Everything Is Terrible So Let's Call the Hall & Oates Hotline
/by Amber Fullerton
Image Via Giphy
You know that thing you never knew you wanted or needed? Well, it has arrived, in the form of a Hall & Oates hotline. Hosannas. Appropriately, its moniker is "Callin' Oates," and it is magnificent. Go ahead and try it now. The number is 719-266-2837.
If you foolishly haven't found out for yourself, a pleasant voice greets you and gives you four options for your musical emergency:
Press 1 for "One on One," press 2 for "Rich Girl," press 3 for "Maneater," press 4 for "Private Eyes."
So much nostalgic goodness!
A couple of guys, Michael Selvidge and Reid Butler, originally created this hotline as an app for Twilio but now only the number remains. It is enough. Enough to bring a smile to your face and take you back to your tweenhood in the middle of a dreary workday. Enough to make like Calgon and take you away.
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It's no secret that things have been discouraging, heart-wrenching, and downright outrageous in these United States of late. The presidential campaign has been dragging on (before it has even officially begun) and it has revealed huge swaths of festering racism that some of us had been previously unaware of and some of us were already excruciatingly aware of. Each new gun spree is a little more upsetting, and each officer-involved shooting is a little more enraging. We could all use a little lightness. Not only could it provide you and yours with a much needed musical interlude, it has the potential to be useful in so many ways:
- Give it to sleazy guys in bars instead of 867-5309.
- Use it to look busy in restaurants while waiting for your friends to arrive.
- Reach for it when your MRA coworker is threatening to drive you insane with his mansplaining.
- Diffuse the situation in a coffee shop when political debates threaten to boil over and spread Philadelphian pop love, not hate.
There are hundreds of times the sweet, soulful melodies of Hall & Oates could provide a laugh and a breather. We just need to use this gift that the universe has sent to us. I mean, who doesn't like to listen to some creepily lyric-ed "Private Eyes" every once in a while?!? I think this idea has legs. Spread it around like wildfire. In these times of trouble that try one's soul, have a little Hall. And Oates. Let it refresh your mental faculties. Callin' Oates will always be there for you.
Amber Fullerton spends her days as a tech writer toiling away to make government engineers sound smart. When not working for The Man, she can be found perfecting her liquid liner, drooling over friends' crotchfruit, playing kickball, or drunkenly shopping for fudge on Amazon. A night owl, pixel pusher, and general malcontent, her work can be found on wittybitches.com as well as on comment boards across the internet. She hopes to someday finish her novel, but that will depend on how much spare time is taken up with that whole drunken fudge endeavor.