Downtrodden Phone
Remember when choosing a mobile phone came down to size, colour and did you want the “snake game”?
The specifications and options choice is long and baffling now and they all seem to do the same things anyway. At least that’s what I thought when we spoke with the sales advisor at the (not very) local store run by our preferred service provider. You’d have thought I’d asked to borrow his wife for the weekend!
For me the options involve an updated version of what I’ve been using for years – I’m not always open to change. But the new phone wasn’t for me. Sue’s had slipped from her pocket so, not hearing the clunk, the first she knew was when she felt something give beneath her foot – and she was wearing solid boots at the time. The new star-like pattern on the screen was rather nice, didn’t make up for not being able to use it though. A new phone was needed.
Last year I’d had my contacts etc. professionally transferred from my old handset to my new one, I didn’t want to mess things up you see. The expert produced the new size sim card and plugged both phones into a clever box. After a while he sheepishly told me he’d wiped all the data and lost my 263 contacts in the process. No problem, I replied, they were on the old sim card as well. He’d shredded that for security purposes, he informed me.
I learnt my lesson, I back up my phone to the PC, which I hadn’t done with Sue’s – “hello, my names Tony, I’m a thoughtless dimwit”.
The phone store was very helpful, gave advice on the best phone for Sue’s needs and she’s happy with the new one. Very pleased with the masses of new emoticons as well, highly important for a text user – I seem to get derogatory things added to my texts from her. Which, I accept, is deserved.
Most of us collect contacts we rarely see but might need to text one day, and without their number how do we ask them for their number unless we have a friend in common? Texting is important for hearing impaired folk, so do back up your phones or make a paper record or, as I should have done, put contacts on the sim card. Storing photos to the external memory is useful too.
Just got a text from Sue, so I’d better go – oh look, there’s a face with the tongue stuck out at the end of the message.