press nine

this is what i heard when i answered the phone just moments ago:
congratulations you’ve just won a free las vegas vacation, press nine to hear more
ummm… no thanks. i know the drill. you press nine and they tell you about this once in a lifetime opportunity; the five star hotel, the shopping, the sight seeing, the oh so wonderfulness of it all. they suck you in by getting you all excited and then while you’re still trying to figure out how you won such an amazing trip they ask for your credit card number. my credit card number? sorry dude, but if it’s free you’re not going to be needing my credit card number.
you see, this happened to us a few years ago. and I do mean us. as in myself, two very close friends, a co-worker’s mom, and the same co-worker’s mom’s neighbor. we had all been at the same rodeo, on the same weekend and filled out our little entry forms at the same booth, all with hopes of winning that dream vacation. only thing was we all won. on the same day. within hours of each other. winner number one showed up to bible study that night ecstatic about the so called free trip she had just one. while winner number one was telling us all the details an unexpecting winner number two got a call from her mom letting her know she’d just won a fabulous vacation. interesting, they both sounded like the same dream vacation. as winner number one told us more details we came to know that she had to give out her credit card number, and it was at this point that we realized they’d been scammed. later that night upon returning home, i received a call winning the exact same dream holiday. i listened to their schpeil and when they asked for my credit card number i told them i didn’t have it with me at the moment (true, it was in the other room) and could we proceed without it. that was also where i announced to the bearer of good news that two of my very close friends had won the same dream vacation just hours before. imagine that. the call ended rather awkwardly after that and left me laughing. only thing was, they already had winner number one’s credit card. long story short, after many lengthy complaint letters, screaming matches over the phone and hang ups out of frustration winner number one got most of her money back.
since that day i look the other way when i see the typical sign trying to luring you in to “enter to win your dream vacation today”. and when i receive the call exclaiming “you’ve been chosen as one of our top 100 to win…” i simply choose to not press nine.