Funny answering machine messages?

[HEyHEY]

My friend has one that always cracks me up. It goes;

"Yello......... do you know who this is?......... I don't know how to put this.... but I'm kind of a big deal....... I have many leather-bound books and my apartment smells of mohagany..... so..... leave a message.

[taterguy]

1. some old friends of mine used this one

Hi, we're having a dinner party and if we wanted to talk to you, you would have been invited

[JohnKleeb]

2. You're friends with Ron Burgandy?

Uh nothing really to compare but the funny ones for me are they have music in the background and you can't even tell its a message.

[HEyHEY]

6. Is that from the movie?

[JohnKleeb]

7. Yep

It sure is.

[LeftyMom]

3. The best one I ever heard was the family's two kids arguing over who would

answer the phone. They had to change it though, because it was too realistic and people kept yelling into the answering machine for the kids to stop fucking around and give the phone to thier mother. :D

[HarukaTheTrophyWife]

4. I accidentally had one saying I was out of the country for months.

When I went backpacking in Ireland, I changed my voicemail to say, "Hey you've reached Jackie's cell phone, but Jackie is in a foreign country right now, so leave a message and she might get back to you eventually." Well, I totally forgot about it, until around three months later when I got this message from work...

"Look, we know you're in the country. You've been back in the country for awhile. Stop pretending you're not in America and answer your phone and let me know if you can come into work early today. We all know that you're done wandering around across the Atlantic. You're sitting in your house in NJ, so call us back."

Personally, I'm amazed I managed to make it that long without anybody making a single comment about the message. Also, I think the greatest feeling in the world is being alone in a place you've never been to before; where you have absolutely no plans at all and no one has any method of contacting you. I need to go wander around Europe again. My parents said they half-expected me to not be at the airport when they went to get me.

[NewWaveChick1981]

5. I haven't heard any yet that I thought were worth a damn

Cutesy with or without songs or whatever... just let me leave a message! :grr: In my line of work, I've had to leave messages for people who had godawful greetings they thought were just great or really cute or clever. Nope, none of them ever have been. One time, there was the five-year-old speaking kid gibberish, and the message would NEVER END...; another time, a family with a nautical name decided it would be hilarious to sing Anchors Aweigh, and it was painful; yet another time, a woman played a very loud gospel song in the background while she was trying to record her greeting. Just leave well enough alone---say "I can't get to the phone. Please leave me a message." Not cutesy or original, but it's far less annoying than the ones I've encountered. :mad:

The funniest one I've heard was the one on Seinfeld when George recorded the "Greatest American Hero" tune with his own lyrics... "Believe it or not, George isn't at home..." (That one was funny because I didn't run into it at work! :rofl: )

[Oeditpus Rex]

8. Yeah, I used to get pretty elaborate

with outgoing messages. When machines used full-size tape, I'd even do overdubs and stuff. Some people found them funny the first time, but some didn't, and I doubt they were funny after you'd heard 'em once — just long.

Now I just say, "Oops, missed me. Leave a message."

[NewWaveChick1981]

9. That's short, sweet, and to the point!

Everyone, including my elderly in-laws, knows what an answering machine or voice mail is for these days, and all of us are usually in a hurry, so it makes sense to make greetings as concise as possible. :)

[Oeditpus Rex]

10. Just as importantly

it reveals nothing about who I am or where I am.

[SacredCow]

11. I used to do that kind of thing...

but now my work lines roll into my personal lines after hours and on the weekend, so I keep it professional.

[calico1]

12. I hang up on any cutesy answering machine

messages. My own is short and to the point. I just don't find them cute or entertaining.

[skygazer]

13. I'm a purist

I have to make phone calls for work a lot and it's just annoying to get some cutesy or "funny" message that I have to listen to before I can do my job.

My message is the canned message that came with the machine - "Please leave a message after the tone" in a robotic voice. I like it because only those who actually know me know it's really my machine and it has no identifying traces whatsoever.

[kay1864]

14. A friend had one that was just

"Hello?"

(caller thinks he's answered, and starts talking. Then)

"Hello? (pause) Hello? (pause) "

(at this point the caller thinks the connection is bad. Then)

"Naw, I'm not here, this is the machine. Leave a message, thanks"

[Nicholas D Wolfwood]

15. I used to do that.

Pissed people off to no end! I loved it!! :rofl:

[bbernardini]

16. My favorite I used to have had no actual message...

Just the big key change at the end of Whitney Houston's version of "I Will Always Love You" (from the big snare hit when she starts belting), with me screaming "oh god...no! Please, no! <various pained screams>".

This was when I was in college, obviously.

[Sannum]

17. My message is minimalist to the extreme

The recording came with the phone. It is a recording of a robot that sounds like the voice on the subway saying "Hello. No one is available to take your call. Please leave a message after the tone" BEEP.

I don't like talking into machines. Even to record a message.

[Aristus]

18. I admit to doing a cutesy message once or twice.

One time I recorded a greeting on my machine that went like this: "Hi, this is Bob's refrigerator; the answering machine is on vacation. Just leave me a message and I'll stick it to myself with a magnet"

Beeeeeeep!

B-)

[MissB]

19. My kids accidentally recorded one once.

Took me about a week to figure it out. I was lecturing them on why they couldn't throw themselves or other objects down the new three-story laundry chute. Actually, they'd just thrown a full diaper down the laundry chute and I was pretty pissed at them. I don't get pissed that easily. One of them accidently hit the record button as I was lecturing them.

So people would call me and hear me lecturing my kids as to why they couldn't throw full diapers down the chute.

[WritingIsMyReligion]

22. !

:rofl::rofl::rofl::rofl::rofl::rofl::rofl:

[NewJeffCT]

20. I knew one guy

Who left a message that sounded like it was from "Conan the Barbarian" or the Hercules TV show with Kevin Sorbo... pounding music, dramatic voice starting with "Many years ago..." and I can't for the life of me remember the rest of it. But, we used to call the guy just to get his answering machine to prove we weren't kidding about the message.

[ThomCat]

21. For years mine just said,

"you know what to do, and when to do it." <beep>

[WritingIsMyReligion]

23. My grandparents' message used to be damned funny:

It was my grandfather, an actor, speaking in this deep stage tone: "You have reached....the XXX residence...."

I'd laugh my ass off everytime I heard it.