DEAR ABBY: I would like to share my mother's method of handling an obscene phone call. She became feeble and hard-of-hearing several years before she died. The telephone was one of her main luxuries and necessities. We live in a rural area, and obscene calls were unusual.
I returned from work one afternoon and went to check on her. With a gleeful voice, she announced, "I got an obscene phone call last night." Shocked, I asked, "Mama, what did you do?" She said it took her a few minutes to realize what the young man was saying. Then she started preaching -- book, chapter and verse.
Mama was a saintly soul with a great working knowledge of the Bible. After several minutes, the man yelled at her, "Hey, lady, you're supposed to shut up and let me do the talking!" She retorted, "No, boy, I have a lot of things to say that you need to hear!"
In a disappointed tone she added, "... and then he hung up on me." To my knowledge, she never received another obscene phone call. -- MISSING MAMA IN LOUISIANA
DEAR MISSING: This is a topic that seems to have taken on a life of its own. I hope your dear mama's preaching put the caller on the right path. At least it made him think again before dialing her number.