfortable, while in New York, I’d be destitute).  I have friends there, I have friends from there, and as a place, New York is aces.

But the fucking people who work for the fucking New York distributor are fucking assholes.  Hey, guys from New York:

1. Stop expecting me to do your job for you.  I know you think I have nothing better to do than wait around for your call all day, but I’m busy.  I don’t have time for you to decide a particular job is beneath you, or that you’re so special someone just can’t wait to jump through hoops on your behalf.  You make more than me; do your fucking job and earn your keep.

2. Don’t fucking talk to me like I’m the Girl Who Answers The Phones.  Okay, fine, I am a girl and I do answer phones, but it’s not for lack of any other skill.  If you’d shut up for five goddamn seconds, you’d know that I’m quite good at my job and willing to help those who aren’t raging dickheads.

3. “I wouldn’t expect you to understand, but this is New York.”  Oh.  Great.  So you’re pulling out the east coast equivalent of “don’t you know who I am?!”  Possibly you didn’t pay much attention in middle school geography, but there is an entire nation west of the Hudson and we do have lives here that involve something more than chewing on hay all day long.  The Bronx is Disneyland compared to East St. Louis, bitch, and I can see that from my desk.

4. I mean, really.  What a shitty thing to say.  Anyone who has such an inflated sense of location is hardly well-traveled or extensively-lived, not to mention really fucking rude.  I don’t care what this is, shithead, because I have 7 other cities to take care of and they all have far better manners than you.

5. Dudes, I know you’re busy.  I get it.  But you are in a single city.  I’m supporting eight.  And that’s on top of every other business function in this global company, plus, you know, occasionally checking Facebook and stuff.  Don’t tell me you can’t follow procedures that no one else has a problem doing because you have things to do.  We all have things to do.  If suddenly you have nothing to do, congratulations, you’ve just been laid off.

6. Seriously, no one else bitches like you!  No one!  The reps in California are up to their necks in stuff to do!  In Denver they’re too stoned to be mean!  Kentucky and Oklahoma have a staggering amount of square miles to cover, and the ones in Boston have become some of my favorite people ever!  You guys are the only colossal assholes we have!  What the fuck!

7. New York retailers are actually not assholes.  I don’t know what it is about industry there, but they are some of the coolest, politest, most understanding people in the world (aside from a woman in Boston who told me I sounded like I was from New England – for a person who’s tried very hard to iron out the Midwest in her voice, this is huge).  Let’s all have a happy hour, guys.  I’ll buy the first bucket.  I’d invite the New York reps, but they’re all too busy to show up.