A new area code on the near horizon

It seems telephone sales are doing so well that the phone companies are running out of numbers for the 717 area code, so the Pennsylvania Public Utilities Commission will be adding a 223 area code. Sometime this summer, probably in August, telephone callers in the 717 area will be required to dial all 10 digits including the area code, rather than only seven digits.

If your new neighbor obtains a new number, you may have to remember that 223 is not necessarily on the other side of the region; it’s next door. And the seven-digit number you are dialing is not in some other state. It’s across the street.

Continue reading A new area code on the near horizon

It’s not what you do it with that counts; it’s what you do with it that means everything

Phones and computers I have ownedA fellow columnist wrote last week thanking other kids’ parents for buying their eight-year-olds cell phones. He thought a cell phone to be far down on the list of things an eight-year-old should have to keep track of.

“But dad,” his offspring moaned, “Everybody’s got one.”

My daughter used that line on me once or twice, to which I replied, “I doubt that a lot.”

Sometime after the last time, Daughter was overheard in conversation with a friend who wanted her company going  someplace.

“Everyone’s going,” the friend said. Continue reading …