Mark, if you re-read my post, I never asked his technical help, he is at least 24 years old, with a maximum of 1 or 2 years of overall experience. He needs 20 more technical years of heavy learning, hard working and reading, before I would dare to ask him any help at all. I was just polite enough to explain him what I was looking for, I never asked him if the phone wire would work... I have experience enough to know what will and what will not work. He intercepted my intentions trying to shut down my plans. My line of questions was just to show him that he knows nothing about it, and trying to get the direction to the coiled phone line shelve... he failed in this job too. First of all, I would never choose to work in something I don't know all about, If I need to do it, I will never try to compete knowledge with a stranger. Fast as a bullet I would try to learn about my job, day and night, weekends, drink it, sleep on it, eat it if necessary, until I could recognize that I really know what I am talking about. I am pretty sure, that the boy did learn nothing from today's experience, he doesn't even got curious to find out an AWG wire specs, I doubt if he knows what AWG means. That store sells electro/electronic devices and components, not shoes, not bread, not flowers. And Mark, I am tired to try to excuse ignorance as being a human sociologic nature to be stupid, it is not anymore, we can not compare ourselves to cattle anymore. We have zillions of ways to learn, and whole ignorance is not accepted easily. We are turning the millennium, and some people just don't know what to do when you call them and say "Can you give me the fax signal please?" Ignorance is just a stamp in the guy's front that says... "I am stupid enough to live the way I do just because I am alive and this is my destiny, I never asked to born"... Be smart and have some knowledge is not a gift, it is not something you born with, it is a plain and simple choice. A person that works with electronics can decide between watch MTV channel or finally read and understand how a FET transistor works, and there is a lot difference between both choices... duh... that difference can make that person grab a nice job in the future, or then, just make part of a group that make use of 10 words to all possible communication... "duh, super cool, dude!" There are a bunch of people that take it seriously, they study, they learn as much as they can, they put all their life to make the life of everyone better, for money or not. Because their effort, we have VCR's, TV, Radio, Cars, Air Conditioned, MicroWave, Light and zillions of things more...doing what? to turn the life of dumb people better, the same people that call those scientists and engineers crazy and make jokes with their knowledge and dedication. It looks like that we have two kinds of human species on the planet, the ones who really took care of things, and the other bunch that just lay down and live as cattle. Guess which group was responsible for Penicillin, Anesthesia, Medicine, Engineering, Technology, GPS satellite orientation, and more. Those engineers and scientists did not born that way... sooner or later they just decided that life is something bigger to spend being stupid, and then dig into years of reading and learning. About your comments: If you can find some circuit I can not understand, I will be the first one to recognize and ask how it works. This is the only way to learn, and nobody will mock me for asking, but they will mock me for faking knowledge. Nobody can *guess* how to do a brain surgery, it must be part of a learning experience. Be a teacher? in real I love to do that, I did it for years, and still doing, but the word "teacher" implies something else, that there must be students, at least somebody that wants to learn, with a *learning* attitude. Yes, I projected and built modems in 1976 and still producing remote equipment that use telephone lines. I was the first one to show a project about home automation via Internet 6 years ago (my company is just releasing the system), and up to now IBM still using a portable device I developed in 1985 to help in locate problems in telecommunication links SDLC, HDLC, X25 and so on, named EDTP. I can say I understand a little bit about phone lines, No, I don't laugh at questions, mainly from the simple and innocent ones posted here... people who does that has the courage to expose their lack of knowledge and they are yelling for help, we MUST help them at any cost...they deserve it. I never left one simple question in my e-mail reader without an answer, lots of people recognizes that, in this and other forums also. I laugh yes, when somebody saw water by the first time in a bottle and try to look more important than others doing a fowl explanation about the Baltic Sea, when he doesn't have a minimum clue about where it is, not even the small interest in take a look at the world map, if he has one. I could be wrong, but at least I know how to fix my home A/C, change a bearing in my car's generator, exchange brake pads, build a computer, write a computer program, build an electronic device, make dinner, and know where "Moldavia" country or "Aconcagua Mountain" is, or why brits are in India, or talking more than a language can save me in Paris International (Charles DeGaule Airport) with a unexpected connection... not because I am special, far from this, the answer is just because I wanted to learn and spent some time doing it, instead sleeping saturday afternoons. It doesn't hurt to learn, it is free, our memory has no limits, but somebody else chooses to spend all his life watching MTV and playing Nintendo... poor me, learn about what means "BRIX" (percent of solids in liquid) from a person like that. Final: As more I learn, more questions appear in my mind, and I am not afraid to ask. It makes me a person with zillion of questions (a simple and ignorant one), but at least I know why the vegetation opted by the green color instead the second choice that was yellow, I don't sell flowers and I know it, does the florist (a specialist) knows why? Wagner > Wagner.. Going to Radio Shack with such questions is like asking an > attendant in a car wash how the automatic wash bay computer works. The > attendant will do a fine job washing your car knowing such detail or not. > They are not there to answer questions outside of the scope of the packaged > product or service. This applies to all fields and professions and at all > levels, including yours. There is a good probability you do not possess all > knowledge, and I bet you would not enjoy someone mocking you if you tried to > comprehend a new circuit! Would you be an idiot too? > > ...and... If you are such a competent engineer, you would know enough about > wire, current, etc, that you would not need to ask such a question of a > non-engineer salesperson to begin with. Ask questions that the salesperson > CAN answer (Wagner - do you have four conductor, stranded 28 gauge coiled > phone wire that is 6 feet in length? Salesperson - YES, it is over here!). > In effect, the Radio Shack salesperson is correct, typical phone line > currents are less than 100ma. I have seen them as low as 4ma off hook (I > should know, I built phone based telemetry equipment based on the PIC, have > you?). Driving 800ma through a phone line will cause considerable line loss, > and would not work well - as a phone line. Duh.. You may MODIFY the wire > (i.e. parallel them) to increase current, but it is not a phone line > anymore. Duh.. Apples and Oranges dude. > > Morale: Be more considerate with those of lesser knowledge. Maybe instead > of laughing in his face you should of tried to explain to him your real > purpose, how it could be used for your project, and what may work. Spread > the knowledge, be a teacher, be a leader... > > But then, you may enjoy his ignorance. You can take your attitude and > be-little any store clerk in any store, with mall mentality or not, for a > good laugh. Just as I have done to you with this message (LOL). What > do you think this discussion group is about? Do you also laugh at simple > questions posted on this list? Jeez.... Give us a break.... > > ..Mark..