Cutting back... the land line.

Dh and I have been talking about whether or not we need the land line. It's not horribly expensive- just $40/ month (+ long distance), but dh has been unemployed for ten months and we are looking at cutting back where ever we can.

We set up the answering machine and turned off the ringers. The answering machine comes on and records the message. We have the cell phone and it is our new 'house phone.' We still have the cell because of contract reasons.

When I was a kid we lived in a small mountain community in B.C. and had no running water or electricity. We also had no phone. One of the people further up the mountain had a phone and there was some kind of system where you could use the phone or get messages. If you had an emergency someone would come down and deliver a message. If you wanted to go visit you planned ahead with people or just dropped in. I think people planned better and life wasn't so tightly scheduled.

I'm going to strongly encourage people to e-mail me instead of calling. For more than a decade my mom insisted that she couldn't e-mail because she didn't have time and didn't want to. When she got the answering machine yesterday she e-mailed. If my mom can e-mail me then so can everyone else...

It has been strangely quiet without the phone ringing all the time. I like it! :-)