Are You Loyal to Your Old Area Code?

Have you moved recently? Is your cell phone still loyal to your old area code? Do you feel the need to get a new number in your new area code?

I ask because as many of you know I moved from my beloved New Jersey and the 732 area code to rural Georgia and the 770 area code in June of 2007. I staunchly refused to change my number when I arrived because I was a Jersey Girl. I'm still a Jersey Girl but I'm getting tired of the funny looks at the doctors office and other places when people ask for my cell number. I don't know why but I feel like by giving up that 732 cell# I am giving up a bit of myself and my rights to go home again. Yeah, I know that's stupid but I like my cell number, I've had it for like 5 years now. If I change I might get an ugly number.

I remember watching Men in Trees last year and the main character, played by Anne Heche, faced a similar decision and it totally resonated with me.

Men in Trees - Episode: Get a Life Area Codes 917 and 646

Annie: Jack, no! A 646, maybe, but a 917? That's vintage, that's class, that's New York City.

The original area code for land lines in New York City/Manhattan was 212. In the 90s, the 917 area code was overlaid in the same area, meaning new numbers, mostly cell phones, were given the 917 area code. In 1999, area code 646 was added. This is why Annie calls 917 vintage. If someone has a 917 area code, it is believed to be more elite because a person had a cell phone before the big wave of technology.

Recent Celebrity Deaths

I was affected and saddened by varying degrees by all of the recent celebrity deaths.

Ed Mc Mahon - was the sidekick to Johnny Carson on the Tonight Show for over 20 years. I have always been a night owl and grew up watching that show. I remember when it was 90 minutes and was upset when they shortened it to only 60 minutes.

His sideline was the Publisher's Clearing House Sweepstakes and like many other Americans I fantasized about the day he would show up at my front door with a BIG check.

Farrah Fawcett - When I was a kid and she was at her peak, she was still Farrah Fawcett-Majors. She was the beautiful, blonde angel that everyone loved. Bonus she was married to the Six Million Dollar Man they were the epitome of the beautiful Hollywood couple.

I probably never gave her the credit she deserved as a dramatic actress; but she had a profound and positive influence on my floundering pubescent self-esteem, for which I am eternally grateful. As a result of that poster in the red one piece swimsuit I stopped being ashamed of my small boobs for which I was teased unmercifully at school and started walking taller and prouder. I rarely got my hair to feather as perfectly as hers did, but I think the gift of self esteem to an adolescent girl is worth far more in retrospect.

Michael Jackson - I literally grew up with his music. I watched the cartoons of the Jackson 5 religiously and I even had the coloring books. From 1976 until now, I don't think I have ever made a mix tape/CD that didn't include at least one of his songs. I think I stopped liking his physical appearance after Thriller. Over the years and his myriad of changes I have chosen to remember MJ as he looked when I first became aware of him. That's the Michael I had a crush on and when I hear ABC, or Rockin' Robin I can shut my eyes and see his sweet, brown, smiling face.

I think Michael Jackson's death makes me the most sad because he was only 7 years older than me and his death reminds me of my own mortality.