Cell phone ring or ice cream truck passing by?

An ice cream truck just passed through the campground. As it passed, the ice cream man eyed my campsite, probably looking for a kid. When I first heard his truck's jingle I reached for my cell phone to answer it. I do that all the time when I hear jingles, whether on the radio, on a CD, or from another person's cell phone. This wasn't the first time I tried to answer an ice cream truck. Too many things ring nowadays. We are a society of ringing things.

I don't know how that ice cream man sleeps. That jingle must go through his head over and over long after he parks his truck, even at night in bed. You can't just put a pillow over your head and make a tune go away! Maybe he changes the jingle throughout the day to help keep a single song from getting stuck in his head -- that would make sense. If you are an ice cream man (or woman), please email me and tell me if you change your tune.

A lot of people are forced to listen to the same thing over and over. At my local grocery store, many customers use the self-checkout. A voice tells you what to do. After you scan an item, a female voice says "Please put the item in the bag." I have always wondered if it's a real or a computer voice. If it's real, then I would like to meet the voice to put a face to it. Not much chance of that, I don't think.

A lone grocery checker monitors all eight self checkout stations. "Please put the item in the bag," repeats over and over, all day, probably a thousand times in one checker's shift.

When the checker goes home, he or she probably just crashes in a comfy chair to zone-out after a day of standing up and being nice to people. I bet "Please put the item in the bag" goes through the checker's head. That would be awful. It would drive me nuts.