Cell Phone Could Use Call-Waiting

I am Joe’s cell phone.

I am nothing but a hunk of plastic and circuitry. I look harmless. That’s the way I like it. I prefer to insinuate myself into people’s lives — kind of like, oh, maybe Satan? — and then I unleash my evil powers. People think I’m cute, like I’m some kind of technological advance or something. But, oh baby, are they ever deluded. I can wreak more havoc than World War III.

Just the other day, I was feeling a little frisky. I hadn’t endangered anyone’s life in, maybe, three or four hours. So I was riding in my luxury SUV with my “owner” Joe when I decided to do something fun. I decided to kill him.

I waited for the perfect moment. We came to a crowded intersection, traffic going every which way — a natural choice, but too mundane for my evil purposes. Every cell phone, even the dullards, always go for the old crowded intersection routine. It’s such a cliche. I decided to wait for something better.

And then I saw it. A bridge. And not just a bridge. But a bridge with a curve in it followed by a traffic backup. This is what separates me, Joe’s cell phone, from the average cell phone. I have an instinctive feel for when a guy needs every ounce of his concentration, or at least two hands on the steering wheel.

So I began to ring. RINNG! Here I am, Joe! Over here on the seat. Where you last dropped me.

Oh, baby, you should have seen the chaos. Joe is reaching across the seat, fumbling for me. I’m sliding around, avoiding him, stifling laughter, and then he takes his eye off the road to grab me. Then, he looks back up and sees the traffic stopped and he jams on his brakes and starts to skid. That’s about the time when, if he were smart, he’d drop me like a hot plutonium ingot.

But what does Joe do? You’re gonna love this. He’s careening across the centerline, the grille of a Kenworth staring him in the face, and he goes, “Hello?”

The guy answers me! I love it! I’m so bad! So I go, “We’re taking pledges for MODD, Mothers Opposed to Dumb Driving and we were wondering if you would like to.”

About then, he slides radiator-first into the oncoming truck.

I’m embarrassed to say that Joe wasn’t hurt, but it wasn’t my fault. The Kenworth driver was paying way too much attention and he was practically stopped when Joe slid into him. In my defense, all I can say is that when police asked Joe why he crossed the centerline, he said, and I quote, “I thought it was my broker.”

A cell phone doesn’t get a chance to wreak havoc like that every day, only maybe every third day, but I get plenty of other opportunities to create chaos of a minor variety. One of my favorites is the old ringing-in-the-movie-theater trick. I wait until the arrival of the movie’s key emotional moment, like when Oskar Schindler breaks down and says, “I could have saved more,” or when Cameron Diaz puts the mousse in her hair, and then I ring my head off. The first thing that happens is everyone reaches under their seats for their cell phones. The second thing that happens is that they all glare at my Joe.

This trick works even more flawlessly in the Northwest Bach Festival, especially in the slowest and quietest passages (I told you I was Satan).

An even nastier trick is to wait until Joe is having a nice conversation with some important client, or some other kind of hot prospect, if you know what I mean, and then I start ringing. If Joe were just slightly brighter, he would ignore me because answering me in the middle of a conversation makes him look rude. But Joe, bless him, thinks it makes him look, and I quote, “important.” I’ve got to hand it to Joe. I couldn’t do this without him.

As a matter of fact, half the time I’m just the innocent bystander. I’m snoozing on the car seat, when all of a sudden he gets the bright idea to make a call. He picks me up and dials me and almost hits a sheep (this was in Montana).

Or I’m sitting in his briefcase at a restaurant when all of a sudden he grabs me and punches the speed-dial and starts bellowing, “Those are not the parameters we discussed under the provisions of our new paradigm,” annoying everyone in the place and ruining their appetite for radicchio.

And, hey, I’m not the one who makes him yell into me. It says right here in my specifications that voice signals are transmitted electronically. It’s not my fault if he thinks he has to shout loud enough so the orbiting satellite can hear him.

And it’s certainly not my fault that I get dragged along on his little fishing trips, so every idiot at the office can call up and ruin his vacation.

I am Joe’s cell phone; I’m not the guy’s brains.