You’ve reached Microsoft office support you know

Microsoft corp. announced this week that it is adding 100 customer service positions in its’ Fargo, ND location. While I fully support Microsoft’s initiative at improving customer service for their office products, I’m just concerned about a growing trend in corporations these days to outsource jobs away from Americans. Now I’m not defining “Americans” as people who actually hold US Citizenship (of which we seem to be close to adding 11 million more) but rather those that live as Americans. Case in point, according to the FBI, North Dakota has one of the lowest crime rates in the nation. Does that sound like your city or state? If there aren’t at least three shootings a week around here you have to figure either the media isn’t reporting the news, or it’s a bad day to leave the house.

When you begin to research the area itself, which your crack staff here at the Doghouse has been doing for the last minute and a half, you’ll uncover some interesting information about your fellow 'Americans' in North Dakota. One thing we learned is that ‘Dakota’ is a Sioux term meaning ‘friends’ or ‘allies’, at least it used to mean that until we drove the original inhabitants from their land. Now, it simply means ‘people who easily fall for what the US government says’, or as they are known in the West, ‘Republicans’.

We also learned that on their famous journey to Oregon, Lewis and Clark spent a great deal of their time in North Dakota. Some say it was to stock up on provisions before heading further into the unexplored wiles of I-94. Truth be told, however, it was simpler than that. It seems that while Lewis was the great explorer, Clark only came along because Lewis said, “hey, you know we’ll be going through North Dakota, there are a lot of hot woman there for you to find”. (If you couldn’t guess, Clark was a Republican). Now, please, don't get me wrong, I don’t want to imply that there aren’t a number of attractive, desirable woman living in North Dakota today. However, considering the high number of Rodeos taking place each year, you have to imagine that passing through the state is more like a trip up Brokeback Mountain than a night at Studio 54.

Back on point, to settle the issue of whether people in the state feel like Americans we contacted NBC to conduct an in depth, comprehensive survey of the local population. NBC, then hired ABC to complete the survey for them, while CBS developed their 54th crime investigation show, CSI Cancoon. The survey results were quite revealing, and showed that people living in North Dakota fall into one of four categories:

1) The largest group (in red) represents counties where the majority of the populace did not even realize they were living in North Dakota. Some thought they were in Kansas, others seemed to have wandered away from Minnesota, but the majority thought they were in Canada, just a very southern province of it.
2) The second group (in purple) is comprised of people who simply didn’t realize that Lewis and Clark found anything West of their fair state. To be fair, their textbooks were slates from 1823, and the local news seems to refer to everything West of the Mississippi as the Western Wasteland.
3) The third group (in yellow), well, they just love Sunflowers. Most were to busy planting, growing, and eating seeds to even respond. Most likely they did not even know there was a survey.
4) Lastly, you have the rodeo group (in brokeblack). They like things how they are. Last heard they were petitioning to rename the state, ‘Brokeback Dakota’. More on that story as it develops.



Maybe we’ll never know the truth, I suppose, for now, we can accept the fact that since the US Mint put them on the back of a Quarter, they must be a viable part of the American Economy. Don't be surprised if the next you call the friendly people at Microsoft for support, you get, ‘You’ve reached Microsoft office support you know, what seems to be your problem eh?’