Each woman in the group used to take turns hosting the get-together, but we now meet at Nadine's house each Monday, since Nadine doesn't drive much anymore, and her mobility is a bit impaired. She's a lovely hostess and looks forward to us descending upon her with our projects. She turned 88 this year, and her eyesight is failing (close-up stuff is hard, distance is still fine), so she's given up knitting but still can lend a helpful hand when we're winding yarn or if we run into a knitting problem.
She has portable phones throughout the house, and always has one in a pocket attached to her walker/zimmerframe. One of our knitters, M, recently moved one state over, and calls us each Monday night to say hello. We take turns talking to her, catching her up on our latest project or just general chit-chat. Well, i was the last one to talk to her when she called on Monday night, and when i asked if anyone else needed to talk with her again, they all shook their heads and called out, "Good-bye, M," so M could hear. I told her good-bye as well and went to disconnect the call. My portable phone has a green talk button and red stop button, so looking down at Nadine's phone, i pushed the only red button i found.
In a nanosecond, i realised that wasn't correct, as it was a button with a red cross on it, and instantly dialled 911 (US equivalent to the UK 999). Oh, dear, that's not what i wanted to do--i simply wanted to hang up the bloody phone and dearly missed the old cradle model just then.
I told the others what happened. Nadine didn't know it was programmed to do that. I dialled 911 and when the dispatcher answered, "What address are you calling from?" i dutifully answered the question. I then quickly explained there was no emergency. I just pushed the wrong button and it automatically dialled 911. He asked for the name of the person living at the address, and i gave him Nadine's name. I told him, "It wasn't Nadine, though, it was me, her fat-fingered friend named Megan who pushed the wrong button."
Here, he laughed, thanked me for letting him know all was all right, and that was that.
It got us to giggling, and i asked Nadine how to switch off her phone. Turns out i had to press the green Talk button. "But, i don't want to talk," i protested when she told me, "I'm done with talking."
"Yes," Nadine said patiently, in that tone that showed many years' worth of raising children, grandchildren, and explaining things to others with small words so they understand, "You press 'Talk' when you want to talk, and press it again when you are done."
"Well, then it shouldn't say 'Talk,'" i said, "It should say 'On/Off'."
I know i've mentioned before that i'm mechanically retarded. And being fat fingered besides just adds to the challenge. But having "Talk" substitute for "On/Off" "Hello/Goodbye" is just cruel.
Oh, and my current knitting project is a pair of mittens not unlike the ones below.
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| I made these for Himself--they were my first attempt at mittens. |
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| I made these for me afterwards, as i liked the ones i made for Himself so much. |
