Street Meat

This has been a very frustrating day- problems with my internet connection, the continuing inability of our HVAC company to keep our system working properly, and that flouride goo the dentist gives you had all put me in a bit of a mood. But all of that frustration has been lifted, due to the arrival at my doorstep of a guy trying to sell me meat out of a truck.

I had the front door open, as I'm watering a patch of hopefully soon-to-be grass on my front lawn, so I couldn't ignore the tap on the door. There was a guy standing there, and parked behind him on the street was a van that said "Capital Meats" on it and was fully covered in pictures of meat. This is approximately how this conversation went (with my snarky asides in parentheses):

Guy: Hi, I'm with Capital Meats. We've just sold some meat to one of your neighbors (my ass you did), and we have some left over that we're trying to get rid of. Do you and your family eat steak and seafood?

Me: We don't cook much meat ourselves, so I don't think we'd be interested.

Guy: (Looks at my t-shirt) Are you a Redskins fan? (No- I hate them, but I wear the t-shirt to confuse people)

Me: Yes.

Guy: We just signed Sellers (semi-obscure fullback for the Redskins) to endorse us. And one other player. (Calls to other guy walking up the street)- JIMBO! (I swear) This guy's a Redskins fan!

JIMBO: Awwww yeeeeeaaahhhh. Aren't we all?

Guy: Who's the other Redskin that endorsed us. Sellers and.... ?

JIMBO: Jason Campbell (nationally known quarterback)

Guy: Right, Jason Cambell (my thought- you remember the obscure fullback but not the QB?)

Guy: Anyway, if you buy the steak, we'll throw in the seafood and chicken for FREE. (Wow- that must be top quality meat!- it's free!)

Me: Look, we just don't cook that much, so I'm not interested. Thanks though.

Guy: OK.

The guy walked away, and I took some pleasure in the fact that he had to walk through my sprinkler.

So that was an amusing enough interaction, but it only gets better. I called my wife, and while telling her about the street meat, I looked up Capital Meats on the web. The second listing on Google is a headline that says "don't buy from these people!" Here are a couple of excerpts from the complaint. I can't be nearly as funny as this person- and the emphases are mine:

"The men were in very baggy pants (enough that I could see their underwear) and they had gotten out of an old pick up truck with a freezer strapped to the back.

There is no way I would even buy meat from that shady looking pick-up truck- even if I did eat meat. The men proceeded to lay meat all over my porch (ew!!) and then he even tried to come in my house (even put his hand on the door and tried to open it) so he could see what kind of freezer I had. ...

I called their Baltimore office (where these salesman are from) to make a formal complaint. The lady who answered said she was the office manager... I asked about a policy of not ringing the bell of people who had a No Soliciting sign and she said she could not enforce that either because those signs are mostly for religious people.

What??? My sign is to deter annoying, relentless salesman! I told her if they stood outside of my door ringing and ringing again, that I would call the cops. She proceeded to just talk over me, telling me she wouldn't let me speak bad about a great company (Everyone on my street hates to see that nasty truck pull up!!) that she has worked for for 6 years and she told me I must have a miserable life and hung up on me...

If this is such a great company, then the least they could do is update their POS trucks with coolers strapped to the back..."

Laying meat on the porch? If I didn't want street meat, I certainly don't want porch meat. I'm taking suggestions for how to mess with them if they ever come around again.