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I qualify for some state-covered services, including basic family planning (birth control, yearly PAPs, STD screening). Once a year I need to renew my application. This process entails me getting lots of letter:

• A letter telling me the renewal is coming up
• A letter with an application I have to send back with my updated information
• A letter instructing me of the date for my phone interview
• A letter telling me my benefits will end if I don’t return my paper application and answer the phone call
• A booklet and letter informing me of my benefits (I get the same one every year, and they’ve already sent me one this year!)
• A letter information me that I will soon receive this previous letter
• A letter reminding me of my phone interview

Piles and piles o’ mail

In the past two days, I’ve received three separate mailings. All of them stated they were sent on the 18th, the day of my phone interview, which I answered and finished in less than ten minutes. The first one said that if I didn’t make that interview, my benefits would end on December 1st. Um, how is a letter you “sent” on the day of my interview supposed to help me make my phone call? Plus, there’s no way that letter could have been sent on that day and made it here the very next day. You, my friends, are not Doc Brown.

Especially when two other letters, also with the same date, didn’t arrive until yesterday. That’s actually possible, but one of them was essentially a you-don’t-have-to-do-anything-but-don’t-forget-this-phone-call reminder. Which I think I got the point of when you sent me the first letter with the date and time less than a week ago.

I’m annoyed. Perturbed, really. Not only is it inconvenient for me to have to deal with all this mail. It’s confusing. The one letter arrived after my phone interview informing me that my benefits were ending if I didn’t participate in said interview. They’re obviously post-dating some stuff, which only makes it worse.

However, I will have received !seven! 7 seh-veeeennnnnnn different mailings in less than a month about this. The only ones I really need are the ones containing the application for me to return, the one instructing me of the phone interview time and one informing me of any changes. Hell, they can even throw the stupid booklet in there because, while I don’t need it, I’m sure they’re required to do so. That’s still half the freakin’ mail that I got.

And they wonder why we’re in debt.

Governor Walker, have you considered ending the mass murder of trees to save money? Maybe the money saved can go toward education or, you know, expanding state Medicaid. Oh, wait. Hahaha. Walker’s a douche canoe who rejected federal money to get that going. My bad.

This isn’t related to the governor at all, but I figured if I was bitching about “the man,” I’d add the most terrible “man” to the list.

Despite my isolation from friends and family, I am inundated with requests and queries and messages. My inbox, answering machine and mailbox never stay empty. If anything, I have developed a very clear stance on spam: I hate it.

I have resorted to letting the machine pick up every call and I’m sure Ryan doesn’t appreciate it but I am sick of taking calls that want something (I tell you, you donate once and they won’t leave you alone. They’re like stray cats!) or for people who don’t live here, never have and no, I don’t know them, thank you very much. I am not Nadia, Melissa or Erica and the Ryan you want is not my husband so stop calling! These people must be going through the phone book and calling everyone with the same last name as we have which is ridiculous. I mean, our last name is in the top 20 in the entire country so that tactic is absurd to begin with. For reference, there are over 10 pages of Martinezes in the phone book.

Car insurance companies down here are also really good at making their ads seem like real mail. They’re vague enough that you have to open them, just in case it’s something you’ll regret tossing. I get those kind of letters at least once a week. Think of the trees, people!

In fact the calls and mail make me happy Thunderbird does so well with fielding spam and that my computer doesn’t “ring” every time I get a knew message. I’d have to kill myself then. I already hate the sound of our phone which also has an insanely loud ringer even on low. I’d hate to hate my computer.

In summary: gtfo spammers.