How to bail on a bad blind date

Conversations lags. You watch the clock on your cell phone. Your palms are sweaty, not due to the flush of new love but because you're anxious to ditch the loser blind-date sitting across the table from you, or even worse, the guy/girl getting up in your Personal Space.

Hallelujah, praise the Lord, your phone rings! You're safe to retreat into a corner and then bail out with an excuse of "my grandma's real sick" or "my sister just had her baby."

I feel for you bad-blind-date-prone relationship hoppers, but I cannot sympathize. Every friend who has offered to set me up on a date never actually followed through. A tragedy I suppose (you can't see my blissful grin now because I write for a newspaper, but I promise, it's there). But if you are one of the blessed, or one of the cursed, who constantly gets fixed up on dates by your Aunt Dee then Cingular Wireless' new "Escape-a-Date" cell phone feature is marketed to you.

Not that I believe anyone would actually drop their cell phone carrier and switch to Cingular because of this shameless pander to Generation Y. All you youngsters would rather cut off your right hand than turn off your phone during dinner. And you'd rather lie to your date than come right out and tell the truth: "Sorry, your mere presence makes me want to heave, do you mind if I leave now?"

Come on, how hard is that? Our society prizes the mask of deception rather than the fresh face of honest confrontation.

And so ends my rant. But, if you are one of those people who would go through the hassle of switching plans just to perfect a lie aimed at some hopeless ex-band geek then allow me to give you the entire spiel.

Cingular Wireless "goes where no other wireless carrier has dared to tread with 'Escape-a-Date,' one of several new options that are part of the company's Voice Connect line of information services."

That was painful. The new service allows you to schedule a "rescue phone call at a pre-set time." The recorded messages actually coach you on what to say for your date to "accidentally overhear."

Other features include a wake-up call, joke of the day or trivia. I have an idea, maybe the recorded messages can also tell me how to lie to my boss when I miss a deadline.

"My cell phone ate my story, I swear!"

Visit Cingular at www.cingular.com and tell them about my good idea.

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My housemate Sarah uses Jafra skin care products and she loves them. They cost a pretty penny, so she only uses them after Christmas, following the yearly gifting from her aunt. But if you go crazy with the skin care and beauty products, Jafra recently announced Dayton woman Tanya Benitez as a new manager.

Contact the company at www.jafra.com or 1-800-551-2345.

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Back to the cell phones. Phos International, based in Sparks, is collecting used and broken cell phones at area coffee houses. The phones will be refurbished into usable phones and spare parts and sent to South American countries and sold there. So, yet again, people overseas get our left-overs. Actually, the money raised from selling these phones will be used to buy food, medicine and clothing to be shipped to the Congo. In Carson City you can drop your cell phone off at Starbucks, 3228 N. Carson St. For more information call 775-342-5191.

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Virginia City Convention and Visitors Authority commissioned local artist Kitty Bonnie to create a series of wood panel cut-outs where visitors can take interactive photos depicting Virginia City venues and tourism attractions.

The camel panel is at the visitor's center, 86 S. C St. The train is at the train depot on F Street and a cut-out Mark Twain is outside the Piper's Opera House, 12 N. B St. I'm sure the kids will love that one.

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To mark the occasion of my first column for the Nevada Appeal I will announce that some of my best friends are ex-band geeks.

Contact Becky Bosshart at bbosshart@nevadaappeal.com or 881-1212.