Ever had to deal with the drudgery of calling a company's customer service department for assistance? Yep, we've all been there. Just this morning, I received a message from Discover -- at work, no less -- saying they were calling in reference to a "request" I'd recently made. ' A victim of identity theft several times over the last few years, I immediately assumed someone had tried to open an account under my name. Then I remembered I was protected under a credit monitoring service through my wife's employer -- plus, they hadn't notified me of any suspicious activity. I called the number and was told that, in order for them to track down the file in question, I would either have to provide a reference number (which wasn't given to me) or my full social security number. The latter was, of course, out of the question, so I opted to do one thing at that point: Call again later in the day and hope the person who attended me then was more com...

Earlier today, I came across a Facebook page that features motivational quotes intended to improve people's moods and enhance their overall self-esteem. Interestingly, I noticed two quotes that focus specifically on quiet people: "Be afraid of quiet people; they're the ones who actually think." "The quietest people have the loudest minds." I've observed that most people's views of quiet individuals can fall under one of two categories: 1. The ones who say quiet people are antisocial, suspicious, snobbish, and/or full of themselves. 2. The people who say their introspective nature and propensity to be deep in thought makes them smarter than their more garrulous peers. The quotes above speak to this mindset. As an introvert known to be quiet at work and at social functions where I might not know anyone, I feel I'm well positioned to dispel any inaccuracies surrounding quiet folks. First of all, the above statements misguidedly put...