Susan's Scribblings the Blog

I have gone through a good half dozen cell phones in my lifetime; my first came in 2000 and was about as useful as a fridge in the Arctic tundra. Over the years my phone has gotten better and smarter. As in smarter than its owner. Which is rather scary.

Phones used to come with a complete, detailed instruction manual, charging hardware and a year’s supply of headache remedy. Back then, one would become acclimated to the basics of the phone and go to the manual when something difficult came up, as in how to make the darned thing ring louder, how to tell all the junk notifications to go jump in the lake, or how to make the battery last more than twenty minutes.

More on that later.

My old reliable phone, which turned six this year, finally became not only outdated, but incapable of supporting software I needed for work. I received sympathetic support from the IT team, but the truth was that I needed a new phone just to get updated software. Being familiar with computers going obsolete from the past, I sighed and began searching for my new ball and chain.

The website pointed me to an authorized retailer some forty minutes from home, which was odd because I have at least four of them within a quarter hour from me. Further drilling down the rabbit hole of “availability near you” produced a hit at one of my favorite locations, so I jumped into the car and went there brimming with hope.

When I arrived, I spoke to a pleasant team member who proceeded to tell me that the model phone I wanted actually was not in stock there. Naturally my next question was where else it might be in stock, and this is where the issues plaguing today’s life became real: for security purposes, the employees were forbidden to tell customers whether an item was in stock. This is an effort to discourage declaring open season for potential malcontents and Karens who might pay a visit to the store to wreak havoc. I was informed, however, that the store to which he was sending me was their definition of a full-service location, so they would be most likely to have something for me.

Suddenly I had visions of the small and larger K-Mart stores dancing in my memory; the smaller places might lack certain perks like an auto shop, while the larger ones were easier to get lost in. I made a turn down an aisle once and found the entrance to the auto shop; I had been looking for the garden center.

But I digress.

Off to the second location–which was closer to home by miles–I drove. Yes, the new pleasant team member said, he can get that model from the back. Off he went, and came back later with what I can best describe as a Tiffany style presentation of my new phone, which came in a large, roomy box about twice its actual size, and with a case and screen protection brought over to seal the bargain.

Everything seemed ready to go until we got to the plan I was on. My plan was eligible for the phone, but not the phones they had in the store. This is where I became the subject of the “locked phone blues.” A locked device is apparently limited to certain plans. The team member then directed me to go across the street to the shopping center and buy an unlocked version of the phone from the big blue and yellow retail guys, then bring the purchase to them to have the phones switched over.

Going to the familiar retailer, I received my new unlocked phone, in a generic tight fitting white box. Proof again that the price of freedom from restriction can sometimes be drained of joy as well. Little matter; as long as it was a new device and did what I needed, that was more important.

I took the old and new devices back to the cellular retailer, and my third pleasant team member spent nearly half an hour–part of the time hampered by French tips which make touch screens and tiny access port holes unnavigable–transferring the data from Old Reliable to the newbie device. When it was finished, I also received advice on how to wipe the old phone and dispose of it (not there). I packed everything into my handy expandable tote (plastic bags are banned in my region, so it’s bring your own) and went home.

That was when I found out that my device comes with a charging cable, but no adaptor and only a quick start-up guide. No manual. And no headache remedies.

Fortunately I found that my tablet enables me to charge the phone with the cable, so I spent the evening engaged in social media with an extra cord winding its way from the output port to my new phone, while I ordered an adaptor from the big blue and yellow retail guys to pick up on a second trip.

In all it took me five stops, two days and a few hundred dollars to put things right. The end result is that my new phone updated the work related software, and it has a charge that has lasted longer than before.

This phone better last me another six years.