An Irishman Tries to Sell Me Insurance

I was supposed to have a job interview this afternoon, but it was postponed... that's about how my job search is going now. My list of interesting job prospects is shrinking daily, so as you can imagine, I'm not quite as optimistic as when I convinced myself to move. I guess that's part of the game.

Instead of heading to the postponed interview, I was instead visited by an Irishman who wanted to sell me insurance. In the process of researching health insurance options over the past few days, I had inadvertently posted my contact information with a big "kick me" sign on its back amidst the Internet, and was contact by this guy with a notable accent who was an agent for an insurance provider I had never heard of before. Before I knew it, this guy had invited himself over to my apartment to show me some brochures and give me an insurance quote. Eh, I figured... it's not like anything else is going right, so why not?

The guy, who was either an Irishman or a subdued Scot, made note of the dogness of my cat and the bareness of my apartment, which should have offended me quite enough to send him away right off the bat. But, feeling residual desperation from my job search creep into my health insurance search, I gave him the benefit of pitching me his wares. Now, mind you, I have no experience buying health insurance; I've always worked somewhere where you have no choice and I just get what's given to me. So I've had to learn pretty quick what deductibles are about, what coinsurance is, why I would want or not want a copay, etc. etc. I'm sure this guy could see my green, and he was happy to put his fast-talking Irishman ways with language into full effect in order to sell me some insurance. He pointed here, and then there, and then at this brochure and then that page of the other one, saying how this all added up to the best fucking insurance deal anyone in Raleigh has ever seen.

Anyone who knows me knows I don't jump in the water without knowing its temparature, pH level, and carnivorous fauna first, so I started stalling.

"Oh, yes, well, I'll have to digest this some before I can sign up for anything," I meeped. But he pushed it.

"Aye, yea, well, lemme get ee calculator oot nay and help yee digest it, em then! Fridaye afternoon st a grand tyme ti make ae decision, then!" he countered. So I went for a more analytic tack.

"Why does your policy say I have to pay the deductible three times up before I get coverage? I don't think Blue Cross does that."

"Oooh, but that there's comparin' apples and ooranges, son. If ya don't wanna pay up thee deductible thrice before ya get cooverage, thah, you won' be wantin' this poolicy anywae!"

He used his laptop to calculate up a quote for the policy I wasn't interested in, and it turned out to be fairly expensive per month anyway. He must have seen my soul die a little more when he showed it and decided I was sunk, so he started packing up his brochures. I told him I'd be happy to look over the information in more detail after he left, but he'd have none of it.

"This poolicy ain't fah yee, I can tell 'lready, son. When I present, I usully see folks intrest'd in a few minutes, and I can tell yah ain't intrest'd. Are yah an engineer then, son? Yah seem very analytical..."

So I showed the Irishman out and immediately decided that I couldn't go wrong with buying the same insurance that 75% of my neighbors have, which is Blue Cross. In investigating the reviews that customers give local health insurers, Blue Cross has a solid 45% "greatly dissatisfied" rate--very predictablly poor, like the cable company. Of course, the company the Irishman represents has a far superior rating, but who the hell knows them anyway?