On a per-minute basis, no information available by telephone is more expensive than the predictions of phone psychics. Rogier van Bakel goes looking for answers in a deck of tarot cards.
Just $3.99 a minute, must be 18.
Frankly, it was the just that convinced me. As a journalist, I spend my time raking up US$500 phone bills by calling politicians and tycoons who won't say anything on the record, except that their PR staff just put together a really nice press release that they'd be happy to fax me. So, naturally, I wondered, Wouldn't I get better value for money from a friend? A psychic friend, that is? Someone who would gladly take my calls, day or night? Someone with "real answers" to my "innermost questions," as the Psychic Network people kept earnestly intoning?
I know what you're thinking. I know you're thinking scam. You're thinking con job. But hey, smarty-pants: what do you know that Nancy Reagan didn't? After all, we're talking "truly certified professionals" here; clairvoyants who assist "politicians, police forces, and people worldwide." Most convincingly, these seers state up front that they know that people are "tired of wasting time and money on phony psychic predictions."
So $3.99 a minute sounded like a steal. Besides, I told myself, I would probably be on the phone five, maybe ten minutes. The dramatized calls in the infomercials usually take less than two.
The truly certified psychic who answered the phone was a woman named Amanda. I knew immediately that she was indeed a professional, because she could tell my fortune despite the really loud TV that was blaring in the background at her end. She, like me, must have felt the serenity of the situation, because she seemed supremely relaxed. In fact, she couldn't stop yawning.
I decided I didn't want to muddy Amanda's predictions by bothering her with the small fact that I had gotten married only a few weeks earlier; I would merely ask her if I would ever find true love. If it turned out I already had, with my wife, then Amanda, no doubt, would be the first to tell me.
Amanda: Let me get some information from you (suppressing a yawn). Let me have your birthday.
__Me:__Sixteenth of August.
Amanda: August is the eighth month?
__Me:__That's right.
Amanda (slowly, as if writing it down): The ... eighth ... month. The ... six ... teenth.... OK. Your first name, please?
__Me:__Frank.
Amanda: Spell it.
Me(surprised): Spell Frank? F-R-A-N-K.
Amanda: (after repeating it very slowly): OK, the state that you live in?
__Me:__Washington, DC.
Amanda: Is W-A the abbreviation for Washington?
__Me:__No, it's DC.
Amanda: DC? OK. OK. Your city please; spell it for me?
__Me:__It's Washington, DC.
Amanda: The abbreviation for Washington?
__Me:__It's just DC, like I told you.
Amanda: No, not DC. Washington. (Silence.) What's the abbreviation for it? That's your city, right? Your state is DC. So what's the abbreviation for Washington?
__Me:__Sorry, I've never heard of that.
Amanda: All right, give me the correct spelling of the way you spell it, 'cause I spell it differently.
__Me:__You spell Washington differently? Hmm. It's W-A-S-H-I-N-G-T-O-N. You may have heard of it. It's the capital.
Amanda (after seven seconds): OK, now when I spell it, I don't have the N and I in there. That's why I was asking what's your abbreviation for it. I spell it differently.
Me (stupefied): Oh. I see.
Amanda's note-taking was a wonderful sign of thoroughness. Or perhaps she was training for the National Spelling Bee. Slowly, we worked our way down a list that was exhaustive, if not quite complete - mainly because Amanda never asked for my great-grandmother's maiden name. Other than that, any bureaucrat or direct marketer would have salivated unapologetically over the information she asked me to volunteer. My street address, year of birth, last name, age, eye color, height, hair color, weight, shoe size: all these things had to be written down carefully. Then it was time to discuss my favorite color.
__Me:__Red.
Amanda: (after a 10-second pause): OK, three reasons why you (yawn), 'xcuse me, like red.
__Me:__Because it's the color of love, and it's cheerful, and -
Amanda: Hold on. Color ... of ... love.... Cheerful -
__Me:__and bright.
Amanda: And bright. Your favorite animal?
__Me:__A dog.
Amanda: Three reasons why you like a dog?
__Me:__I can think of only one. Dogs are good companions.
Amanda: Are they friendly?
