The phone booth

[Matt Deckard]

These are the ones in Phillipe's in LA.

Old school and wood. There aren't many phone booths around LA nowadays.

Superman would use them to change. Clark Gable would use them to tell off his editor (it Happened One Night). And I use them to call MK.

If you have pics of ones around you... even the red boxes some of you Brits use... a few pics of yourselves using them I think would look pretty spiffy.

Show us your booths.

 

[MDFrench]

My father brought a fully restored British phonebooth back from England in the early 1990s after we came back from living there. It is now in the finished basement of my parents' home. Needless to say, I have asked it be willed to me in the years to come. My father also owns a London Taxi, but that's in storage right now...

I'll get pics of the phonebooth soon.

Mike

 

[mysterygal]

It's too bad they're so few and far between, it's nice to have a phone conversation with a little privacy...I don't think there's any around where I live, cool photo by the way

 

[Vladimir Berkov]

What is this "phone booth" you speak of?

 

[Marc Chevalier]

Here in L.A., the Jonathan Club still has its carved oak telephone booths from the 1920s. Club members and guests are not allowed to do two things within the building: have cash in hand, and make or receive cell phone calls. No cash, because everything is charged to a member's account. No cell phones, because they're disruptive. Members and guests MUST go into the old phone booths and close the doors if they want to make or receive calls.

 

[Shaul-Ike Cohen]

One should provide booths for users of mobiles in restaurants and the like, maybe with jotting down facilities. Can you see the picture of a queue of nervous people with switched-off mobiles waiting in front of an occupied empty booth?

 

[Marc Chevalier]

Can you see the picture of a queue of nervous people with switched-off mobiles waiting in front of an occupied empty booth?

That would be bad news for Superman.

 

[RedPop4]

I'll have to bring my digital the next time I go to the old bowling alley my kids like. It still has at least one.

 

[Shaul-Ike Cohen]

Now really, what does Superman do now that mobile phones replace booths?

 

[RedPop4]

There would be more if Underdog didn't go around blowing them up all the time.

 

[silhouette53]

There aren't many phone booths around LA nowadays.

If you have pics of ones around you... even the red boxes some of you Brits use...

Unfortunately, here in the UK the once familiar red phone boxes became a 'thing of the past' many years ago and were replaced with characterless parodies in aluminium and perspex. :eusa_doh: However ....... even these have diminished drastically since the rise of the dreaded cell phone and here in the City of Birmingham I really couldn't say how many there are - or even where they are !!! Yes, I'm a cell phone user too [huh] though in my defense I have to say I use less than £10 per month in calls on the thing. ( US$17 ) I find them intrusive and have mine on silent most of the time.

Its real difficult to be detached from the modern world - I love retro stuff and appreciate the quality of older things compared with the junk we get in todays 'throwaway' society.

 

[Marc Chevalier]

I once met a guy who got rich selling the old red British phone boxes all over the world. He had warehouses full of them. Sent them to such faraway places as Chile and Argentina, where British-style "pubs" used them for decoration.

 

[Shaul-Ike Cohen]

Yes, I'm a cell phone user too [huh] […]

Its real difficult to be detached from the modern world - I love retro stuff and appreciate the quality of older things compared with the junk we get in todays 'throwaway' society.

Maybe what you're looking for is this:

Probably easier for women who carry a handbag than for men taking it out of their jackets, though the fun effect would even be greater.

And get a r-r-rrring ringtone! I found one somewhere on the 'net (actually, it's a British-style r-r-rrring-r-r-rrring), but you can easily record one yourself on the computer for most newer 'phones.

 

[Vanessa]

Well, it's not a picture of me, but here's the only booth photo I have.

[

 

[16_sparrows]

I do wish public phones were more prevelant because I would surely get rid of my cell phone if that was the case. I barely use it and really see it as quite a bother. They still have a few in the EL stations in Chicago since cell phones don't get reception underground.

One should provide booths for users of mobiles in restaurants and the like, maybe with jotting down facilities. Can you see the picture of a queue of nervous people with switched-off mobiles waiting in front of an occupied empty booth?

They actually have something like this in Japan - a cell phone silence chamber...if you will. Talking on your cell phone in public in Japan is considered extremely rude so many places offer a zone where people can talk on their phone and their jabber is "blocked" from public. I'm still waiting for when they do something like this in the US. I'm happy to see that cafes and shops are starting to have "no cell phone" rules.

I once met a guy who got rich selling the old red British phone boxes all over the world. He had warehouses full of them. Sent them to such faraway places as Chile and Argentina, where British-style "pubs" used them for decoration.

An apartment building near me uses it as the call box to get buzzed into the building. Such a creative way to use it! Perfect too because then you don't hear "Yes, Who's there?" crackling on a speaker when you are trying to eat lunch in the cafes that surround it.

 

[Marc Chevalier]

I believe that a 10-ton phone box should drop down from the sky and flatten every person that uses his/her cell phone in a movie theater or concert hall.

 

[Shaul-Ike Cohen]

I'm not against mobiles in general, though I see that most calls are void of any meaning, even on the level of communication for communication.

I don't understand why people must shout into their cell phones, but otherwise, what's the difference between two people that chat in a caf?©, and one person who chats on the 'phone? The difference is only there when you at the next table are listening, and why should you?

 

[Tony in Tarzana]

It's generally the volume of the speech that's the problem. It is beyond me why people feel the need to shout into the damn things, when they're an inch from the face.

Perhaps it's the lack of sidetone? I dunno.

 

[Matt Deckard]

I'm still getting used to people using Blue Tooth. They look like they are talking to themselves.

Now a cell phone booth... that's an idea. Cone of silence.

I'm guilty of talking on my phone in public places... it goes with the hat.

 

[KAT]

well Matt...you know the place where another phone booth is hiding lol