I called some friends today and left a message on their answerphone, regarding a cat show. A few minutes later, my phone rang and I picked it up. A few odd noises, music, distant voices that sounded rather like Steve and Helen, the friends I'd just phoned. I spoke a few times, listened to the noises and tried to make out what was being said. No one was actually talking to me.

Odd. Perhaps one of their cats has knocked the phone off the hook and trodden on a preset button ? I pressed the button to end the call. No effect.

I listened again and it certainly sounded like Steve and Helen, chatting to one another, though I could only make out occasional phrases. They certainly couldn't seem to hear me. I hung up, then picked the phone up. I could still hear them. I tried a couple more times, and even picked up the other telephone. They were still there !

I tried unplugging the phone line from the socket in the hall. Plugged it back in and picked up the phone.....still there ! Tried again.....still my phone line had been hijacked. Went to see Tania in flat 1 and ask if I could use her phone. Called Ven to get Steve and Helen's mobile numbers. Steve didn't answer his; Helen's was wrong. Tried the Operator and got told that they were very busy and I should try again later <click>. Tried Steve again; still not answering.

AAAAAARRRRGGHHHH !

Tania suggests I try yelling to see if I can make them notice their phone is off the hook - and mysteriously refusing to let go of the line. I go up to my flat, pick up the phone and get.....a dialling tone. Hurrah ! Phone Steve re: visit to cat show on Sat. He mentioned that'd he'd handed his mobile over to his wife when they were driving home, just in case it got knocked and accidentally phoned someone. Well, the intention was good.

I had an interesting phone call last week. I answered my mobile but no-one would talk to me. After listening closly I thought "That sounds like Emily (friends daughter)". Finally figured she'd got a hold of mums mobile and hit the re-dial button, but wasn't actually trying to talk on the phone. Bit of a laugh once I'd worked it all out.

I get these a lot from Kaiserdad aka Roy

I have to work out where he is then see if I can phone anyone else there on another phone to tell him to turn it off before he runs out of credit

thankfully he does eventually run out of credit



---
Sylvester says.... *plock*




actually he says peep, cheep, chirrup, squalk,muttermuttergrumblegrumble, oh and now he falls off his pirch whish is followed by a sheepish peek round to see if anyone was looking and a quick scramble back up

once my housemate sat on the phone and it dialed her mum, after a while we heard the voices coming from the sofa under a coat and we saw the phone was on
:-)

A few months ago one of the staff at a British zoo started getting phonecalls from somebody who just made "heavy breathing" noises at them: The resultant investigation revealed that a colleague had lost his mobile phone whilst in the chimpanzees' enclosure, and the ape who found it had discovered the redial facility...

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"God rot Botchkamos Istochnik!"

my mum used to get calls from my aunt's mobile phone - it would get knocked on whilst in her bag. Mam had a 40-minute answerphone message one day. She phoned my aunt to ask if she'd managed to get the shopping she needed in town, to which Aunty Mary replied 'how on earth did you know I was shopping?'

tee hee

She also got a call from my uncle's phone - he was in the car with some of his mates, and apparently the language was a bit rich. Mam phoned my Aunt again, who phoned his mate (who was with them) and proceeded to give my uncle a right telling off for swearing..

I get this a lot (I call them 'pocket calls' as they are more often than not made by somebody's pocket). The reason I get them is because my name begins with 'A' I am quite often the first person in people's mobile phone books. The worst ones are when you get called when you are asleep at 3 am and you can hear loads of people having a party in the background, then you can't get back to sleep for wondering why you hadn't been invited ;)

About 10 years ago my daughter had a fight with a girl at school who had been bullying her (well, I say a "fight" - Em basically laid her out flat with a single well-aimed punch). Inevitably I suppose we received an extremely abusive phone call that evening from the girl's father, which I listened to politely, agreed with all that he said and then wished him a good evening (seemed the quickest way to get rid of him really). Unfortunately however he failed to slam down the receiver properly afterwards (either that or it bounced off again), which we didn't realise until ten minutes later when we tried to phone someone else. In the background we could hear the family screaming at one another. We couldn't break the connection try as we might, so I turned on the speaker-phone and we all settled down to enjoy the entertainment for the next half an hour or so. Truly an interesting sociological insight into how certain families interact with one another. I learned a lot about myself - I hadn't realised I have no father for example, or that I sexually abuse myself. I even learned some new swear words from his partner, for which I'm forever grateful!

We tried using our phone again just before bedtime and could still hear which TV programme they were watching (actually, we probably could even without the phone it was so loud) plus what appeared to be some rather percussive washing-up going on in the kitchen, or maybe they'd been having a Greek meal and were disposing of the plates in time-honoured fashion. By the next morning our phone appeared to be working again, so I have no idea how long their phone call to us actually lasted but it was at least 5 hours and probably twice that. Oh, I would have loved to have seen his face when he saw his next phone bill and realised not only how much it had cost him but who he'd wasted all that money on!



Post Edited (08-11-03 17:35)

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* I'm backing the campaign to get the official Stalker for 2007 evicted *

Ptolemy - excellent story.

> The reason I get them is because my name begins with 'A' I am quite often the
> first person in people's mobile phone books.

This is the reason why I have an entry on my mobile with its own number and a name of 'aaaaa'.

I also have 2 fake numbers on my mobile - aaaa and zzzz

Did you hear about a rather enterprising American company which set up in the long-distance phonecall business, a year or two ago? Apparently whenever one makes long-distance calls in (at least some parts of) the USA one gets asked to specify which service-provider one wants to use for this... So this particular firm thought of registering the trade-names "I don't know", "Who cares?", and another one along similar same lines to those ("You choose one"?), and was apparently _ when the newspaper article in which I read about it was written _ doing very well for itself.

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Warning! Product may contain Newts!

I have a habit of using the phone in my sleep, which is pretty embarrassing when you fill up an entire tape on an answering machine with random burblings...



PSD

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This is the work of an Italian narco-anarchic collective. Don't bother insulting them, they can't read English anyway.

Overheard at the Marriage Guidance centre:

Q: " Do you ever talk to your partner during sex?"

A: "Only if there's a phone handy..."

Long ago, before mobile phones even, when I was some poor sods PA he had a regular habit of taking his dictaphone (dont even go there Ptols) out and about with him and when I got the tapes to transcribe there would be long sections of things like car journeys and other boring stuff but there was one memorable one of him having a pee......

Sorry Holly but I just can't resist an opening like that (and don't YOU dare go THERE....)

Heard in the office outside the Marriage Guidance centre:

Q: "Can I use your Dictaphone?"

A: "No, use your finger like anyone else..."

Yup, thats the one I was thinking of. You have no self control.

True, true >sigh<

psd, are you sure you're asleep when you leave those messages?

I would have thought he'd leave burbling messages whether he was a wake or asleep.