It's good to talk

Emily loves using the phone; so much so that she has a little book with important phone numbers in that we've said she's allowed to call: Pappous, Auntie Loula, her godfather, her friend Giorgos, and so on.

Sometimes of course she can get a bit enthusiastic, so to avoid the possibility of friends and family becoming too annoyed, we've limited her to one call per person per day. The only exception to this rule is that when she's at Pappous's house she's allowed to phone home if she needs to.

Predictably enough, this is a loophole that she exploits to the maximum - while I was working the other day, I received three calls in the space of half an hour (initially to ask if she and Phoebe could have something to eat, then whether they could watch TV, and finally to tell me some interminable story about what they had been doing together - I zoned out half way through so I don't even know what it was about). Eventually (with a deadline looming) enough was enough I had to tell her not to call me again.

Five minutes later, the phone rang.

Me: "Yes?"

Emily [feebly attempting to disguise her voice]: "Hello, I'm calling from a translation agency and we have 500 words that we want you to translate for tomorrow."

Me: "Very clever Emily! Now stop bothering me."

I hung up.

Three seconds later the phone rang again.

Me [wearily]: "Yes, Emily."

Emily [attempting to disguise her voice again]: "I'm not Emily, I'm from the phone company and you owe us 10,000 euros, please."

Me: "Ten thousand euros, eh? That's a lot of money, madam. I'm not sure where I'm going to get such a large amount from... [pause] Tell you what, how about instead of paying the bill I just give you my eldest daughter. She must be worth something!"

There was a squeal of panic, the sound of the phone being dropped, and then the line went dead.

And there were no more phone calls after that!