I've had my current cellphone for about four years, and it does everything I need it for.  It makes calls (I assume it receives as well, but it's been a while since anybody has actually called me), it both sends AND receives texts, it's my primary alarm clock, so on and so forth.  It's never more than six feet from me, and usually a lot closer... both because it's my ONLY phone (haven't had a land-line in a looooooong time) and because if something happens with my ticker (and, by the way, I had the 10 year anniversary of my Cardiac Event this past Sunday), having it close at hand might save my life.

So you can imagine how I felt when I left work on Tuesday and... the touchscreen didn't work.  It worked perfectly fine when I turned it off going IN to the office, but... well.  Not having a working touchscreen is something of a drawback on a touchscreen-based phone.  Oh, I eventually figured out a way to make a phonecall, involving the physical keyboard, the "phone" button on the frontplate, and a weird combination of opening and closing the slideybit, but I couldn't hang up when the call was over.  I also couldn't answer the phone ha-ha-ha, nor could I send texts.  Indeed, anything that needed the screen was no longer functional.  This was bad, as I had reset my alarm for a one-time only thing and couldn't reset it for the right time to wake me up for work.  Fortunately, my actual alarm clock, now closing in on 30 years old, still works... barely.

After work let out today, I set sail for my carrier's standalone store.  I had gotten the replacement insurance on the thing, so I assumed I'd be forced to upgrade to a so-called smartphone... there's no way they'd still have a four or five year old phone in stock.  As it turned out, I was right: they didn't have the phone anymore.  What they did have, though, was a brand new touchscreen!  After about a half-hour of techguy maneuvering little bits and pieces of the phone hither and yon, he called me over and said "it works great!"  Sure enough, it works like a charm.  Yes, the new frontpiece is purple, not blue, but I'll cope... when I first got the phone, I wanted purple anyway; they were out of stock. 

The best part however was that techguy laughed at my wallpaper (seen here to the left) when he turned the phone on.  And not a "that's stupid, ha-ha-ha loser" laugh, but an actual "I'm amused" laugh.  Which was nice.

Kids these days must have common experience with anime.  Either that or he's seen so many stupid/shocking/horrifying wallpapers over the years that he's stopped caring.  One of the two.

I'm not prepared to say which one.

But it doesn't matter, because my phone works again, at least for a while longer.  I'll take it for as long as it lasts.  It's a GOOD phone.  I'm used to it, and it at least tolerates me.  What more could you ask for?

Posted by: Wonderduck at 04:05 PM | No Comments | Add Comment
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