When the right number is a wrong number

To regular readers of this column it will come as no surprise that your faithful scribe does not possess a cell phone, or any other hand-held communication device for that matter, they being of absolutely no use to him. This does not stop me, however, from inflicting them upon others.

Several years ago, when She Who Must Be Obeyed was spending considerable time on the road, often at night, I purchased a cell phone for her for use in emergency situations. To be fair it has come in handy at various times. But, like myself, my bride finds it as much a nuisance as an aid so she keeps it turned off until needed.

This in itself has been the source of some anxiety since she refuses to give out the number to friends and family since they couldn’t make a call to her anyway unless it happened to be that rare instance when she was using the phone herself. This was of particular irritation to the mother of my bride who I am sure believed it was a part of some deeper conspiracy organized by her son-in-law.

Recently, we took a trip to Ontario to visit family. In anticipation of considerable phone traffic – making reservations, organizing times and places for gatherings etc. – the phone was activated and the number given out to a select few. This in turn led to two important discoveries.

Both of these important insights into the workings of Canada’s telecommunications industry were the result of a change in server that the love of my life had made several years ago. First, when you change server and keep your phone number, that number still remains the property of the original server. The second thing is that after a period of time the original server can give out that number to a new customer – without telling you. Which is exactly what happened.

The result of this was that the love of my life could make calls from her phone but anyone trying to call her got someone else at the same number. To avoid any embarrassment or possible law suits, let’s call her Antoinette.

The first instance came when a friend, seeing the report of a tragic accident that closed the west-bound lane of the 401, tried to give us a warning. She reached Antoinette and asked for Jane. Antoinette told her that she had dialed a wrong number. Apologies were forthcoming and the call ended amicably.

Later that day a call was placed to my sister who was out at the time. When she attempted to return the call some time later and asked for Jane, Antoinette assured her in French that she had the wrong number. Again things ended on a reasonably pleasant note.

When my perfectly bilingual sister-inlaw tried to return a call some hours later and asked for Jane, Antoinette was justifiably becoming somewhat more testy in her affirmation that this was indeed a wrong number and that no one named Jane was there.

When my son returned a call around ten o’clock that night Antoinette had all she could take of this idiot Jane who had given out a wrong number to apparently hundreds of equally stupid people. She lit into my bilingual son with what he could only describe as a flurry of classical French profanity before breaking off the call in a less than gentle manner.

It wasn’t until the next morning when we gathered together for brunch that the full sequence of events was brought to light. My suggestion that to cap it off one of the female members of our group should phone and say, “Hi, this is Jane. Have there been any calls for me?” was dismissed out of hand.

Let’s be fair. It wasn’t Antoinette’s fault. Nor was it the fault of She Who Must Be Obeyed or any one of the friends and relatives who were innocently drawn into this hand-held fiasco. My only suggestion . . . if you change servers, get a new number.