Please cough into the mike

“Hello, doctor,”

“This is a recording. Doctor Crandell is away now. Give your name, phone number and symptoms. Doctor Crandell will call you back when he returns. Thank you…”

“ I’m Harry Kranowitz. Riverside 6-1800. I’m running a very high temperature, I’ve got pains in the head, chest, and I’m coughing a lot. I feel very bad.”

Harry went to bed. He had been sleeping for some time when the telephone rang. He got up and went to the living room.

“Hello?”

“This is a recording. Dr. Crandell is still away. Your symptoms however seem to show flu for which you should take aspirins every four hours, eat lightly and drink juice. Dr. Crandell will call you back when he comes. Thank you.”

Harry looked at the phone for a few seconds, coughed and slowly went to the kitchen. He took a bottle of juice, two aspirins and went to bad. He couldn’t sleep. He had a terrible cough and he felt that his temperature was still very high. We went to the phone and called the doctor again. As the doctor was still away Harry’s symptoms were recorded for the second time.

Sometime later the telephone rang again:

“This is a recording. You have nothing more serious than flu. If you follow the instructions which were given to you earlier you should be better by morning. Thank you.”

Harry went to the kitchen, took some whiskey and went to bed. Some time later the doctor himself called him.

“Listen, Kranowitz. Your symptoms show flu for which you should take two aspirins every…”.

Harry put down the receiver and went to bed.

A week later he got a bill in the mail for $10 from Dr. Crandell. He was sure that the bill had been made out by the computer.