My bank thinks my mom's name is Dorthy.

I got in an argument with the verification people at my bank today. I don't know how they ever got Dorthy into their files, but here I was calling them to verify a purchase, and they up and decide that my mom's name should really be Dorthy—not Debbie—and lord knows what they have as her maiden name.

Needless to say, after I failed the mom's-maiden-name test and the mom's-first-name test, the operator was pretty convinced that I was not myself. She proceeded to ask me a series of are-you-really-who-you-say-you-are questions, and I must admit, that I didn't do the most convincing job arguing that I was me. It is just hard to justify one's existence before your first cup of coffee. Next time I call them, I'll be sure to be fully caffeinated.

On the topic of identity confusion, I met up with a friend of Chip, my old roommate from college, this weekend. His name: Colin. We hit it off, and so I foresee great confusion if we ever hangout with a group of friends. As I don't get to meet many people with my name, so this name confusion would be something new that I haven't dealt with before. I suppose that I'd get a descriptor pegged onto my name, like 'fast and witty Colin' or 'super badasssss Colin', or more realistically, 'American Colin.'

I've been testing out interesting questions to ask strangers for ages now. The goal is to avoid small talk, and to move on to something with more depth. A brief job description is only entertaining for so long, and what do you talk about next? I have been puzzling over the best cut through the crap questions with Christy, and I think that we hit on something while we were asking not-me Colin about himself, and vice-versa. It's all about least favorites.

What is your least favorite band? Or more poignantly, what band do you hate the most? Drinks, personalities, professions you name it. Give it an ask, and you quickly get to see what really gets someone's blood boiling. I know in this modern world that we are supposed to be beyond hate, but I can't get rid of my animosity towards The Dave Matthews Band, even if he does do a song with Jurassic 5. For the record, I don't mean to promote hatred, I am just sussing out people's interesting opinions. In fact, if you want to avoid people who, say hate oranges, it might just be best to ask about that right from the get-go. That's certainly more interesting than asking about work.