Aging Fast Enough, Thanks

I just wasted half an hour trying to slow down the aging process, sort of. And getting pretty vexed at a couple of organizations that supposedly serve so-called Older Americans.

Obviously, some out there has A Mailing List, and on that Mailing List is my name, and after my name is an incorrect date of birth. Consequently, I have been receiving junk mail from HeartLine Plus, a Dakotacare program apparently designed for folks on Medicare who have heart conditions. I appreciate their concern, but I'm still 16 years away from being eligible for Medicare, nor do I have a heart condition.

Being a good sport, I went online a few weeks ago seeking to e-mail them and encourage them to quit wasting good money sending me unsolicited junk that will go straight into the garbage. Of course, their web site was spectacularly unhelpful. You would think a "Contact Us" link might provide something more than an 800 number and a street address (I wish to waste neither a stamp nor my time on what will likely be a sales pitch)...like, say, an e-mail address, since it's a virtual certainty that someone who visits their web site will have e-mail access. But no. Finally I Googled them, found an address for the Executive Director, and e-mailed him. No reply. Well, unless you count the junk mail that came from them the other day, over the signature of the Marketing Director. Whom I e-mailed today (thanks again, Google, since the Dakotacare web site hasn't improved in the last couple of weeks). We'll see. Hah.

I've also been getting junk from AARP, expressing confusion over my not joining since I am "fully eligible" for their dubious services. And yet, the very junk mail they send me indicates that one is eligible for membership at the age of 50...which I have not yet hit. Whoops.

Well, see above re: being a good sport, and also good luck finding an e-mail contact on the AARP web site. Again, do they not suspect that anyone who is, you know, at their site might have e-mail? Their "Contact Us" page is in fact an overgrown FAQ page. Google was not much help, at least in part because there are so bloody many hits. Finally I did come upon a form to fill out with comments on the web site. My comment, naturally, was that their site does a pretty poor job of proffering contact information and, oh, by the way, howzabout you take me off your mailing lists, since I am ineligible...which is why I was trying to contact you in the first place!!

I have to say, my experience with these two organizations does not fill me with enthusiasm for possibly doing business with either of them when I reach my Golden Years. They don't seem to be very detail oriented; in the case of Dakotacare, they don't seem very responsive; and based on my experience with their web sites, neither seems really interested in making it easy for their "members" (or anyone else) to contact them. Both of these outfits are really going to have to spruce themselves up if they want any money from me down the line.