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# Hanging on by thread
- URL: https://www.smdp.com/hanging-on-by-thread/
- Published: 2006-08-12T15:00:00.000Z
- Updated: 2026-10-25T00:38:54.000Z
- Author: Guest Author
- Tags: Opinion, Santa Monica, #archive-import

*By LAUGHING MATTERS BY JACK NEWORTH*

As I write this column each week, I often wonder is this worthy of a column, or just a random idea I’ve managed to stretch into 700 words? Sometimes I can’t tell the difference. As always, you’ll be the judge. The idea for this one came to me one morning a few weeks ago when I phoned a friend who’s had the same number for twenty years. I hadn’t finished dialing when suddenly the phone started to ring. I hung up and redialed. Astute observer that I am, after the third time I sensed something was amiss. Finally I heard a recording saying I had to dial 310, even for local numbers. Great, one more annoying, time-consuming thing I can do nothing about.

Before complaining to the phone company, I remembered when Lenny Bruce said many years ago when he called them a monopoly worse than Communism. He warned if you got “hot with he phone company you could wind up with a Dixie cup and thread.” That in mind, it’s still seems so absurd to have to dial 310 when only calling the apartment down the hall.

At the risk of this being titled “Next Stop Woodlawn Cemetery,” I can remember in the 50’s when there were prefixes, BRadshaw, GRanite, WEbster, WYoming, or VErmont. Santa Monica’s prefix was EXbrook. You dialed the prefix followed by 5 numbers. It was so easy to remember. Then, out of the blue, the phone company went to all numbers. The movie “BUtterfield8” wouldn’t have been the same as,“288-4118.”My father predicted the switch to all numbers was the slippery slope of automation. Little did he know.

Despite negative public reaction, the phone company has presented its logic why this was necessary. Then again, the Bush administration presented its logic about the war in Iraq. So much for logic. By the way, for fans of statistics, here’s a doozie. By this November’s election we will have been at war in Iraq longer than all of World War 2! Something to think about, perhaps as you’re dialing 310.

Not only does extra dialing of 310 put one at risk for the dreaded “finger fatigue,” it plays havoc with local numbers in your speed dial. They’re now useless. I’ve forgotten how to store numbers on my phone. I’ve misplaced the instructions. It might take me all day to find them in my cluttered apartment, and then, all I might find is an old dry cleaning claim check -- which wouldn’t be so bad, now that I think of it.

I don’t know if it’s A.D.D. or I’m just terrible with electronics or both. I bought a radio for my bike, which also has a clock, which also has an alarm, that happened to go off in the middle of the night. It was so piercing I thought it was Al Qaeda. I wonder if you have to dial 310 before you dial 911?

All this reminds of a story about Bill Gates, only in reverse. While developing Windows, Gates challenged his programmers to make it boot five seconds faster. Of the millions of people who would use windows multiple times in a day, he calculated how much time would be saved world wide. It was staggering. This is as well, only in reverse. If it takes an extra two seconds every time you dial 310\. And if you make twenty calls a day. And if say 3 million people are in the 310 area code, over our collective lifetimes, I figure we’ve lost 1 billion hours! How are we going to make this time up, eating faster? Look at the time I’ve wasted just figuring this out.

Well, I can see by my computer’s word counter, I’ve come to the end. Was this worthy of a column or just stretching 700 words? As always, you’ll be the judge. Two weeks ago I joked about rent control and got a call from my landlord. Last week I wrote an antismoking piece and joked about a call from the Tobacco Institute. This week, to quote Lenny Bruce, I hope I don’t wind up with a Dixie cup and thread. (Jack Neworth is a freelance writer. He at:)

*Originally published in the Santa Monica Daily Press print edition on August 12, 2006.* [Read the original PDF.](https://s3.us-east-1.amazonaws.com/smdp%5Fbackissues/081206.pdf?ref=smdp.com)