Tag: General

There are lots of reasons that might prevent you from answering the phone.

My reasons are that sometime, I’m not in a position to answer your call.  Other times, neither my phone or I recognize the phone number and don’t have the time or desire to listen to some bullshit SPAM call is shitty pigeon English.

I will usually answer if it’s family or close friends. Sometimes if I answer someone’s call and explain that I’m really busy it goes like this.

Me: “I’m really busy right now, is there something you needed immediately? If not, can I call you back in a few?”

Them: “Oh, what are you doing? I called to just chat. Did you hear what Matilda did? I was so cute. When are you going to visit? What’s the weather like there, here its’ been hot and rainy.” And on & on & on & on.

Me: Still up on the ladder, balancing the 40 pound ceiling fan holding the black and white wires connected to the light switch and wondering if I turned this particular circuit off or if I could use it to electrocute myself rather than have to listen to this unnecessary conversation.

Them: “What’s wrong? Why aren’t you talking to me? Are you mad? Did I do something wrong? Are you okay?”

Me: Still looking at those wires that could mean the end of my annoyance, wondering if I’m “Right Enough” with God that I’ll end up somewhere beside Purgatory or Hell… “Well first, I can’t get a word in edgewise, and second as I said I’m very busy right at the moment.”

Them: “Well you don’t have to be snippy about it! All you had to say was you’re busy!”

Me: “I DID and you completely ignored me.”

Click!

Me: Sigh… 

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As a rule, and I think everyone pretty much uses this rule, I don’t answer phone calls from unknown numbers.

Voicemail is a great place for those calls to go even if they’re important. If someone has legitimate business with me, then they can leave a voicemail and reasonably expect that I’m going to return the call.

Someone not leaving a voice mail is an immediate BLOCK on their phone number. Clearly they are up to no good and I have no time for them.

I’m surprised that scam calling still exists. You’d think it would go away if no-one was taking their calls.

I’m still applying for jobs and still getting zero responses. I’m considering going to the highest level of call filtering my cellular provider allows. I’d turned off a lot of security measures because I didn’t want to miss a phone call about a job application. Obviously, I needn’t have worried about that one little bit!

With the new voicemail feature on iOS I can read a voice mail as it’s coming in.

I find this amusing because it takes us back to the old days when we’d listen for the person’s voice before we answered the phone attached to our answering machines.

How many answering machines did I have through the years? Honestly I’ve lost count. They tended to break a lot.

There’s one machine that I wish I still had, but it was lost in a fire. That last answering machine had two fantastic messages both stored digitally, not on tape. One was from a hospital ER telling me that my other half had been in an accident, the other was my grandmother screaming into the machine, (because the machine was deaf,) that my Father had shot himself, followed by a ‘click’ as she hung up the phone. 

Yeah she left it there. Just hanging…

So many questions about that statement!

There was another message on tape from many years before, that message was from my Father informing me that my grandfather had died and that he’d been called because folks were trying to reach my mother. (At this point my Father and Mother had been divorced for 30 years?) 

He asked that I give him a call. He also said that he didn’t want me giving my mother this news. He’d handle it as soon as I gave him her number. He told me that he’d be waiting on my call and he was there for me.

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All of this is floating through my mind because of a flood of phone calls coming from Orange County. More specifically from Huntington Beach and Cypress.

I think it’s a spoofing ring. The phone numbers appear to be listed to Vietnamese folks all of the numbers are from the same prefix and the first two numbers of the remaining four match. Either these calls originate from the same business (in which case they’d leave a voicemail,) or they’re some kind of scam operation.

Probably the latter.

It just got me thinking about phones, phone ettiequte, and how very different things are now.  Back in the day, you’d call someone leave a message and wait a reasonable length of time to try calling again.

These days, scammers will call, get voicemail, leave no message, hang up and call again & again trying to bust through Do Not Disturb on my phone.

I’ve had bosses do the same thing. There is nothing more annoying than being in a doctor’s office and having your boss or anyone else hammering on your phone. 

There are times when I really do miss land lines!

I miss leaving my home, getting in my car, and being blissfully unaware that anyone was trying to reach me for 8-12 hours a day. 

Yeah, I’m turning up the security! If you change numbers and call me, better leave a voice mail or you’re going to be in the blocked forever pile!