Oops!

I insulted someone tonight...and they let me know!

I'll start at the beginning. I'd had a couple of phone calls from call centres tonight...regardless of the fact that I have registered with the Government's "Do Not Call" register. I have a phone with an LCD and either the phone number of the caller comes up, or if it's a silent number (ex directory) the word "private" comes up. The majority of call centre calls come up as "private", as did the particular call I'm going to tell you about.

This was the third call of the evening that came up on the screen as private. I picked up the phone and said hello and there was silence...which also happens with call centre calls, especially if it's a computer generated call. So I said something rude and hung up. The phone rang again immediately, and I let it go through to Message Bank.

After a few minutes, out of curiosity, I lifted the receiver to check if a message had gone through. It had, it had the distinctive dial tone sound that indicates a message is left. I thought it may have been my daughter as she has a silent number and knows I won't pick up. I dialled the Message Bank number and this male voice says, "Thanks very much for hanging up on me. I really, really appreciated that. I'll ring you back later."

I'm now totally mystified. I don't know the voice. I replayed the message and couldn't get the name of the caller, but I'm not even sure if he left one. I rang my daughter and told her what happened and she went into gales of laughter. It's obviously someone who knows my number because they immediately called straight back. Unless, of course, they originally misdialled and then hit redial.

I'm not sure whether to feel embarrassed or not...if it was someone I knew, I probably would be embarrassed but at least, if I knew who it was, I could ring back and apologise. But I haven't a clue! Curiouser and curiouser...