I recently wrote an essay about the super-annoying phone calls I get in my job, which require all of my ability to stay calm to cope with them.
However, there is one brand of recurrent phone calls that does NOT infuriate me – calls from scam artists seeking to separate me from my hard-earned money.
That’s because my great-uncle was a pharmacist in Brooklyn by day and a con man the rest of the time. He actually did pretty well. One time, during Prohibition, he was driving across the Brooklyn Bridge in his car, when he banged into a Duesenberg or some other expensive vehicle. The irate owner leaped out of the Duesenberg and threatened my great-uncle with jail time and lawsuits.
But my great-uncle shrewdly noticed that the collision had flung open the rich man’s car trunk and revealed two cases of illegal Canadian Whiskey. Great-uncle swiftly pointed out that the rich man was violating the Volstead Act. What could make this federal felony go away? Answer: the rich man paying my great-uncle a good sum of money, providing two bottles of whiskey, and assuming the costs of the car…