__Me:__Yes. Fine.
Amanda: Friendly.... And a watchdog? A good guard?
__Me:__Sure. I guess so.
My truly certified absolutely real psychic now needed a personal question answered. Suppose I had been on a desert island for six months, and a nice-looking girl came up to me and asked me to have sex with her. Would I? Naturally, I was shocked - shocked. "No way," I exclaimed, and added that I would insist on taking this amorous female to a restaurant before I would even contemplate performing the lechery that had been asked of me.
Amanda (confused): There's no restaurants on this island. This is a desert island.
__Me:__OK, you've talked me into it.
Perhaps Amanda had, in a previous career, been answering the phone at 1-900-SO-WET-4U, because she seemed decidedly more comfortable than I was discussing the topic of hot schmecking (as former Studs host Mark DeCarlo, Fox TV's poète maudit, would have delicately put it).
Amanda: Now, do you like sex, love sex, or you're crazy about sex?
__Me:__Depends on whom I'm having it with.
Amanda: So you like it?
__Me:__Oh, all right.
Amanda: Like ... sex ... (yawn). Two reasons why you like sex?
Me (embarrassed): Um, because it's intimate and it feels good. Oh, and because if it's good enough for Bob Packwood, it's good enough for me.
By now, the clock was approaching the 20-minute mark. I had already spent almost 80 bucks, which was fine - I mean, you can't blame people for wanting to get the facts straight. Still, I was getting anxious to know what the future had in store for me. Amanda, her psychic gift kicking in, seemed to sense this. She asked me to choose from three differently colored decks of tarot cards. I picked the red deck - the romantic reading. Amanda then diligently shuffled the deck for about half a minute, close to the receiver. She truly had the patience of an angel.
Me (timidly): Would I be offending your psychic powers if I asked you to do it quickly? Because I am paying $3.99 a minute.
Amanda (unperturbed): I'm gonna lay the cards out for you. Do you want me to lay them out in a triangle or a box?
__Me:__A triangle.
Amanda (after 30 seconds): OK, right now (yawn), I'll be able to tune into your cards and let you know what's in store for your future. OK?
Turns out she had some terrific news. Not only will I have a long and happy life, I am going on a trip sometime soon! Somewhere out of the city! And as for my love life: my psychic - my guaranteed genuine and certified, definitely not the least bit phony spiritual helper - was very encouraging.
Amanda: I am picking up through your cards that you haven't had nobody in your life for a while. But in just a few months, you'll be finding a woman. Her height is about 5-6; she'll be weighing like around 135; she'll have short blond hair and blue eyes. You are going to have a very beautiful relationship for six or seven months, and then you're gonna ask her to marry you, and she's gonna accept.
__Me:__Oh goody! You couldn't speed things up a little by giving me her phone number, could you?
Amanda: What? Oh. Let me try.
Me (after 20 seconds): Does she live abroad? Is it a really long number?
Amanda: No, it's not that. I don't think I can pick up her number. I'm trying to look for it, if it comes up in the cards. (Another 17 seconds pass.) No.
__Me:__Oh. That's too bad. Well, let me ask you this: If I don't meet the right person in a few months, or if I meet a woman who doesn't fit your description at all, can I call you and get my money back?
Amanda (this time without a second's pause): Oh, no way! There is no possible way that that can happen! It wouldn't be fair to us 'cause we're telling those people the true facts about them and if they happen, anybody can call and say, `your prediction didn't happen, I want my money back,' and for us to return that, that would be going on all day long, seven days a week.
__Me:__Yeah, I guess there are a lot of dishonest people out there.
Amanda: Right. That wouldn't be fair!
__Me:__Well, this has been, um, illuminating. Thanks.
Amanda: Wait, I'm picking up a lot more things for you.
__Me:__Some other time, maybe. 'Bye!
I had been on the phone for exactly 30 minutes. Sure, it set me back $120 - but had I not received an enthralling glimpse of times to come? I'm no psychic, but I feel confident in making this prediction: If no one stops them, Amanda and her colleagues are going to have a glorious, golden future.
