Southern Beale is shining the light on a scam when she caught a kid in a lie about Tuscan Readers Services, where people try to sell magazine subscriptions door-to-door. She’s written about this before.

The kid lied to me. I mean, I always figured they were lying, but this was a lie I could verify. She told me she lived in a particular house, but in fact I actually happen to know the family that does live there, and she isn’t one of them. She made up a whole big story about how they’re selling the house and moving one street over–also a lie. I know the family has their house on the market and they’re moving to another part of town.

This is what kills me. Every time they come to the door they make up a family name, pick a house in the neighborhood, and claim to live in it. Well, our neighborhood is pretty sociable with one another. We’ve had quite a few neighborhood get-togethers and while we don’t know everyone, I certainly know the people on my street. The assumption seems to be, since this is a suburban neighborhood, no one will know one another. Maybe that’s true for some neighborhoods but it’s not true for us.

She warns that some people do pay attention and now about their neighbors.

She cries foul and points out that just because they say Vanderbilt Children’s Services is getting the money doesn’t make it necessarily true.