Another ploy was to place hundreds of back issues each month by inserting them up in the corrugated roof slots of the roadside picnic and rest areas along the highways. Going on a nice long drive counting service time was really great!!!
The timewaster's guide to field service
by RunningMan 17 Replies latest jw friends
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Scully
The Pioneer's Guide to Padding Your Service Report
1- Set your alarm clock for 6:00 am. Open your window and throw a tract outside. Begin service meter. Hit snooze alarm and go back to bed until 7:00.
2- At 7:00, toss another tract out the window because surely by now someone has picked up your previous gem of Truth and divine wisdom and is coming to an accurate knowledge of God's Word. Proceed to the shower.
3- 7:45 - Get dressed and go to McDonald's or a diner that serves breakfast. Leave a set of magazines on the table instead of a tip for the waitress.
4- 8:30 - Try that nagging Not-At-Home, the one with the For Sale sign on the lawn and overgrown yard and no curtains in the window. Slip tract under the door. Proceed to service arrangement.
5- 9:30 - Service meeting concludes and car groups are organized. Your meter is still running with 3.5 hours in already.
6- 9:35 - Swing by several other nagging Not-At-Homes so that the rest of your car group can start their meters too.
7- 10:35 - After running through all these nagging Not-At-Homes, it's time for coffee break. Remember to leave a set of magazines for the waitress, instead of a tip.
8- 10:50 to 11:50 - Return visits. Everyone invites you to go with them because you're the pioneer and they think it'll improve everyone's opinion of them if they hang with you. Pat yourself on the back for being so generous toward them.
9- 11:50 - Break for lunch. OK, so it's not quite noon, but if we carry the magazines in front of us while we walk to our destination for lunch (your place, not mine!) we can keep the meter running.
10- 12:00 to 12:15 - Thank the host/ess for the peanut butter and jelly sandwich and the glass of milk. Read something interesting out of the latest magazines to his/her cat.
11- 12:15 - Walk back to the territory, holding the magazines up to your chest like a billboard. You are alone, because the rest of them already have finished their day in service. Your meter is ticking away at 6 hours 15 minutes.
12- 12:30 - Find your car. Drive to the mall. Tuck tracts under the windshield wipers of surrounding vehicles. Go to the food court and get a real lunch. Leave a set of magazines on the table for the cleaning staff instead of a tip.
13- 13:00 - Return to your car. Notice if there are any different cars that have replaced the ones where you left tracts. If so, tuck tracts under windshield wipers of replacement vehicles.
14- 13:15 - Check your coat pocket for change. Mutter something about publishers not appreciating you because they don't give you any gas money when your car is used in field service. Put $5 worth of gas in the car. Leave a set of magazines tucked into the pump handle so the next person can learn about Jehovah.
15- 13:30 - Go to Brother Moppensweep's to see if he has enough help with his cleaning company. Flirt with Sister Well-Endowed, and notice the magazines sitting on the corner of her desk. Make a mental note of her dishonest time counting practice, after all she is "just" a publisher. Tell her you were in the neighbourhood while doing some Return Visits.
16- 14:00 - Return home for a nap. Mutter something about all the litter and paper waste in the yard of your apartment building. Make a mental note to complain to the superintendant. Leave a set of magazines in the building's laundry room to make your meter stop at exactly the 8 hour mark. Feel good about yourself for placing 10 magazines too.
17- zzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzz
Love, Scully
It is not persecution for an informed person
to expose a certain religion as being false. - WT 11/15/63A religion that teaches lies cannot be true. -WT 12/1/91
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bluesapphire
The "Unbaptized" Publisher's Guide to Counting Time
Make arrangements to sit next to another unbaptized publisher in the car group. Talk to each other and let the meter run the whole time.
The Self-Righteous Publisher's Guide to Encouraging the Flock While Counting Time
Drive by the "friends" homes who are busy getting ready to go to the beach on Saturday instead of going out in service. Roll down your window and yell out at them "Go out in service you schmucks!"
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RunningMan
"The unbaptized publisher's guide to counting time" reminds me of a morning in service many years ago.
I was working with a friend who was not baptized, and we were short of magazines, so we shared a set. I would present them, get turned down, then pass them to him to do the same. Every time I passed him the magazines, I counted a placement. Sweet.
