Estimated reading time: 2 minute(s)

I was sitting at my desk this morning, typing a quick story to a friend over instant message. As I was most of the way through my story, the phone rang. I saw who it was via caller ID, and figured I would call them back in a minute, since my IM friend needed to leave in about that same amount of time.

Well, I finished the story, and figured that the caller might still be on the line, leaving a message. So I picked up the phone. I was correct. The caller was still leaving a message. I quickly said, “Hello! I’m here! One moment…” and then clicked on the hang up thingie (what is that called?) to stop the answering machine from recording, without hanging up on the caller.

What happened next was extraordinary.

When I lifted my finger off the hang up thingie (mind you, this is all within about 1.2 seconds) I said, “Hello?” just to make sure the caller was still there. Imagine my surprise when the voice responding was ANOTHER, totally unrelated caller!!! (Of a different gender, to boot!) Somehow caller #2 had squeezed in a call in those few moments where the answering machine had picked up, and when I tried to switch it off remotely, my phone picked up the call on call waiting – though I had no idea it was there!!

So then, caller #1 thought I had hung up, and calls back! I put caller #2 on hold, explained briefly to caller #1 (and #3?) what happened, and finally got back to #2.

That was crazy. Crazy enough to make the blog. 🙂