I remember when the first car phones hit the American streets: my mother and I disparaged them, making fun of the drivers who thought they were so self-important as to need to talk on the phone while driving between work and home. We would mime talking into our outstretched fingers by our ear in mock-severity, and joked that we could buy a rubber banana, attach a phone cord and market it as "Bananaphone: It Has Phone A-peal!" and make a mint.

This was, of course, before my mother had two of her own businesses, and now owns a cell phone, a pager, a voice mail system and six phone lines. Hypocrite.

Me? Well... I now have a cell phone too.

I held out for years, never necessarily needing one, then finally admitting that considering my track record with automobiles, I might actually need one in an emergency. Note I said "emergency" and always intended that to mean if I breakdown or run out of gas or something... the definition slowly loosened to include "I'm running late" or "oh that reminds me to call so-and-so" calls too. But I have not gone so far as my husband. who has a safety-minded earpiece and microphone hook-up which he wears into the house like some Babel fish on a leash.

[Note: If you don't know what a Babel fish is, you are a total loser. Go read Douglas Adams right now. Don't Panic.]

So my point is to warn you that the phone companies have all assumed you have phones and don't plan to provide you with options of their own. Case in point: my trip of insanity.

Truthfully, this was a short trip. (Both literally and figuratively, thank you.) I was meeting with a friend who has obviously succumbed to madness because he believes that publishing an online cartoon strip of my drawings may be a good idea and not throw the universe into abject chaos. That being said, I was thrilled to meet with him and discuss the possibility.

He had sent me directions and I jumped in the car, then promptly got lost and realized I'd never make it to our meeting on time and I was running low of fuel. So, ever the conscientious cell phone driver, I pulled over into a gas station and reached for my cell phone. It wasn't there. Slight panic. (Don't Panic.) Oh yes, now I remember: it was in my other briefcase. Ah well, there's a pay phone here, so I'll just use that.

I pulled over to the phone and suddenly noticed the sharp increase in the cost of pay phone calls: no longer 25 cents or even 50 cents, it was a whopping 70 cents to call the same township. Grumbling a mite to myself, I scraped up the change in my ashtray and plunked it in. I dialed his number and waited. No ringing, no tone. I hung up and a lone nickel dropped out of the change slot. Mildly annoyed, I dialed the operator to either get my change or get connected.

"Hello?" she chirped.
"Hello, I just made a call but I only... "
"Hello?" she repeated.
"Hello? Can you hear me?"
"This is the operator." She identified herself. "Hello?"
"HELLO?!?" I shouted, but she had hung up. So much for this phone.

Fairly miffed, I jumped into the car – now much later than before – and went directly to the next gas station. I walked up to the counter and got change for a dollar, then went straight to the pay phone. Dead. No tone at all.

Now fairly furious, I got back into the car and drove back up the highway, figuring to at least get some more distance between me and this Pay Phone Doom, and possibly a little bit closer to my destination, before trying again. I got off at the proper exit and pulled into the nearest gas station, preparing myself to apologize for running so late but that I was right off the exit and... Dead. No tone at all.

Done. I drove right to the meeting, a half-hour late, and swore up and down that I would have my cell phone from now on. I'm now happy to be one of the bazillion people who now own cell phones because, basically, you're screwed on the highway without one.