AIBU to get annoyed when asked my marital status when leaving a message?

[peanutbutterandbanana]

GGGRRRR - I used to get this in the last century... you make a call and the person answering needs you to leave a message, so you give your details and they say 'Miss or Mrs?'. My marital status is unnecessary and a man would certainly not be asked to confirm his personal home setup.

I've just called someone who runs an employment agency and I know her quite well. She's a one-woman-band so obviously uses one of these answering services, so I had to spend ages spelling my name out, detailing whether I was an individual or a company and then asked 'is it Miss or Mrs?', "Irrelevant," I said.

But my blood is now boiling. I cannot believe that we are well into the 21st Century and this question is still being asked when it is absolutely not relevant to this call or to my potential employment or to anyone else, in fact, apart from me and my OH/DP/DH. AIBU?

So she actually meant no title, then?

Yep. No title or any indiction of marital status at all.

And no using her first name willy nilly without prior permission.

Which I did not have.

Yes, use Ms, surely.

Oops, x-posted. But Ms is still marital-ststus

Arse, sorry. Ms is still marital-status neutral -surely that would've been ok?

I'm a married cat owner (not married to the cat, obv...). As are lots of people I know. What is it with the single woman = cat owner stereotype? Aren't men allowed to own cats? Bang goes half the flipping internet content, for starters.

I think it goes back to witches supposedly having cats as familiars.

Although, come to think of it, 'witches' were probably just harmless women who happened to live alone/not have kids/dress differently/not conform to society's expectations in some way.

Other people surely had cats too, so I'm not sure why it was a problem for a 'witch' to have them.

I like being Mrs. Thats why I married

Although, come to think of it, 'witches' were probably just harmless women who happened to live alone/not have kids/dress differently/not conform to society's expectations in some way.

"Probably"?!

For some reason, Barclaycard got my title wrong when issuing my new credit card last year. For a few glorious months, before I put them right, I was known to Barclaycard as 'Captain Anilec'. They would address me as this whenever I rang them up. I liked this very much.

Sadly, honesty won out and now I am demoted to 'Initial Anilec' :(

cjelh - really, that was the only reason?

Cjelh lol!

Imagine getting married just for a name! Did you know ANYONE can be Mrs? You don't HAVE to be married.

HA. no of course not the only reason but if I had wanted to be a ms or miss, then what was the point? by verydefinition you have to be married to be a mrs. thats what the word means!!!!

So you're saying you wanted to be a married woman (rather than be mrs cjelh)?

Yes, cj, but that's the problem - I don't see why random double glazing salesmen or ticket office officials who sell me my season ticket need to know whether I'm single or married. None of their business. They don't get to ask dh, he's been Mr since he was a teenager.

Vivacia, what's the problem?

What do you mean?

Ah, I realised that you're probably referring to the witch conversation yesterday OnlyLovers. My question is that you think witches were probably just women who didn't conform to the male-orientated norms of that time, why did you say "probably"? What other possibilities were you considering?

"Ms is never the wrong title for a woman, because it denotes that you are a woman."

unfortunately when you speak to people on the phone it can be incorrect, in a personal sense.

If the person is called Mrs Smith or Miss Smith, then Ms Smith would be the wrong title.

What if she was a reverend or doctor?

Even as a Mrs or Miss, I think it's the person's choice that makes it the correct one.