The Stark County Democrat. [volume] (Canton, Ohio) 1833-1912, 1904-03-01
TALES ABOUT TOWN

There are bowling fiends, finch
fiends, those who go daffy over pedro,
base ball cranks, followers of races,
men and women who think more of
clubs than they do of home. 1t is the
nature of the American people to go
the limit on any fad they take up. But
the most prevalent epidemic just now
is the
Telephone fiend.
Every party line has one of them,
they exist in every nook and corner.
ley are in the stores; in the shops.
They hang about the saloons, can be
found in restaurants. Like the mi
crobe, they are everywhere, and it is
thought that in some instances they
have been found where the microbe
had never penetrated.
The fiend may be a man-married or
single, a girl or a woman. They hang
to the telephone like leeches. The
man always wants a girl or woman at
the other end If the man is old, he
prefers some young woman. II she
happens to be addicted to the use of
the telephone in chronic form the
two will talk for half an hour and say
"a lot Of foolish things that they would
not dare say TO each other face to face.
Especially in the presence of witnesses.
Men talk to other mems wives. and
wives hang on to the machine and talk
TO other women's men. People who
are not acquainted buzz away al each
other as though old friends Looks
have nothing to do with it. 1t is the
voice and the ability to say nice things
that count
Then there are the boys and girls.
They are not bit sillier than the older
ones, but they giggle and simper more.
One end of the conversation is some
thing fierce. Both ends might drive
IA fellow to drink They begin at about
10 and keep it UP until any age
The central girls are annoyed by a
lot of fellows who always want TO talk
to them little while. The conversa-
tion is often broken, as the girl has to
stop every little while to plug in some
wires.
There are the newly married couples
who want to be called up about six
times a day over the phone. This spe-
.cies recover gradually and drift into
N ntl
wives and husbands.
But the worst of o.; is the woman
who is on five or six Larty line, and
who wants to butt in and hear all that
her neighbors are talking about. She
has hard time of it, but she is happy.
She negleCts her work and hangs
around the phone and every time she
hears the bell jingle she gets down the
receiver and listens. She knows that
the persons talking are next, but she
does not care. She is the kind that
can pry into family secrets and dis
close the skeleton in any closet. You
can tell her by the way she keeps
house and the way she Is stunned by
her neighbors. She is the only kind
that is absolutely dangerous and cal
.culated to provoke murder. The
neighbors cannot stop her and the COM
pany does not care to. She is like the
grip, she has to be endured.
Cigarette smokers have been fired out
of the fire department of New York
They are not considered worth their
wages.
Oysters are getting scarce, II is said
Well, the blame things may have mi
crobes in 'em, anyway.
Two robins appeared in the west end
Sunday and attracted more attention
than circus parade. People going
along the street heard their chirp and
to look and admire the first
thing that looked like spring that has
shown UP since last November. The
birds evidently blew I'm with the storm
the night before. They were in good
shape and apparently hungry. After
seeing nothing but English sparrows
lfN,. ~ II.