I just realized something today. Its not something I usually spend much time thinking about. Its probably not something anyone usually thinks about. But I realized as I was canceling my Discover (Platinum!) Card that I have an inexplicable and unfounded aversion to Master Card. I have no idea why.
Credit card preferences, I imagine, are much like political affiliation in the south. You just do what your parents did. No questions asked. Growing up, my parents always used Visa. I don't know why. Those were the halcyon years of wine and roses when the card actually looked like the little logo in the corner of your current card. Those were the golden days, when my father sent back his hot and sour soup at the chinese place because it was too cold. When the waiter asked what he wanted, he said it should be hotter. The waiter returned with a spicier, still luke warm soup. My father tried to explain that he wanted the temperature hotter, not the spice. The waiter took back the soup and returned with yet a spicier concoction. This happened once more before my father was left with a room temperature bowl of liquid fire, good enough to scald the Alpha Beta's nether regions. But I digress.
Those were the years even before the hologram. But the credit card went through more changes. Next came the era of the "new" cards. My mother got a Discover card because of the cash back system (I'm convinced after having one for about 6 years that you get less than 1% of your money back). Then came the time of the specialty cards, an era which allowed countless parents to get hundreds of thousands of airline miles by paying for their children's tuition bills via airline credit cards. Yet, for those of us without a steady (or any) income, the credit card was not in our arsenal.
In college, I always had the "emergency" credit card. A card that I was supposed to use only when the situation was so dire, that I could not pay in cash. Although my name was on it, it drew from my parents' account. I think the only times I actually used that card were to get more money on my meal card freshman year (remember the M-Card tard?) and when I broke Colediggy, the Gimp, and my collective double bubble, ice-holder bong sophomore year. Before they even noticed, I went out and bought a new, admittedly less cool version (they didn't have the same one we had) for our enjoyment. When my mother questioned the $60 charge from Stairway to Heaven, I said it was a music store where I bought a couple of cds and some posters for my room. I'm not sure if she believed me.
When I got out of college, I was officially off the payroll, which is why instead of living in a nice, doorman building in Manhattan, I lived in an old Italian couple's basement in Lyndhurst, New Jersey (if they weren't so old, it would have been like living in the Soprano's basement). It was at that time that I decided that I needed a credit card. Once I saw that Visa allowed me to get a card with the Redskins logo on it, I was smitten. I became a loyal Visa customer. I even got their scam insurance in case I was ever unemployed (because my first job fucked with my head so much).
But the thing I always feel when choosing or even seeing credit cards is that I would never, ever, EVER have a Master Card. I have no idea why. I even think Master Card and Visa are the same company, but I would still never own one. In fact, I don't think I've ever even seen one used before. I've had Visa, the aforementioned Discover, and the newly-acquired Delta Skymiles AmEx, but I would never choose a Master Card.
So these are my questions to my readers (if I actually have any). Do you have a Master Card? Do you have an inexplicable and unfounded aversion to Master Card? Have you ever seen someone use one? Does the company even exist? Can you find me a full-time, lucrative job?
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Praise Jesus!
