Foiled!

Do you ever get phone calls on your regular phone from a fax machine? And someone has programmed her/his fax machine to resend until transmission is successful, which means your phone rings repeatedly and all you hear is fax whine? And ultimately, you begin shrieking into the phone, “I’M NOT A FAX MACHINE, DAMN IT!” Even though such shrieking is useless.

Sometimes you can outfox the machine and forward your number to an actual fax machine where you know a person who will receive it for you. That person will provide you with the sender’s phone number, enabling you to call and shriek at someone who can actually hear you. Or you can be nice and calmly say, “Your fax is not being delivered because you have the wrong number.” Which option you choose is totally up to you.

Unfortunately, that solution doesn’t always work with all fax machines. But tonight, I thought I would finally get satisfaction. After getting two fax calls, I connected the fax machine that my brother sent me a while back. This requires some strange logistics (I live in an old house, and it’s not always easy to find a phone jack and an electrical outlet near each other), but I knew it would be worth it. At last I could call Mystery Faxer and tell him or her to STOP FAXING MY DAMN PHONE. (It’s clear which option I’d choose, huh?)

But the sender’s fax machine quit trying after two attempts.

Bastard.