I remember her telling us growing up how when she was working at Goldblatts after the Christmas season and how the answering machine wasn't working properly and had to call out the phone company due to fact that the message would start out normal and then drrraaaagg and then be normal and then drrraaaagg.   When the phone repair man responded to the call.   He checked out the answering machine,  checked the phone lines,  was dumbfounded because everything was checking normal working order with the exception of the drrraaaagging answering machine,.   He finally asked if they had decorated the office for Christmas ?  Did they have a Christmas tree with lights on it?  Did they have them flashing on and off ?   And they answered YES to all the questions .   He knelt down and unplugged the answering machine removed the flasher plug they had used on the tree and handed over the plug adapter and when they checked the phones answering machine it worked perfectly .   Her and the other individuals who worked worked in the office never told their boss what the actual problem was.   Just that it must have been something related to the phone line because the repair man had fixed the problem .