Phones are, indeed, instruments of torture... at least for introverts. As a cat, I'm blessed to not deal with them... my Humans, not so much.
People just behave strangely with retail stores. One of the "family businesses" is a small art gallery, and people call all the time with the strangest questions:
"Yeah, do you know the hours of that place upstairs from you that sells cookies?"
Umm... why don't you call THEM?
=^..^=
Yeah, asking for neighbour's phone number or operating hours is a regular thing