Phun on the phone

[Enzo]

A favorite gag of mine is to leave a message on an answering machine when I call a friend who isn't home that goes "...the $10,000, so better luck next time on DIALING FOR DOLLARS."



This story happened a while back, but I never told it here.

My sister in Washington DC has a good friend in North Carolina. Very nice woman, came up to watch the kids while my sister dealt with my mother's passing. Margaret. Margaret was going on vacation for a couple weeks, and sis decided to play a prank on her. Thinks sis, "Now who do I know that could help plan a prank?" Faster than Google can find 1,270,000 naked cheerleader URLs, she thought of me. Go figger.
She asked if I could help, and her idea was wouldn't it be funny if Margaret came home from vacation to find a bunch of mysterious phone messages on the machine. Here is her number.

Say no more, sis.

Every day we made a couple calls to her machine. Our son even helped. He called and left the message, "WE HAD THE BABY, IT WAS A BOY!!! I gotta run, talk to you later."

I called and said "Yeah, this is Ed down at Carolina Paving, just wanted to let you know we'll be over there first thing Monday morning to tear out the drive and repave. Leave your car on the street."

I can do a lot of voices.

The Wenzo called a few times, "Hi, this is your Pampered CHef representative, and the party is on for Saturday. We couldn't get the blue tables so I had to go with brown, that is OK I hope." Then a couple days later, "Hi, your Pampered Chef rep here, we DID get the blue tables after all, see you soon." I never heard of them, but everyone else involved has.

A few other odds and ends, but my favorite was "Phillip - from Blockbuster Video." Phillip is modelled after the bald kid in High Fidelity, very tentative and fairly quiet, but with a bunch of John Malkovich thrown in. The way he talks without breathing sorta. (Mary Steenbergen talks like that sometimes - well most of the time)

Phillip called every day. "Um hi, this is um Phillip from Blockbuster Video, and we need you to return those Adam Sandler movies you rented last month. WE need them back." and "Um hi, um, this is Phillip, from BLockbuster Video? AND Um we really do need those Adam Sandler movies. You can hang onto the Andrew DIce Clay tape, but we need the others.. Um thanks." "Um hi, this is Phillip from Blockbuster Video, adn um you know, sometimes people have tapes that stick in the machine and they get embarassed, but it is OK, we can get them out, it happens a lot. So you can bring the whole thing in if you like."

Now I am resourceful if nothing else, so I looked up the Blockbuster Video in her area, so "Hi um this is Phillip from Blockbuster Video over on Franklin, um if you can't bring thos Adam Sandler tapes in, could you call me at (insert whatever their phone number was here) an maybe I can help"

And a few more in that style.

Eventually the poor woman came home to find just tons of really odd messages on her machine. Of course she had no idea where they came from, so we didn't find out how it went over.

A while later sis was talking to her on the phone and idly mentioned she gad gotten some odd calls. MArgaret then told her about all these calls she had gotten while out of town. As the story unfolded, she had no idea who had the baby and was asking all her friend and the people at her church and just everywhere. No one knew of any new babies.

There was no Carolina Paving and of course no driveway work.

It turns out she really did have a pampered Chef rep, but of course ther were no plans for a party or anything and her rep was clueless as to who might have called.

But Phillip hit a homer. She called the video store wanting to know WHO this Phillip was and why was he calling her every day. SHe had never rented any such tapes and in fact hated Adam Sandler. They assured her they had no Phillip, they had no record of any Adam Sandler tape rentals, and in fact here name was not in any of their records, and they would have sent a post card anyway.

Margaret was steamed, so sis never owned up. Margaret, who in person is very sharp, a smart woman, never considered this was a bunch of pranks.

Well, a couple months go by, and MArgaret is coming to Washington to visit my sister. Sis thinks, wouldn't it be funny if Phillip calls here THERE. She tells me Margaret will be there about 11PM.

So I call sis at 11PM and of course the poor woman is there. Sis answers the phone says in a puzzled voice "Margaret, huh, it's for you." SO there I am face to face so to speak phiilip to Margaret.

"Um hi, this is PHillip from Blockbuster Video, and we still need those Adam Sandler tapes back and..."

"Now LOOK, I don't know who you are, the store doesn't know you, I don't have your tapes, why are you calling me here?" "Well, um, I'm very dedicated to my job..." She never thought about HOW could Phillip know where she was let alone get the number and call it at 11PM. Still isn't catching on. We bantered back and forth a while, the woman is getting steamed again and I am trying to think of a way to get her to talk to my sister, and I start to lose it. At one point I even said "I am sorry ma'am I am starting to fall out of character." Even that wasn't a clue. "Um, maybe you should talk to the lady of the house?" "I AM THE LADY OF THE HOUSE!" "No, I mean the lady of the house you are visiting, she has some information for you.

I got her back with my sister and ended the call. My sis owned up to setting up the prank, Enzo was just following orders.

They are still great friends, but once in a while sis mentions Blockbuster, and apparently it is still not funny yet. Sigh.

But Margaret tried to get me back... tried. I got a post card in the mail from Hawaii - Oahu. NO signature, no return address, total mystery... sorta. The message reads "Thinking of you." In fact I have it in my hand, I tucked it between a couple books and sticking out betwen them on my shelf here, I'd forgetten where I stashed it.

When I was growing up, my parents called me by my middle name, Bruce. No one on this earth calls me Bruce except my sister. When I went to college, I shifter to my first name since it was easier to deal with, and took the name Enzo shortly thereafter when I went on the campus radio network. Been Enzo ever since.

But the mystery post card was addressed to.. Bruce. Nice try Margaret.

Still, Phillip lives on between me and the wife. WE can't drive past a BLockbuster without at least looking at each other and snickering.

[troubleagain]

Gawd, you're evil. I loveit. 8)