Most Embarrassing Cell Phone Moment

(Illustration by Mark Matcho)

Yesterday, I had a job interview for a copywriting position at a large corporate company. Fingers crossed they liked me...

Nokia ad campaign I created and wrote

One of the writing samples in my portfolio always makes me chuckle. It's a campaign I did with Nokia years ago. In addition to writing copy, I worked with the sales team to develop fun promotional packages to pitch to clients. This campaign was one of my personal favorites. Why? Because it actually happened to me.


The online campaign was targeted to females 13-21 and it was basically, "Fess Up About Your Most Embarrassing Cell Phone Experience" and one winner was picked at random providing she sent in a short explanation of her moment.


So here's my story. I was dating this guy, but secretly wasn't feelin' him at all. My parents weren't feelin' him either and I was ready to quit him two months into our relationship. He was a rebound after my college boyfriend decided he was done with me now that we had graduated college.


I remember the night so clearly. I'll never forget it. I was hanging out with a male friend whom I had a big-time crush on. Later that evening, I was to meet up with my annoying boyfriend. However, while with the hottie, I managed to get a flat tire.

Hottie is in a dark parking lot, on the ground fixing my flat while I'm desperately trying to reach annoying guy to break our plans. This was back in the "dial-up days" of the internet and apparently my loser boyfriend was online. Upon hitting redial like a freak for about an hour straight, I began getting frustrated. I flew into a tirade and began spitting out all of these horrible things about the guy I no longer wanted to date.

Finally, the spare tire was set and we were ready to roll. Then it happens ... My cell phone rings. It's loser boyfriend. I'm faking it like, "Oh hi sweetie! I've been trying to reach you." He's very quiet (unlike him) and softly explains that he could swear I called him and that he heard me saying some very cruel things about him. Ouch. My heart stopped. How would I get out of this one?

I used the excuse that I was angry about the flat tire and couldn't reach him all night. I tried to blame him for my embarrassing mishap. Somehow I sweet talked my way to forgiveness and broke up with him a month later. That had to be my most embarrassing cell phone moment.

I'm convinced we've all had them. What's yours?