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Hmmm
Philo posted a similar thread a while ago. Since we have so many "newly interested ones" in our midst, I'm going to resurrect my post from that thread, as it brings back so many great memories for me. Mind you, this is in a city territory where you can drive from one end to the other in about two minutes. People in more rural areas can stretch things to new heights of inefficiency.
The 14:59 rule
Two variations on this theme: In my area there was the "15-minute rule." Basically, if you stopped "preaching" for 15 minutes you had to stop counting time.
When doing streetwork in business territory, going back to the car to warm up or cool off, depending on the season. Stay in the car, chatting with friends for exactly 14 minutes and 59 seconds, then jump out and walk around one block until one circuit has been made, or one person talked to... whichever comes first. Then back to the car. Ratio 5 minutes walking, 14:59 in the car.When making return visits, follow roughly the same pattern. The other unwritten rules about making RVs can really work in your favor here. Consider this scenario:
I (broA) am in a car group with broB, sisA, and sisB. I go on a call and take sisA with me. Whether the householder is home or not, we drag it out as long as humanly possible. (See Philo's point about miming a door knock, etc...) We return to the car at 2:00 pm. The clock is tick, tick, ticking
Now it's sisB's turn, and she takes broB with her. We drive to the next call--as far from this house as you can get and still be in the same time zone. Arrival time at the next house is 2:06.
At 2:15 sisB and broB get out to do the call. Luckil... er, fortunately, the householder is home and they're in there for a whopping 23 minutes. They return at 2:38. The next four minutes is spent giving us the high points of the call. During this time, the 15 minute rule is suspended. At 2:43 we drive across the territory for the next call. Interestingly, this call is on the same street as my first call.
[Note: this visit was stretched out utilizing one of Philo's documented techniques. It involves a social contract between publisher and householder:
Tea and bikki calls
old dears who are lonely, and tell you so.
But you have to pretend to evangelise (to count your time) while they pretend not to be uninterested (so you can come back)
"Yes, I know you read your bible, Edith…I SAID, I KNOW…" ]It's now broB's turn. The householder is a female, so he must take one of the sisters with him. He asks sisA to accompany him, since he was with sisB last time (besides, sisA kinda likes us both, and he needs to spend some alone-time with her so she can decide who she's going to hold hands with at the next movie outing.) At 2:58 they get out of the car.
They do us a favor and take as long as possible, continuing to knock despite the obvious fact that there has been a major fire at the house and nobody lives there anymore. No need to mime any knocking, here. They knock LOUDLY on the charred door frame, ignoring the fact that the fire department knocked in the door some weeks ago. They return to the car at 3:03, promising to look up the householder in another few weeks, since they weren't home.
It is now after 3:00 and time for a break. We drive three minutes to Burger King for something cool/hot to drink. When we hit the BK parking lot, at 3:06, the 15-minute clock is tick, tick, ticking. At 3:21, not wanting our precious time to stop, we head back out. We arrive at the "next" house at 3:25. I must get out, but I have managed to count time for one hour and 25 minutes from the back seat of a car.
Ahh, the good old days of pioneering.
Hmmm
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normie67
........you guys forgot the coolest technique known to a timid publisher......................"THE AIR KNOCK"......its pretending to knock, go through all the motions and yet never actually knock!!!
Honestly I have never done this but I know of some who do!!
Imagine the householder seeing somebody come to the door and yet no KNOCK...LOL...sounds like a "Seinfeld" episode....(In Jerry's Voice) "They're AIR KNOCKING....Why do they AIR KNOCK???....Don't they know we see them????? So why all the AIR KNOCKING.......my 2cents
n67
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r51785
Very popular now in Southern California is the table set up in the shopping mall. The sign on the front says something to the effect of "WT Cult Recruitment -- Join us or die." Two publishers sit behind the table counting time and studying for Sunday's WT study. No one ever bothers them.
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hungry4life
We used to leave tracts at phone booths and I knew every single laundromat (including private ones in apartments) in town. Many times when we stopped their would already be magazines there. We would swap them for a fresh copy hoping to arouse interest in a different article, count the placement and our time. The sad thing is I learned all of these tricks from far more experienced witnesses including pioneer sisters. Always thought it was cheating in a way. Now I see it as pathetically delusional, who were we trying to kid anyway?