Pluggers by Rick McKee for July 10, 2022

Let’s hope no one was in an accident…

Oh, the good ol’ days afore caller I.D.

Still don’t know whos calling. Almost all the calls i get are listed as unavailable.

This is the IRS calling. Mam, according to the rules and regulations, there are overseas transactions under your name and you need to pay the full portion of the transaction fees to the IRS Department, which you never did. They have investigated each and every thing, and they have filed a lawsuit complaint against your name. Please go to Walmart and buy 5 $100 gift cards and tell me the numbers on the scratch off so the police will not come and arrest you. Oh, and dhanyavaad.

Pluggers’ phones still ring.

Back when landlines were the only option, phone calls after 10 PM were almost always bad news. Now it’s someone selling an extended warranty for a car you sold last year.

And phones were connected to the wall by a wire. And, no voicemail or “codaphones”, either (answering machines). If you missed a call you just… missed it.

Nowadays, you don’t want to know who’s on the phone. Probably a spam call.

Been there … Done that :-)

Rotary phones and party lines.

“ Number please” and party lines.

Now days, if the number isn’t in my directory, I don’t answer. One exception: If I’m expecting someone to come out and work on my house.

I think the same thing when the landline rings at 7 AM or earlier and after 8 – 9 PM but know it’s a spam/robo/etc. call. And I always let it go to voice mail. Reasonable people don’t call that early or late, unless it’s an emergency.

Very ‘energetic’ phone—ringing so vigorously that spills her tea !!! ! ! Never knew that to happen to our phone.

Lately I have been getting lot of calls from “unknown number”. From overseas: Chad, the UK.. Angolia.. Afghanistan.. Mauritania.. Algeria.. Georgia.. Chagos Archipelago.. Liberia…. Phone rings 3~4 times and hangs up. Forced me to activate a feature Telus provides called Call Control.. Apologies for the inconvenience to any legitimate callers.

One of the best features of modern communication is the ability to see a name or phone number before you answer. I remember having to race down the stairs to get to the phone (on the kitchen wall) before it stopped ringing. It took me 9 rings to get there from my bedroom. And email is another great one — especially for those of us who can’t hear as well as we used to. Messaging is OK for short messages, but too many ‘corrections’ for anything longer than a sentence or two.

With a party line you had to wait to see if it was for you. :)

I have anonymous call rejection on my landline. It rings maybe twice a week.

I wouldn’t mind having had a land line this week. I live in Canada, so some of you may have heard of the Rogers debacle – for a full 24 hours!!!!!

There was a time that any phone call after 10 pm was not good news.

There has been a spate of scam calls, in my area.. .again. Someone calls, saying they are “Deputy ‘whomever’ from the Sheriff’s Office,” and the call recipient has a warrant for their arrest, for missing jury duty, or some other inane thing. The way to satisfy the warrant is to (and here is the part that’s so stupid, yet, people fall for it!) send them up to $1500 in Walmart, or Target gift cards, or, use Venmo, and send them the money. There is not a cop-shop in this country that would do that. Unfortunately, these slime use the name of a real deputy, but, unfortunately, a lot of people do not call the Sheriff’s Office to verify the veracity of the caller.Just like the IRS, if there is a problem, they are NOT going to call, and, fines are generally paid at court, not at a police station, or sheriff’s office, and NOT in gift cards!

Never had a party line.

From decades before the current spam calls we always left the answering machine on – did so since my dad had his first answering machine when they were (illegal).

I remember my nephew when he was in first or second grade calling from school (we were all niblings’ emergency number) and I heard him on the answering machine saying to the school nurse “No, just let it keep ringing and the answering machine will answer and tell them it is me.” (He is in his 30s now.)

We have a similar phone number to a Domino’s pizza, a TV repair store – later transferred to a doctor’s office, and an eyeglass store (we used to get calls from those trying to collect from him).

If they call and leave spam messages for one to call back – shouldn’t they leave their phone number?

I once had an argument with a woman (NOT MY MIL) who was very upset that I picked up and told her she had a wrong number. She not only insisted that she had dialed the correct number – she insisted that my husband’s message had been her son on the machine!

Now with my cell phone – the “other” major political party leaves constant text messages for me – sometimes 10 a day – if I liked them I would be upset at the constant messages!

Some decades ago I was at a client and she was not there. Her secretary was surprised that she was not and did not know where she was. Secretary got a phone call from a major news company asking for a comment.

She was in a panic and did not know what to do. Neither of us knew anything that was going on. I took the phone from her and firmly said “There is NO COMMENT.” and hung up. I was reminded of this recently when someone in something on TV was in a similar situation and started giving the caller information.

That was the last time I went to that client as she was no longer in business after that.