djdaneh@pacbell.com (Dan'l DanehyOakes) (02/07/91)
Peter the Hacker writes: >Back when I was going to Berkeley someone accidentally gave out the # >of the payphone outside the door instead of their own. They got a lot >of calls, and some of the store's regulars would take to answering the >phone in "interesting" ways after "Pay Phone" and "Wrong Number" wore >off. "AT&T security, hold for a trace please" was one of the more >memorable ones... Not surprising after 10+ years, Peter, but your memory of this is a bit off. They installed a pay phone right outside the door of The Other Change of Hobbit, a science fiction bookstore in downtown Berkeley, in 1978. The number on the payphone was one of a bank that had recently been converted to COT use, and in fact had been in other use for some time and until very shortly before the change ... as the business line of "The Wild Ones Massage Parlor." Some of the employees and regulars of the Other Change began answering the phone in strange ways, as you say; a few female persons began putting on their slinkiest voices, and saying, "Wild Ones, this is Prudence [or whatever], may I help you?" -- and making appointments for these "gentlemen." Unfortunately, none of us knew where TWOMP had actually *been* or we might have gone down to watch their amazement and dismay when they arrived for their, ahem, massages and found that the place no longer existed. My favorite, however, was when Eric "the Large" Larson answered the phone, with an appropriate second-generation Irish-American accent "Wild Ones Massage Parlor, Sgt O'Malley speaking. May I help you?" Momentary fum, fuh, uh, ah: then a click. The Roach