Trees die

AT&T, the current owner of Reno’s local telephone company, is going through the annual ritual of distributing the new phone directory. Households are getting one set of white pages and two sets of yellow pages.

The familiar phone book—nine inches wide, 10 and three-quarter inches long, 2 and three-quarter inches thick—contains both white and yellow pages as usual. But accompanying it is a second version of the yellow pages in a different format—7 inches wide, 9 and one-half inches long, 1 and one-quarter inches thick.

The large combined book weighs 5.54 pounds. The smaller yellow pages book weighs 1.69 pounds.

AT&T does not have a local spokesperson, but Sacramento representative Brooke Burgess said, “The smaller version of the Yellow Pages is called the ‘Companion.’ It is designed to be more portable for on-the-go consumers. The Companion can be kept in a vehicle or as an extra book in a home or business.”

The corporation does not offer a way of opting out of delivery of one or both books, such as a check-off on the monthly phone bill.