My company has a wide product line and a large majority of those products have the option to be managed by an online application. My job is to support the products, but I was also temporarily added to the online application support team as they are short staffed and getting overloaded by calls and emails.

7 years later, the temporary expansion of my duties is finally nearing its middle, when late in the evening, I get a message from the dev team. It looks like this maintenance window has logged out everybody world wide. My disappointment is immeasurable but I am eating a pudding cup, so my day is not yet ruined.

The next morning brings a wall of emails and a line of phone calls with “interesting” people.

Many of the emails are blank except for a subject line reading “password” and a few reading “PASSWORD”. Others just say “call me” but provide no phone number. Luckily some of the email addresses are associated with accounts and resets can be sent out. The rest get replies along the lines of, “I’m sorry but the email address ba115d33p69@aol.com is not associated with any of our accounts. Can you provide your user name, name of the account, or the email address associated with the account?”

The phone calls range from straight forward to the occasional Boomhauer impersonator complete with southern accent and the wind noise that comes from having the windows down while doing 70 mph on the highway.

Me: How may I help you today?

Caller: Abu daba diba daba!

Me: Absolutely Mike. I can help reset your password. Can you tell me your user name or email associated with the account.

Mike: diba daba daba.

Me: No? Then do you know the name of the account?

Mike: dibooo aba yada.

Me: I see. It’s either Bertsproducts, or something that sounds like it. Unfortunately that’s not getting me close. Are there any other details?

Mike: daba claba maba.

Me: You remembered it’s actually Mannysgoodstuff? Excellent. . . I’m still not finding it, could you spell it out for me?

Mike: ah. . . Ba. . . (10 uninterrupted seconds of what sounds like fighter jets flying by) Da. . . Ba. . . Diba.

Me: could you spell that again? Something loud covered up most of what you said.

Mike: ah. . . Ba. . .

(After 3-5 tries and his ignoring me repeating the spelling back with the NATO phonetic alphabet, we get there).

Me: Ah, of course. It was Manny but spelled with two Z’s and a K. Your password reset email is on the way. Clicking the link will let you choose a new password.

Mike: Yaba daba ding.

Me: I see. Well, even though that’s your brother’s second cousin’s email, it’s set as the primary account holder and is the one needed to perform the reset. Have a nice day.

Now I see a dealership is calling my company cell number they got after I made that one on site call about 4 years ago.

I need another pudding cup.