Overheard on the bus.
A girl on her cell phone: "You know who's pregnant? [pause for the other person to respond] Julie. You know what I said to her? [pause] "I said, you know what I think, [insert blah blah blah about what she thought about Julie's pregnancy]." [pause] You know who just got out of jail? [pause] Jeremy. [pause] You know where I'm having my birthday party? [pause] You know what I'm going to have? [pause] A Long Island iced tea..." Lather, rinse, repeat for about 10 minutes. I'm not sure if I was happy that "OMG!" was not her style, or if I was longing for an "OMG!" now and then. Perhaps her friend on the other end of the line filled that role.
A youngish guy on the same bus asked me if I had a cell phone. I said yes thinking he might need the time, and being so young he might not know that there are these things called watches that also give the time. He asked to borrow it because his phone was dead. I fumbled through some lie about having to pay for minutes because it's an emergency-only phone, while secretly praying no one called me until he and I parted ways, and he politely said "OK, thanks anyway" and went back to watching the street signs for his stop.
At first I felt bad because maybe he really did need my phone. Maybe he was going to call his mom and not his drug lord as I suspected. Maybe I've watched too much Wire and have gotten a bit paranoid. But the hell if I'm lending some stranger my phone. It could end up tapped and I could be trailed by the Portland police or worse, the F.B.I.
Because, you know, all MY calls are to and from drug lords, and I'd hate to give up my newfound comfortable apartment for a jail cell.
But when he got off the bus in front of a motel and walked toward it I felt justified turning him down. The girl also departed, and all was right with my world again. Until I almost got hit by a car and cursed the driver out. That was fun. Bloody Portland drivers.
Dude, I'm with you about not lending my cell phone to strangers. I was approached by two young teenage girls at Disneyworld last year with the same approach: "Do you have a cell phone? Can I borrow it to make a call?".
ReplyDeleteI can't remember what sort of excuse I gave them but I refused to let them use it even when they asked again (and said please). Instead, I told them they could use a pay phone or one of the park offices nearby. Call me cynical, but I was in a crowded park with my daughter in a stroller next to me while hubby was several feet away getting daughter an ice cream sundae. I pictured these kids running away with my cell phone/PDA and me not being able to run after them. That or playing some other prank/scam that would cost me some crazy amount of money in long-distance phone fees.
Of course I felt bad about being suspicious, but...sigh. Such is the world we live in these days.