Good afternoon, Gents, I thank'ee for the cuppajoe, my day just getting started, since I slept past noon; must'a been tired, or something.
We, too, have a "house phone", sort of a knee jerk thing, would feel disconnected without it, but for the most part, it is only a nod to being older; it is served by cable rather than the direct wire telephone system, so when the power fails, so does the phone. We can't justify the use of two separate utilities, and the phone company only offers tv service through satellite. Our cell phones have become our primary means of communication.
Back in the early eighties, I was a Webelos Den Leader in the Boy Scouts, and had twelve ten year olds to wrangle. One weekend, I had to work on Saturday (a more common situation than I liked) so one of the boy's dad took on a crafty project for the kids at his gaage. I stopped i after I got off to see how things were going, and helped finish up. Since a few of the boys lived on my street or an adjoining one, I said I would take them home, and told them to call their folks to let them know. Augie had a desk phone in the garage, a standard rotary dial piece, and I noticed one of my boys walked over to it, picked up the handpiece and looked at it, looked at the desk piece, hung it up, looked around kind of confused. He picked up the handpiece again, and poked at the dial, but didn't turn it, and was just generally confounded by that phone. I finally went over and showed him how it worked, and he made the call. Now, his sister was my older son's girlfriend ----------------
----- (I started thjis at 1400, and it is now 2050, sort of got sidetracked) Well, eldest son and girlfriend are now married (25 years, my gawd) and that little Webelos is now one of my extended family kids, arguably the most accomplished and successful one of the bunch - he is now a highly respected Pediatric Anesthesiologist with a practice that covers most of Southern California. When he got his MD, I told him I would not tell folks of his telephone adventure any more ----- but I lied.