So this happened yesterday… just your typical Friday night around here.
So I have these neat-o Bluetooth headphones.
They are pretty convenient to use. Most just fall out of my ears, but these ones seem to stay in place, as long as I am not jogging or exercising.
I really like them except for one thing.
You have to push a button on them like three times to raise or lower the volume one bar.
So if I want to take my headphones from full blast down five bars to a more reasonable level, I have to push the button on my left headphone like 15 times, in sets of threes. It will take an eternity (or like 10 seconds).
It’s really annoying.
So I use the volume control on my iPhone to do that.
Well sometimes, because I am good at multi-tasking, I will change the volume with my phone still in my pocket.
But also, because the phone is in my pocket, I will be inadvertently holding the phone upside down. So instead of pushing the “volume control” buttons, I will instead be just pushing the side button.
This very thing happened yesterday.
The volume wasn’t changing and so I just kept pushing the wrong button.
The most curious thing happened after that.
My phone made the sound of a police siren for a split second and when I pulled it out of my pocket to inspect it, I saw this :
“Dialing 911: emergency services”
😳🤦♂️
Mortified to learn that I had somehow dialed emergency services while just hanging out at home with my kids, I panicked and immediately hung up, which was probably the last thing I should have done.
Because of course, they called back.
One thing Jonah really has a tough time with is me talking on the phone.
He will scream, “‘ALL DONE,’ DADDY PHONE!! All DONE ‘EAR!” over and over again.
So I didn’t really want to answer it, especially with Jonah screaming in the background, because the cops would think something was amiss and would be showing up at my front door.
But I didn’t NOT want to answer it, because the cops would think something was amiss and would be showing up at my front door.
So I went and hid in the bathroom to answer, hoping Jonah wouldn’t hear me.
“Hello?”
“Yes, this is 911 emergency services and we received a call from this number. Is everything okay?”
“Yes. Everything is fine. I…uh…”
I felt like quoting Han Solo in Star Wars:
“Everything is under control now. Situation normal. Uh, we had a slight weapons malfunction. But, uh, everything’s perfectly all right now. We’re fine. We’re all fine here, now, thank you. How are you?”
I’m sure that would go over well. Probably as well as it did for Han.
“I uh…”
How should I explain it?
I didn’t want to make it sound like I was under duress and trying to placate somebody holding me at gunpoint. I really didn’t want the cops showing up.
What was the term people use?
“Um… I…”
Should I just say I “butt dialed them?” Would that sound suspicious? How do you “butt dial” the police?
Or what? “Sorry… my phone ‘accidentally’ called you… by itself.”
That sounds SO much better. I’m SURE they wouldn’t send an officer out immediately after hearing that… At all…🙄
But I didn’t want to launch into the whole story about trying to change the volume on my phone and somehow the next thing I knew I was talking to them but maybe I needed to tell the whole story or at least say SOMETHING and it was about here that I realized that I had just not said ANYTHING for an awkwardly long amount of time and that is probably the MOST suspicious thing I could have done…
“I pocket dialed you.”
That’s what I said.
“You ‘pocket-dialed’ us?”
“Yes. I apologize. Sorry about that.”
“So you don’t need any emergency services?”
“No, ma’am. Have a good night.”
I hung up.
How would I rate that exchange? I gave myself a 50/50 chance that a patrol car would be arriving within about 10 minutes.
It wasn’t 10 minutes…
About 15 minutes later, I got a “Ring” alert that “someone is in your driveway.”
OH. GOOD. LORD. 🤦♂️
“LUKE, WE’RE GONNA HAVE COMPANY!” (My son is in a “Star Wars” phase)
I looked around my house to see if things looked like they were amiss.
Would I have to prove “ownership” of my house? Like how police will ask for “license and registration” when they pull you over?
Would they think my kids dialed them? Like I am mistreating them or holding them against their will or something??
Would they think I’m a kidnapper???
As I was thinking that, I thought, I can’t just speak with them on the front porch. I can’t leave the door open because my cat and/or my child will dart straight through it, and I may never find either one of them again.
But I can’t go outside and close the door behind me, because I need to keep an eye on Jonah, and he would probably open the door behind me to see what I was doing and let the cat out and then I would have to chase them both (whilst simultaneously avoiding the police officer who would no-doubt be trying to handcuff me by this point).
The cops would just have to come inside and I would need to shut the door behind them.
…where they would then see that I have a combination-style deadbolt INSIDE my front door. You know, the kind that won’t allow anyone to leave unless they have the combination? 😳
And then directly above that, one of a quarter-dozen security cameras inside my house, pointed just inside the front entrance so I can see any and all activity related to people or animals trying to leave my house?
😳
No sir. Nobody being held against their will here… 🤦♂️
sigh
WHAT IS HAPPENING IN MY LIFE RIGHT NOW? WHY ME?
As I tried to calm my nerves from the panic setting in, I noticed that the white mid-range SUV that had parked in the driveway was not, in fact, a police cruiser and the person approaching my front door was not a law enforcement officer.
It was, in fact, Mama. Just getting off work. Coming home to relax on a Friday night, with lots of goodies from her work party.
😮💨
Should I tell her? Not tell her? 😬
It wasn’t something for her to worry about right? It would be okay. Right? Most likely? Probably?
So I didn’t say anything.
Minutes passed. Hours passed. The cops never came. And before long, I realized they never would.
whew
Do you know how you learn something new everyday?
Some days l learn things about parenthood.
Some days, I learn something new about myself.
Yesterday, I learned that if you push the side button on an iPhone 5 times, it will not change the volume of your Bluetooth headphones at all.
It will, in fact, call the police. 😳🤦♂️
…And if you’re not careful, it might ruin your entire Friday night.
#Ausome