Goodbye, Palindromic Phone Number

Wifey and I are late to most tech developments, but today a worker from our alarm company is due over to make an update which will cause a major change: we're getting rid of our land line.

A few months ago, we noticed that, while you could call out, our home phones didn't ring.  We had an ATT man over, and he couldn't figure it out -- he concluded that the problem was "internal" -- somehow our new in 1997 system wasn't working.

I stopped answering our land line years ago.  Typically the only calls on it are junk, or to Wifey from her BFF Edna when Wifey ignores her cell phone, or my mother in law.  Well, my suegra is now phone-less -- the ALF calls when we're needed, and Edna only uses the cell.

The only reason we even kept the landline was because of our alarm.  But the cheerful Arresco man came by, and said we could switch to an all cell system -- the alarm, which we rarely use, anyway, would go only to our cell phones.

I guess another reason I kept the landline was because of something I had read -- when the power goes out, old school landlines can keep working.  No more.  ALL phone service is now, essentially, electronic, and when the power goes, your landline is as worthless as a teat on a bull.

So it'll be adios to 6693966.  My friend Jim, upon learning of that number in 2000, when we got it, immediately saw it was a palindrome.  Not really, since the company went to 10 digit dialing, and you also need to use 305.  But still -- it served us well.

If all goes to plan, we'll be up and running with the new system today.  Then Wifey can perform a task she dreads -- contacting ATT.  They'll try to keep us on the landline plan -- they get $40 per month for it, but we'll opt out.

$40 per month is 5 martinis at Trulucks during happy hour.  That will be money much better spent than we currently waste on a dinosaur technology.