Since she discovered the joy of laptops, my mom Cathy likes to sit on her couch and work. She still works mostly from her cool home office, tucked away into an alcove.
When she works in her office, I have to sit on a cushion on the floor. But when she works on her couch, I curl up on the other end. That way I can keep Cathy out of trouble and make sure she stays more or less focused on her business. All part of my underpaid, underrated job.
Since Cathy works on the phone, she likes having a cordless phone so she can sit on her couch and talk. And she can jump up and pull socks away from me, while holding a conversation with someone halfway around the world.
So when her 8-year-old cordless phone started dying, and she couldn’t push the buttons to dial numbers, she said, “I will go purchase a cordless phone. No big deal.”
Wrong.
I heard her talking to someone from her cell phone. “Why can’t I get a cordless phone that works? I’ve been through two phones already. I can’t hear the person on the other end, although I can hear operators. Ridiculous! What happened to the days when you could just walk into a store and point to a box and say, ‘I’ll take that one.'”
After she hung up, she used a few words that are not suited to my innocent canine ears. Then she vowed to use her old cordless phone, which works beautifully. “I just can’t dial out but people usually call me anyway,” she explained. “At least I can hear them.”
Cathy called half a dozen people on her cell phone to see if anyone could help. They said, “Who uses a land line anymore? Just a cell phone, thank you very much.” Or they said, “I hate my cordless phone too.”
Frankly, I don’t care. Dogs don’t talk on phones. And I’m sleeping on a ten-year-old dog bed, so I’m hardly in a …um…position to advocate for change.
I just hope Cathy doesn’t go over her cell phone minutes because then she’ll mutter about wasting money. And she’ll think twice before buying me another toy, let alone a bag of those delicious treats from Downtown Dog Lounge.