Harbinger of doom, or just reality as it exists now?

[monkey5s]

This afternoon one of the college students who have recently been promoted from page to adult clerk was making phone calls regarding a program at the library. She turned to me at one point and said, "What does it mean when you dial the number and it just goes 'beep, beep, beep, beep'?"

"You see, back in the dinosaur times, people did not have voicemail, call waiting, and automatic forwarding systems. If you called someone while they were on the phone with someone else, you got what you just heard, a Busy Signal." I told her I would remember this moment forever, because it was proof how much life had changed regarding the telephone. She had never heard a busy signal before!

Comments

[readinggeek451]

Heh.

And to think I (used to) get quite angry at getting a busy signal and then a voiceover that begins, "The phone is busy..." It took me a long time to learn that that was an offer to leave a voice message, because I would hang up in disgust at that point. "I *know* the phone is busy. I recognize a f***ing busy signal!"

[monkey5s]

Yeah? I guess I don't remember that. Voiceover after a busy signal, I mean. I suspect I simply hung up the moment I heard the busy signal. AR AR AR!

[giglet]

Hah, yeah.

We had the unfortunate experience of teaching t'boy that long distance phone calls cost money. He knew that some people have unlimited long distance, and that email doesn't cost money depending on distance, and it just never occurred to him that a call could be billed depending on distance and duration.

[monkey5s]

Oh, ouch. That's a tough one.

At work we have a public-use fax machine. It's on a land line, and we have a LOT of people who come in to use it and complain that it's not working.

When we step in to help, it's usually that they were dialing a long-distance number and failed to dial a "1" before the area code. I keep wanting to put a sign over it that reads "THIS IS NOT A CELL PHONE."