Our newest weapon against the telemarketer

When the national Do Not Call Registry came out and we were told that by signing up we would greatly reduce the number of calls from telemarketers, Fred and I were all for it. Lately it doesn't seem to matter that we're on any list, because I probably receive 5 - 8 calls a day from these evil minions of the devil.

Caller ID has helped me weed out a lot of these losers, but if I don't recognise a number and I'm expecting a call; I will answer on the off chance that it's somebody I actually want to talk to.

I always hate getting into conversations with telemarketers because trying to tell them no is like talking to a wall; they don't listen to a word I say, and they prattle on about nothing for what seems like hours.

I don't remember who thought of the idea, so I'll claim it as my own, but Fred and I came up with the ingeniously evil plan to let our very talkative 22-month old field these calls from now on.

Elise LOVES the phone. She'll walk around the house pretending to talk on anything that might vaguely resemble the telephone; a calculator, her blood sugar meter, a kazoo, her hand... she's got words and she's willing to use them.

Usually Fred's and my Mom are Elise's target for her inane conversations. It's awesome. If you're not someone who spends all your waking hours with her, you'll have no idea that when she's telling you, "mocho, Val ouse, ooo-ooo, mocho-mae, mocho-be-be". It means, "we went over to Val's house and she has owls in her backyard! Owls! There's a momma owl and baby owls!"

The girl definitely has her own lingo, and today we got the chance to sic her on a poor, unsuspecting minion, er telemarketer. Fred and I were practically rolling on the floor with laughter. The conversation went something like this:

Minion: Hello ma'am, I'm calling from...

Elise: Hi Gamma! Avo! Hi! Mmmmmm, where Sewin? (Hi Gramma, Avo= Gramma in Portuguese, where's Seven - our dog)

Minion: Huh?

Elise: Vaca, neigh... hi Gamma! Ach o-gurk Gamma! (cow, horse, hi Gramma. I ate yogurt)

Minion: Can you...

Elise: Where'sa Gamma? Where'sa Gamma? K, bye (Where's Gramma x 2, okay, bye)

At this point she hands us the phone, no longer interested in talking to the person that is most definitely NOT Gramma. It was so great, I cannot even describe how excited I am for the next telemarketer to call. This time, I need to put it on speaker phone and catch it all on video.

And I'm thinking of taking our name off of the Do Not Call Registry. You can never have too much laughter in your life.