The Answering Machine

Some people have extremely long voice messages on their mobile mail box or answering machine. Not me. I have none. And I am always upset when someone else´s voice message after a zelaous introduction explains the obvious to me, that I can leave a message after the beep.
On his hand, his friends complained how short and dry his voice message was. “I am not there”, without an explanation nor a promise to follow up the received call with another call. “That´s just plain rude!” they kept on telling him. But the truth was the reset button was stuck and there was nothing he could do now to exchange the already programmed voice message despite regretting it. And so, he is forced to sit longer and longer next to the phone to be able to answer every incomming call. He has been living a very strange life ever since.