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So here I am, innocently hanging my new living room curtains, when comes shuffling by a head-hanging, bad-postured, nervous, little man. Well, actually, he was quite tall, but he was so stooped over and intently focused on his electronic notepad that he was only about four inches taller than little old me.
He stands there for a moment, in front of the door, pacing. I just stare out the window, drapery hook in my mouth, scissors in my hand.
Finally, an assertive KNOCK.
KNOCK, knock, knock.
I open the door, scissors still in hand. He steps back, looks from the scissors to my face (briefly), shuffles a bit more, and exhales a monotone murmur, "I-am-Mike-Moseley-from-the-US-Census-I-would-like-to-take-a-few-moments-to-ask-you-a-few-questions-about-this-address-is-this-address-XXXX-XXst-XXth-Street-Number-XXX-Austin-Texas-78XXX?"
"Yes," I say, finally. I was probably raising one eyebrow over the top of my glasses - I can't promise I wasn't.
"I usually dont answer the door with a weapon, I promise." He didnt find that amusing.
So then he asks me all these questions about who was living here as of April 1st, 2006. Of course, I can't answer most of them, but he then starts calling the previous tenant "person one" and asking repeatedly until I make up answers. He let me off the hook on her ethnicity and whether she ever spent a considerable amount of time at another address. He made me guess her age, but I told him I didn't know her birthday. WTF?
Then he starts asking me about my previous address. How many times am I going to have to utter my old English address? It sounds so much lovelier than it ever was. Ha. When he asked my previous address, I was like, "It was in a foreign country; do you still need that for Census purposes?" and he looked confused, stared at his notepad some more, as if it were going to answer me, so I offered, "It was in England." His furry little eyebrows contracted in confoundment, and he punched a series of pinched, angry tat-a-tap-taps into his palm, then finally responded, 'Okay, what was your previous address?"
It took him, literally, five minutes to punch it into his notepad. He was straight out of some Charles Dickens novel, I swear. There must be a socially retarded, stuttering, mealy-mouthed, poor-postured bean-counter in one of 'em, right? Anyway, I had to spell "Essex" five times. And I couldn't help but get the feeling that my so very slowly repeating "E-S-S-E-X" over and over was making him simultaneously excited and upset. His eyebrows shot up and down a few more times. And he could never get it through his head that my address didn't have a house number.
So, finally, after like 15 minutes of suffering his stuttering and general infuriatingness, he suddenly looks sheepishly, fleetingly up at me and stammers, "That concludes the interview."
"Okay, thanks - have a good night!" I say, cheerily. He just shakes his head, rapidly, and shuffles away. I shut the door, and go back to hemming my lace undercurtains. He proceeds to stand over by the balcony, staring intently again at his notepad. Then he starts pacing, and I am afraid he's about to knock on the door again. Then he finally walks away. Ten seconds later, I am back up on my ladder, and here he comes again, walking the other way, with great hurry and purpose.
Really. Where do they find these people?! I was wondering if it was all a practical joke for the first ten minutes.
Still, it was kind of exciting, even though I am sure the information will be used for insidious NSA purposes. I've never been in the Census before! I am pissed off that he didn't ask my race, because I was going to say I was black. I wanted to see his expression.
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