Hold the Phone, by Elayne Riggs

Elayne Riggs

Elayne Riggs is the creator of the popular blog Pen-Elayne on the Web. She was a founding member of Friends of Lulu, an organization dedicated to increasing the involvement of girls and women in comics, as readers and creators. She is married to inker Robin Riggs, with whom she shares two cats, and has odd love/hate relationship with Hillary Clinton.

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9 Responses

  1. Russ Rogers says:

    I think Jose was invited to a pool party. He would need to bring a towel. There might be many women there in bathing suits, but touching and fondling were not part of the party's scheduled activities. Depending on where Jose was from, the concept of a "pool party" and that you might have to bring your own towel (that this basic hospitality might not be provided), this might be, well, foreign. And unfortunately men don't have to be from another culture to have to be reminded that just because a woman is good looking and her outfit is revealing, "you can look but you better not touch" is still generally good manners.Have you talked to your phone company about methods of blocking or rejecting incoming Text Messages?Did you know that you can view and update a blog from an iPhone or Blackberry? You can do it from a web enabled PDA too!

    • Neil Ottenstein says:

      When I received unsolicited text messages I asked Verizon and they said they can block all text messages, but cannot any specific ones or numbers. And of course, you are charged for each text message if you aren't already on some kind of text message plan. They did give me a credit that one time.

    • Elayne Riggs says:

      I dunno, Jose didn't seem to know what a towel was, Cell Phone Guy was bringing one for him.

  2. Neil Ottenstein says:

    You pay only 5 cents for incoming text messages? Verizon started charging 2 cents, then raised it to 10 cents and currently charges 15 cents. This is to encourage people to sign up for one of their $5/month or $10/month text message plans.And remember, those bluetooth cellphone devices that people wear on their ears make them vulnerable to the Cybermen.

  3. John Ostrander says:

    Perhaps the most inappropriate place I've seen guys using a cel phone is while standing at a urinal in a public washroom. I wish I could say I've seen it only once and I wish I could say I was kidding. I don't care how important that phone call may seem to be or how important the fellow may think he is (and neither were very important in either case or in either sense), he should finish his business before taking care of business. If I was on the other end of that call and I had any intimation of what he was doing, I would have said, "Dude, are you pissing while you're talking to me? Call me later."On the other hand, as a writer I LIKE those little glimpses into other peoples' lives. Maybe I'll see/hear something that I can file away for later use. Or I can make up my own story surrounding it. I don't care what is the most logical explanation; I'm just trying to figure out what would be the most interesting STORY to tell around this moment. It's a like a mini writer's exercise. Has nothing to do with reality other than the bit of reality I observe.I also hate getting charged for texts that are spam from my own provider. I don't text, I don't want TMs, and I don't want my own company to charge me. I broke down and got a cel a few years ago and keep it for necessary use.OTOH, I wouldn't say no to an iPhone. Those look cool!

    • Alan Coil says:

      If somebody is using a cell phone in a public bathroom, I find reasons to flush the toilets.

  4. Vinnie Bartilucci says:

    Didn't Tuli Kupferberg used to do a comic for Inside Joke called "Overheard at America's Lunch Counters"? Seems there's an easy update to that just staring us in the face…BTW, is this page mad crazy formatted for anyone else today?

  5. mike weber says:

    My favourite cellphone cartoon was on in the New Yorker several years ago – woman talking in cellphone. In the background is an open door, man talking on cellphone walking in. Caption: "I have to hang up – you just walked in the door."Of course, there was the recent 9 Chickweed Lane strip, in which Edda, leaving a snippy message on soon-to-be ex-boyfriend Amos's voicemail, ends by barking "Blammitykerbang!" into the phone. When her dance partner Seth saks what that was all about, she says she realised it's impossible to slam down the receiver on a cell phone.

  6. Lauren says:

    Elayne,please call your cell phone company and ask them to stop texting ads to you.