Phone Phun

Pacific Bell SBC AT&T has announced that the phone numbers that tell the time will be discontinued later this month. The "Time of Day information service" has been in available in Nevada and California since the 1920s. AT&T says the 1960s equipment used is failing, and no replacement parts are available. (I guess it's beyond their tech savvy to hook up something new with a $199 PC.)

In some areas, the phone number for time is POPCORN; in the LA area it is 853-1212. Because the entire 767 and 853 exchanges are devoted to the time service taking the service down will free up some 300,000 phone numbers.

A funny quote from an LA Times article on the subject: "In the 1950s, a woman named Mary Moore emerged as the nation's leading time-teller. Her reading of hours, minutes and seconds was delivered in a distinctive if somewhat prissy tone. Moore's odd pronunciation of the numbers 5 ("fiyev") and 9 ("niyun") influenced a generation of operators, much as flying ace Chuck Yeager's West Virginia drawl is said to have been adopted by innumerable airline pilots."

Sure, there are a bazillion other ways to find out the time now, but dialing for the time is a, uh, time-honored tradition.

You can still call (303) 499-7111 to get the time from the National Institute of Standards and Technology's atomic clock.

Have a question about nutrition? Members of the Professional Order of Dietitians of Quebec (actually, Ordre professionnel des dietetistes du Quebec) will be available to answer questions about diet and health — today only from 9AM-4:30PM Eastern time. The number is 1-866- 233-3310.

Keep an eye out for 1-800-YellowPages from AT&T. It's currently only available in Bakersfield, CA; Oklahoma City, OK; and Columbus, OH, but they're expanding soon.

According to the (surprisingly crappy) web site, it's "a new service offered by AT&T that provides free access to directory listings with a few touches to the phone keypad…Consumers get free access to directory listings while letting advertisers reach potential buyers at a critical moment of their purchasing decisions."

1-800-YellowPages: that's 800-935-5697… uh… -2437.

Tell Me (covered before here) has entered the free directory assistance market. The service says that it can find the phone number of any business in America for free.

Call 1-800-555-TELL (8355) and say "Business Search". You can then say the name of a particular business that you're looking for, or say the type of business that you want — such as "pizza" — to find options in your geographic area. You can optionally have Tell Me send you the company's phone number and address via text message.

Ready to stop smoking, chewing, and otherwise imbibing tobacco? The 1-800-QUIT-NOW hotline offers telephone tobacco counseling and tips. It will also direct you to your local state's tobacco quit line: many states offer free nicotine patches and in-person counseling sessions.

Dialing 1-700-555-4141 will tell you which company is your long distance carrier. Dialing 1-your area code-700-4141 will tell you which company provides your local toll service (oxymoronically known as "local long distance".)

"Oh no! The wine! The red wine! The red wine on my shirt! The red wine all over my new white shirt! Oh, what shall I do? Whomever should I call? Alas, alack, woe is me!"

Don't fret, poor soul, help is just a phone call away thanks to "Dr. Laundry's Stain Hotline", a series of recorded messages that tell how to deal with holiday-related stains including gravy, cranberry sauce, coffee, chocolate, pumpkin pie, soup, eggnog, and lipstick.

Remember the great living room eggnog disaster of aught-three? Heavens be praised that we won't see a problem of that magnitude ever again, thanks to Dr. Laundry's Stain Hotline, and the good people at Clorox.

The number is 1-877-STAIN-411 (1-877-782 4641).

So we covered the Buttterball turkey hotline, the other day, but it turns out that Butterball doesn't corner the market on Turkey Day info via phone.

The Perdue chicken/turkey company has a consumer help line at (800) 473-7383, and Foster Farms offers an automated Turkey Helpline at (800) 255-7227. Reynolds (the aluminum foil company) has a Turkey Tips Hotline at (800) 745-4000 (automated, running 24/7.) And the U.S. Department of Agriculture also offers a Meat and Poultry Hotline, at (888) MPHOTLINE (or:(888) 674-6854).

And if something goes horribly awry with your cranberries, call the Ocean Spray consumer help line at (800) 662-3263.

Everyone should commit to memory the number of the national poison center hotline number: 1-800-222-1222. There is actually a network of 65 poison centers around the US. When you call that number, you'll be prompted to enter your ZIP code and you'll be connected to your regional hotline.

There's also a hotline for poisoned animals: Kansas State University's College of Vet Med runs an animal poison center hotline at 785-532-5679. If you think your animal has been poisoned, an on-call veterinarian is available to help.

Need to talk turkey? Butterball's free turkey talk-line is available daily (including most weekends) through December 25, at 1-800-BUTTERBALL. During operating hours (8AM CST through 6PM or 8PM CST), live operators are available to help you through prepping and cooking your bird. Outside of those hours, recorded info can guide you. And yes, they're open on Thanksgiving. The complete schedule is here.

Gobble gobble.