I called my sister the other night because I had to ask her something that was too long to type through email, and I accidentally dialed the wrong number. My cordless phone has a numeric display on the handset, so I saw that I was a number off, and I hung up before it got through the first ring. Fifteen seconds later, my phone rang.
“Hello?” I asked to the person that had the mis-dialed number. My greeting was met with, “Did you just call here?” “Um,” I replied, “I mis-dialed a number, so I didn’t wait for someone to answer.” *click* was the response to my admission of committing a typo.
When the hell did a “wrong number” become a cause for a call back via Caller ID or *69? I have Caller ID and I’ve had people call me looking for someone that doesn’t live at my number. I didn’t call them back; they figured out that they didn’t call the right number and that’s that. If the same person called every five minutes, insisting the Juan the Donkey lived in my condo, I might call them back, but not for a one time wrong number. I didn’t even call back the guy that left a message on my machine, requesting leasing or rental information on truck I had available: it was a wrong number!
Caller ID is useful to screen my calls, mostly for telemarketers (who don’t even call my house anymore) and to track people that I know that don’t leave me a message (i.e. my grandmother, my father and mother.) I’ve never thought to use it as a way to punish people for mis-dialing a number before… if someone I don’t know doesn’t leave me a message, screw’m.
So, the other night, after the Apprentice, I called my sister again. I wanted to see if she agreed with the firing of the week and a woman that had a voice that wasn’t my sister’s answered the phone. I checked the handset and realized that I transposed a different number this time, when I dialed her number. Or more accurately, tried to dial her number. I hung up quickly, which is the internationally accepted greeting for “oops, I dialed the wrong number.” Fifteen seconds later, my phone rang.
“Did you just call here?”
Happens to me a lot. I guess I side with you, mostly because I don’t have the time to track down people I don’t know just to make them feel more stupid then they probabaly already do.
Sign of the times I suppose. Everyone’s hooking into the information age, not all are mature enough to handle it responsibly. Oh well, right up there with the spammers I suppose…
I hate that, I don’t have a home phone and if I see an number on my cell phone that I don’t recognize, I don’t answer it. Why waste my minutes on your mistake?
That’s what I’m sayin’! I mean it’s not like the number cranked your or even called more than one time… I remember a while ago that I called a Chinese restaurant (and it’s one that I’ve ordered from for years) and got another call just after dialing… and even SHE called me back! Bah.
It could be some kind of desperate hope that they were just called by someone they’d never heard from before but was important, i.e. Ed McMahon. Maybe it was a stranger calling to tell them their missing dog was found. Who knows. All possibilities, just all desperate. I know that may be the case, because I’ve been on that end myself.
‘I hung up quickly, which is the internationally accepted greeting for “oops, I dialed the wrong number.”‘
No. It is the internationally accepted “greeting” that means “I am a rude, boorish asshole who can’t even be bothered to take a moment to apologize after disturbing a total stranger”.
Who the FUCK were your parents?
P.S. I think I posted this in the wrong blog by mistake. Oh, well!
Riiiiiight.
As this has started happening to me a lot lately, I tend to agree with you. Though the odd thing is, I am getting these type of calls on a line that I don’t make many out going calls on. I got one this morning inquiring about a call supposedly placed yesterday … given that I wasn’t even home yesterday, there’s very little chance the call actually came from my number … yet … there it was on their Caller ID.
I would also say that hanging up immediately when someone answers (because you’ve dialled a wrong number) is a bit rude. The polite thing to do is say, “I’m sorry. I got the wrong number.” Let them be the rude one that then just hangs up … smile … you’ve just taken the high road. ;-)