Over the weekend, someone called my office voice mail and left a 228 second message that sounds like a muffled pro tennis match play-by-play.
For a minute there, I thought I had a new social trend spotted in the wild: voice mail spam.
So I called the number from the caller ID.
It's not a social trend. It seems a former student took his young daughter to the tennis match this weekend, and during the match he gave her the cell phone to play with. She happily pushed buttons, it called my office, and I got a recording of a bit of the match.
But I had a nice chat with the dad, who's now a partner in a big local firm and seems to be doing very well.
I have a friend who has me on speed dial on his cell. Somehow when he is in meetings his phone rings mine. And boy are his meetings boring! They,re faculty meetings. But I have this fantasy of him being an investment banker and I get to eavesdrop on a big M&A, and my fortune beckons. Is that really insider trading?