Hello? Operator?

The other day I called my parents house and got the busy signal. Remember the busy signal? That damn signal plagued my high school years and got in the way of a lot of important conversations. Sometimes I would sit and listen to the *beep* *beep* *beep* for minutes before giving up and walking away from the phone. Most of the time I would just hang up/redial, hang up/redial, hang up/redial, repeat repeat repeat until it finally started ringing. One time though I just sat there so long listening to the beeping that it finally connected my call and it started ringing. How long did I sit there with the busy signal? Who knows. Seems like a total waste of time now, but back then I'm sure it seemed totally reasonable.