I hope this will not get me banned, but I want to talk about a few conspiracies relating to Area Codes "910" and "913". When I was a kid, area codes were very predictable. They were three digits. The first number was "2" through "9". The second number was ALWAYS a "0" or a "1". The third number could be any digit as long as the last two weren't "11".
Since phones were all rotary – yeah, there was once a time when you actually had to DIAL the number – having a "1" for the second digit was better than having a "0". Thus, New York City got the "best" area code - - "212". Alaska, not surprisingly, got one of the worst "907" – but Sarah Palin is trying to change that.
Now, there’s no conspiracy whatsoever around "907". I mean Alaska was just an icy wasteland when the old area codes were assigned. Why would you give a sexy area code like "312" to a state where no one ever sheds their parkas – except, perhaps, for those enrolled in abstinence-only programs?
But "910" and "913" are a different story. You may think this is not an important issue, but for many it has been a source of constant heartbreak. For example: You live in Topeka. You mom lives in Topeka. Your grandma lives in Topeka. For as long as you can remember, the areas code had always been "913" – not a great areas code, but a normal one. Then, without any citizen input, the phone company tells you that the new area code is going to be "785". What kind of area code is "785"? What’s worse, Kansas City got to keep "913". We all know about the corruption in Kansas City. From the days of the Pendergast Machine, Kansas City has been corrupt, corrupt, corrupt. I would not be surprised if someone pulled an inside job to keep the "913" area code in Kansas City and stick the hard-working, rural folks of Kansas with "785". It’s scandalous!
And you will be shocked to learn the story behind "910". I lived through it – and let me tell you, it was harrowing. Well, I really didn’t live through it since I had already moved from North Carolina to Wyoming, but my parents did. You see, we had a perfectly good area code in Winston-Salem – "919". Then back in the early 1990s, the phone company told us that they were going to create the "new" area code "910". This wasn’t too bad, since "910" was a normal area code. Not surprisingly, they let Raleigh-Durham keep "919". But there was the extra work required to reach all the way to the "0" on the dial – rather than just to the "9". When you multiply the number of people by the number of calls made – it comes to millions of kilojoules. But wait, there’s more! Only four years later, they changed it again. This time to "336". What a perfectly ghastly area code. It ruined my address book.
And these are just TWO examples. I’m sure that there are many more that careful research will uncover. I think that if you were to do a multivariate analysis about who got to keep the "good" area codes, you would find that the rich and powerful always win out. Maybe Lily Tomlin can help.
I'm mad as hell and I'm not going to take this anymore!!!