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Hello.  You have reached my blog.  My blog operates 24/7, 365 days a year.  If you are calling during this time, please pay attention as our options have changed.  If this is an emergency, please hang up and dial 911.  Press 1 if you would like to read my blog.  Press 2 if you would like to comment on my blog.  Press 3 for the location of my blog.  Press 4 if you would like to speak to a receptionist to make an appointment with my blog.  Press 5 if all of the above apply to you.  Press 6 if none of the above apply to you.  Press 7 if you are blond.  Press 8 if you speak english.  Press 9 if you are under 5'9".  Press 0 to reach the operator or simply stay on the line.  -click-  buzzzzzzz . . .  -  Can you believe something very, very similar to this is what I heard today when I called, of all places, the doctor's office?  I expect this when I call a school, a hospital, or Walmart, but the doctor.  Come on!  When you are sick, the last thing you want to do is push buttons trying to reach an actual live human being.  Luckily, I was not the sick one and had a small amount of patience which was quickly eroded by this wonder of automation.  All I wanted was an appointment.  If I wasn't getting disconnected, I was being rerouted back to the main menu or, even more frustrating, sent to the receptionist's voice mail.  She's the receptionist.  Her job is to ANSWER the phone.  Webster's defines the position as "one employed to greet callers".  What in God's name does a person that has the job of ANSWERING the phone need with voice mail?  What ever happened to answering the phone and putting the person on hold?  At least that way, you can hope they will return and talk to you.  Or even the dreaded busy signal, a thing of the past, would be more welcome than the receptionist's voice mail.  After twenty minutes of pushing button and starting over again, I finally reached someone who transfered me to the receptionist and made sure she would take my call.  I guess she was the receptionist to the receptionist.  I don't know.  All I know is my daughter was hacking up a lung beside me as I journeyed through the seven levels of automated hell.  But in the end, I got the appointment, she got the antibiotics and we got the heck out of there before I got sick and had to start calling all over again.