Voice mail is so 20th century

Not long ago, I realized something about myself. I hate voice mail. Not just the voice mails you get at work, but voice mails at home and ESPECIALLY voice mails on my personal cell phone. I hate voice mails at home because they're not private: everyone in the room (or the whole house, for that matter) can hear your mammogram results, or that you have a doctor's appointment at 3:30pm on Tuesday. I hate voice mails at work because I want people to just email me if they need me - I have a Blackberry and am constantly checking my emails, so that is really the best way to reach me during the work day. And I hate voice mails on my personal cell phone because I can never remember my password, and because it always makes me listen to all the saved voice mail messages (all the way through) before I can listen to the new messages. Grr.

I've got caller ID on all three phones. I can tell when someone is trying to call me, and generally speaking, if I don't answer the first time, there's a good reason: 1) I'm asleep; 2) I'm in a meeting; 3) I'm out of range; 4) I'm someplace where I have to mute or turn off my phone, or 5) #4 happened and then I forgot to unmute or turn it back on.

Despite my loathing of voice mail, I totally dig text messaging. If you want to reach me on my personal cell phone, and you really want a response fast, this is the way to do it. I LV TXT MSGNG!!! OMG!!! i don't even mind anymore when people don't start their sentences with capital letters or capitalize the "i" in i. 

When I was in North Carolina a few weekends ago, my nephew and I were talking about pet peeves, and he said: "I hate it when people leave voice mails." I was, like, "Me, too!" So it seems that I'm not the only one. Maybe hating voice mail has a genetic component? 

Perhaps he and I should create an outgoing message that says: "Please do not leave a message at the sound of the tone." :-)