I'm In The Wrong Business

For the last several nights, I've received phone solicitations from my undergraduate university looking for donations. Most of these calls have been during the dinner hour. For most of the calls, I had not been home, but two nights ago, I was. And I was eating. And it was 6:30PM. I took the call. Someone, presumably an undergraduate student, Identified himself and asked for me by name. I told this kid that yes, I am so-and-so and asked if he was aware that this was most people's dinner time and told him that I wasn't interested. I then hung up and went back to my meal. I was rude, yes. But I had had enough.

Look, let's say I go to some major department store near my home and buy a refrigerator. I finance it and pay it off after a few years. Since that time, I have moved, and even though the first refrigerator was immensely useful to me, having stored my meals and enabled me, in part, to get where I am now...I bought another, more advanced refrigerator from another major store.

Years later...the first fridge is paid for, the old store closed its branch near my old home, and doesn't even sell refrigerators anymore. But I still get these calls asking me to help the store expand its headquarters or help other people buy other appliances. Now, to be fair, I am allowed to come back and watch other people shopping for those appliances free of cost (called auditing)...which could be cool. And I receive mailings updating me on other former customers and am occasionally invited to dinners. On the downside many of the sales reps are politically liberal...but...I digress.

Alright, enough analogies. The point is that I graduated 18 years ago and paid off my student loans. My campus was bulldozed and made part of an expanding mall and my degree program was canceled. For all intent and purposes, the school I graduated from doesn't even exist any more. And yet, the calls keep coming. Give it up already. What other business...and yes...colleges and universities ARE businesses...tries to get away with this? Surely, not one I would be lucky enough to own. A nice job if you can get it, though, I guess.