Attention Richard Liang

For the last several months, I've been getting phone calls from various creditors. While I know I have a tendency to owe people money (sorry Thomas and Galen), I'm certain that I do not owe Discover Card anything. I also don't I hold any account with MBNA. Yet they keep calling.

Apparently, my number comes up first on a big online telephone book in a search for "Richard Liang", which makes me The Internet's Foremost Richard Liang in some respects. (Typically I'm outstripped in the Google searches by a very good youth badminton player in BC somewhere; however, he probably still lives with his parents, so bully for me.) While this is a goal of mine, the problem with it is that a 60-year-old man named Richard Liang living in Danville owes money all over town. Why these people don't have his phone number on record, I don't know; I can only assume that this guy sold his telephone to pay some kind of gambling debt.

Most of the phone calls tend to sound like this:

[phone rings at 9:30AM]
Me: [groggy] Hello?
Creditor's agent: Hello, is this Richard Liang?
Me: [still groggy but trying to sound polite] Yes.
Agent: Yes, hello Mr. Liang, I'm with [creditor].
Me: Uh, hi.
Agent: I'm calling about the outstanding bill you have with [creditor]...
Me: [interrupting] I don't have a Discover Card/MBNA account/[connection with creditor].
Agent: [pause] Is this Richard Liang, living in Danville, [state that is not California]?
Me: No, I live in California.
Agent: And you don't sound 60.
Me: I'm not.
Agent: Alright, well I'm very sorry, I'll remove your number from the system.

That's typically the last I hear from these very nice people, which is kind of sad -- some of them seem fun.

MBNA is the most recent. I came back from holidays to find 8 messages on my machine, all from very pleasant-sounding MBNA agents. Since it was a long weekend, I didn't want to call any of them back. Over the weekend I had unpleasant thoughts about my credit rating being decimated due to some 60-year-old compulsive gambler (and how I might then exact revenge). Assured by the very nice fellow from MBNA who woke me up today, this will not happen. So, I will stow the piano wire for now and instead issue the following open letter, which I can only hope that Richard Liang will find (although he probably won't, having likely sold his computer to finance his gambling problem):

Attention sexagenarian Richard Liang of Danville: Please pay your fucking bills and get a damn telephone.

Sincerely,
Richard Liang

Current Music: LCD Soundsystem - Daft Punk Is Playing At My House