Ballard Street by Jerry Van Amerongen for March 27, 2021

The ‘smart’ phone zombie apocalypse has hit Ballard Street.

I remember when the phones were bigger.

Thank God “Push to Talk” is no longer popular.

Thankfully we no longer have those antennas on our phones….oh. it’s Ballard…yeah.

And they’re all on a conference call with each other.

People talk on those?

Some quick googling seems to indicate that there are still pay phones around, or were as recently as a couple of years ago. Maybe COVID concerns have made people leery of the few that were left.

I don’t know if any of them are still housed in booths, though.

Listening to others conversations is the most annoying thing in public places…and WHY. Are they YELLING?

Easy to forget that the original publication date of this comic was February 19th, 2004.

Now it looks like Van Amerongen was just drawing reality…

but the scene pictured hadn’t happened yet.

If he was so prescient…

Can we hope that the other scenes he draws of the happy life on Ballard Street are also on the way?

Yep

While traveling I was in a very nice cafe having breakfast, but was seated towards the back where a local group of 2 meter amateur radio enthusiasts liked to gather every morning and play with their handheld radios, with the speakers turned up. It was quite annoying but I said nothing until I paid the bill at the cashier. She said that they liked to meet for coffee every day and she didn’t think anyone objected. Several months later I was back in the area and found the cafe closed and out of business.

Hey! I just had an idea for a new mask!

(^ ͜ʖ^)

Ballard St has finally caught up to the rest of America.. well almost, America now texts but still progress

’04 edition

I saw an old New Yorker cartoon: an empty phone booth with a sign “Quiet place to talk – 25 cents”.

Oooooohhhh, yeah!

Internet cafe.

Almost 20 years old and very prophetic!