How Do You Spell "Ripoff?"

I love a box office. The seemingly disembodied head behind a glass partition. Sometimes you speak through a little hole in the window. Often, the person is shielded even more by venetian blinds as if those tickets for Patti Lupone in "Gypsy" are really coveted by enemy agents. WME. Weapons of Mass Entertainment.

But there is something delightful about making such a transaction. Walking up to that Broadway theater lobby. Or, in Los Angeles, driving downtown on a Saturday morning to get the hook-up from some guy parked behind the Ahmanson Theater will-call window. And you can do a better job of finding the right seats. You can get a real-time response to such questions as "are these full view?" or "will there be an annoying buffoon sucking on a sour ball candy anywhere around me?" Whatever the case, I am all about the personal touch and certainly not afraid of one-on-one conversation with a fellow human being.

Translation: I almost never buy tickets on-line.

Except, of course, when I have to. And that was the case recently when, as a full season plan holder, the Dodgers set up a special on-line pre-sale for extra post season tickets. For every scheduled playoff game, I am allowed on one day and time the ability to purchase up to four extra tickets. Since this is the time of year when I suddenly find myself with five dozen close friends as opposed to the usual one dozen, I like the ability to serve as ducat dispenser for those allegedly close to me. As long as they have the money to pay.

But, all this means is that I have to commence dealings with Ticketmaster. The dreaded on-line ticket sales arm of what used to be the Third Reich. I am convinced that, when blond and blue-eyed minions showed up to hear Adolf Hitler speak, they were holding computer-written tickets emblazoned with the Ticketmaster logo and a swastika. How else can I explain the injustices these thieves offer up to the generally unassuming public?

Let's take a look at my most recent on-line transactions. For every ticket to a playoff game, you are presented first with a "facility charge." Six bucks a ticket. Facility of what? Mine? I'm the one who did the heavy lifting. I navigated through the Ticketmaster website. I'm the one who tried to discipher that stupid anagram or configuration of letters that is impossible to read. For that alone, you should credit me at least ten bucks.

Then, there was a per-ticket "convenience charge" of seven bucks. Whose convenience? I am paying seven bucks plus to Ticketmaster because I had the good sense to buy a PC and become semi-computer-literate? Indeed, Ticketmaster is doing nothing for me but simply printing out a ticket on a computer and putting it into an envelope. And there are now times when you can print the ticket yourself. Even more convenience for me and less work for Ticketmaster. There is often an additional charge for that. probably because I also had the good sense to buy a printer when I was originally purchasing the aforementioned PC.

Now, with the Dodger games, I wanted to help out my "friends" and put some pre-paid parking into the mix. After all, one of my buyers is the guy who purchases 25% of my games every season and he is quite accustomed to the red carpet treatment when it comes to driving his vehicle to Chavez Ravine. Luckily (?), Ticketmaster makes this available as well. And, inexplicably, they have not jacked up the price. And, amazingly, there is no facility charge. But there is a tack-on cost of $2.50 for my convenience all over again. Once again, I am penalized for being reasonably saavy when it comes to hitting a "print" button.

While all these playoff tickets showed up in my postman-controlled mailbox alongside my phone bill and a package of coupons from my "good friends" at the Promotional Shopper, the actual act of Ticketmaster affixing a regular postage stamp to all of this, the order processing fee was $4,10. And, of course, since I bought multiple games at the same time, each game's tickets had to be "processed" separately. When I was done getting all these extra seats for the Division Series and the NLCS, I had paid Ticketmaster over 225 dollars in fees alone. And, you lose that whether or not the games are played. For tickets not used, the cost is credited back to your account. But they keep all the postage charges and still send you the tickets. Four days after the Dodgers were eliminated from the postseason by the Phillies, I received in the mail four extra tickets for each of the World Series games that were not to be played at Chavez Ravine. After all, Ticketmaster still needs to be paid for all the hard work they put into my order.

Give me that weird guy behind the venetian blinds any day. At least, he might actually tell me to "have a nice day." And, last time I looked, there was no fee for simple human courtesy.

Dinner last night: Pasta and meatballs.