DMV

You know the DMV (department of motor vehicles) got it half right when it came to taking pictures for driver’s licenses. Everybody complains about their picture and how they weren’t prepared or how much they hate their picture.

I think that the DMV didn’t go far enough in catching people in their “natural state” of how they look when they are driving. When you stop and think about it, how many people look like a movie star glamour shot when they’re driving a car. From my experience of traveling on the road, I think that the more realistic shot would be to give women the choice of: a) being caught in the act of putting on their eyeliner b) putting on their lipstick c) talking on a cell phone d) wearing a hooter hider.

The men could be snapped shaking their finger or with a look of “who me?” on their face.

Conversations on the phone

A while back, I had a reality check. Here is what happened. I was teaching a group of new apprentice linemen on construction standards. (Don’t tune out yet while I talk "shop".) We were talking about joint use (communication lines attached to the power poles) and I made reference to “Ma Bell” every now and then. One of the apprentices raised his hand.

Yes.

Who is this "Ma Bell" that you keep referring to?

AT&T.

Oh, you mean the cellular phone company that got bought out by Cingular. (And has since been bought out and changed its name back to AT&T.)

No. This was before cell phones ever existed. You may know them by the “Baby Bell” name they used for their regional company: MST&T (Mountain States Telephone & Telegraph) or Mountain Bell. Blank stares from the class.

How about, US West? More blank stares. Qwest?

Finally, some nodding heads of recognition. Boy, did that make me feel old.

Has it really been that long ago since AT&T (Ma Bell) was broken up by Congress? 1984 — I guess so.

Now, I am really going to go back into ancient history. Before cellphones and all of its craziness, I can remember when Mountain Bell owned all of the phones in your house. You only rented them. When you signed up for service, you picked up how many phones and what style you wanted to rent. The rotary phones were the “plain Janes”, then came “Princess” phones, and then touch tone.




Utah County was divided into 3 calling areas — North Utah County (Lindon, Pleasant Grove, American Fork, & Lehi), Central (Orem & Provo) and Southern (Springville, Spanish Fork, & Payson, etc). You could call toll free within the calling area, but it was long distance to call to the other areas.

Back then, you referred to your phone number as Sunset 5-2622. You only had to dial the five numbers if you were calling within your toll free area i.e. 5-2622. The “Sunset” designated the number as being in Pleasant Grove/Lindon. Some of the other cities I remember were: “Franklin” for Provo, “Academy” for Orem, and “Skyline” for American Fork. If you wanted to dial to a long distance area within the county, then you had to dial the first two letters of the call zone + the 5 digits i.e. a call from Orem to Pleasant Grove would be SU5-2622 or 785-2622.

As I mentioned, it was long distance to call from Lindon to Orem/Provo. When I was growing up, we had 2 white phones hanging on the wall side by side in our kitchen. My father worked in Orem and we lived four blocks away in Lindon. As a condition of his employment, he had to live in Orem because he was on call 24/7 and they needed to get in touch with him on an Orem line. He countered with the option that if he had an Orem phone line then would that suffice? (I’m certain that there was much more to it than that, but I was young and don’t know the details.) Anyway, they okayed it and my dad paid to have a line installed the four blocks from the Orem border to our house. Thus, the two phones. The one on the right was the Pleasant Grove/Lindon line and the one on the left was the Orem/Provo line. Needless to say, it was the topic of conversation whenever someone came into our kitchen for the first time and saw two exact same phones hanging side by side on the wall.

Why do you have two phones?

Oh, that. “His” and “Hers” of course. One for my dad and one for my mom.

Next history lesson: The demise of the typewriter. (What's a typewriter?)

iPhone2

2001: A Space iPhone

Not since 2001: A Space Odyssey have so many apes gone crazy over a rectangular object.

Cell Phone Happiness

It finally showed up! cs and I had kept checking each week to see if it was here…but nothing but disappointment each time.

Nope. Not today, they would say.

We'll try back again, later.

I dropped by the store today and thought I'd ask one more time. They pulled out a sack and put it on the counter. Was that it? Yes! It was. Finally! After a month of searching it had showed up.

I picked it up and turned it over and over. I tried starting it up, but the battery was dead. I immediately thanked the sales person and headed home to charge it up.

cs' cell phone that she had lost at Costco a month ago was found and turned in.

…What's that? What's the picture at the top? — Apple's new iPhone arrived in stores today…we can celebrate our happiness together — them for launching their new cell phone and us for finding cs' cell phone.