Wait, did I just hear someone dial a number that sounded like the Mary Tyler Moore theme song? That’s like my old high-school friend whose number played “Old McDonald had a farm.” Which further reminds me of my ex-girlfriend whose number spelled out JAY-LENO (and her cousin’s was VAN-PELT, if you can believe it) and I never bothered to learn the actual number and one time I tried to use her Blockbuster card and the guy said we had to call her to make sure it was OK — because Blockbuster does not fuck around when it comes to making sure everything is on the up and up — and I kept saying “JAY-LENO” over and over, fruitlessly trying to convert it to numbers, and the clerk was obviously thinking I was crazy and wishing he’d never quit that horrible job at the puppy-drowning factory because at least there he didn’t have to talk to anyone.

The point being, why could I hear what someone was dialing at all? I’ll tell you: they put the thing on speakerphone and then dial and then pick up the phone when someone says MMMMYELLOW? all loud and distorty through the speaker.

And why do they do this? Well, in the nice imaginary world in which I live (aka FLESHWORLD), they only did it that one time because they knew they could delight their coworkers with the Mary Tyler Moore theme (sort of like last week when one of the receptionists called into her boss’s office and said, “Tom, it’s Jerry,” and then someone had to explain to her why that was semi-funny). But in reality, they do it every time, like: “I’m sorry, people, but it is 2003 Anno Domino, OK, and in today’s fast-paced world I just don’t have the time to pick up the phone and cradle it against my shoulder whilst dialing. You want I should get some neck injury that makes me into that retard from Facts a Life?”

“You want I should” is an expression that has always baffled me, though not as much as something like, “I don’t know from Betty, I know from Veronica.” What is going on with that, for reals? Any time I encounter weird turns of phrase like that I assume it’s a Massachusetts thing, and judging from this I’m usually right.