Kim.Fosbe@iugate.unomaha.edu (Kim Fosbe) (02/17/91)
Ok, maybe you guys can answer me a couple of questions that I've wondered about for a couple years. First there was this time a couple years ago when I was out of work and all depressed and I was just lying around the apartment this one afternoon killing time and just kind of lying on the bed playing with the phone buttons. I know this is stupid but I was kind of pushing buttons seeing what would happen. I made sure not to push the "1" or "0" first so not to call long distance. Ok, so I call this one number and there were all kinds of clicks and stuff and when I hung up I couldn't get dial tone back until I held it down 30 sec. or so. So here's what's wierd. About that time my roommate comes in and the phone rings. She gets it and some guy asked "did you just call a 294 number?" so she yells in and asks me if I did and I said "no" not even thinking. Then I realized that I didn't know what the hell I was calling and I very well could have called a 294 number or any other number. Ok, I asked around and found that 294 is the prefix for a local Air-Force base. That really freaked me out, cause from that time I wonder if I accidentally called some high-security number that they were able to trace and they were checking me out or something. Now this next one was not really freaky but I wonder about it. When I took a trip to New York City a few years ago, one of my girlfriends was meeting me at the airport but my flight was delayed in Chicago and I had to call her, but I didn't have enough change so I called collect from the pay phone at O'Hare. Now I've called collect from pay phones and maybe the operator stays on for a second or two just to ask if they will take the charge. But this time the operator dialed the number I was calling PLUS some other numbers. I heard the beeps as she dialed them, and this recording then played back the number I was calling to and the word "solid", and then the call went through. I know she was testing to see if the number was ok to charge to but I never had this happen again. Maybe is there a telecom wonder-wizard out there who knows what was happening. It's not really that important but I wondered about this stuff ever since they happened. Ybbat (DRBBS) 8.9 v. 3.13 r.5 [200:5010/666@metronet] (200:5010/666.0)