Friday, May 09, 2008

telephone madness!

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This weeks prompt on Sunday Scribblings is Telephone.
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I’ve got a cell phone. A simple one. In theory I can make calls, receive calls and if I’ve got plenty of time to spare, send a text message on it! I sometimes receive text messages, but more often than not I press a wrong button and delete them before I read them! Actually I often do the same with incoming calls! Either I cancel them, or spend so long trying to remember how to accept them that the time runs out and it stops ringing.
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Apparently it takes voice messages too. At least that is the impression I get from a symbol which appears on the screen sometimes. How to retrieve them though – well, that’s a mystery I’ve yet to solve.
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Having said all that, if it does ring, squawk, squeak or shake, it is a fairly rare event anyway. Most people who know me are fully aware that they would be wasting their time trying to get me to respond to a call on my mobile. Everyone I know contacts me via my home phone or computer. They know they will get a reply that way!

I’m going into grumpy old man mode now. Teenagers! Why oh why do they seem to think it’s necessary to have one permanently in their hand or glued to their ear? One local council is so concerned about the danger kids are putting themselves into by walking along the street staring down and texting, that they are considering wrapping protective padding around lampposts and other pavement mounted signs!

I have the dubious honour of working with teenagers in my kitchen at work. I don’t approve of these wretched phones being used whilst they are working. Oh, they tell me, what if there is an emergency and someone needs to get hold of me? Simple! We have a landline – contact you on that!! I employed a chef once who became so annoyed with one young lady whose phone kept ringing, that he coated it in fish batter and dropped in the deep fryer!

And what about people using them on trains and busses? Don’t you just want to rip the infernal devise out of their hand and lob it out of the window? They speak so loudly! And you can’t even have a decent eavesdrop, because you only hear one side of the conversation!

Actually it is quite funny when you hear people lying about where they really are. ‘I’m stuck in the office dear’ they say as the down their second glass of beer and pinch a young lady’s bum! I know of one pub in London where there’s a special booth in which to use your phone, and it’s fitted with a sound system which plays background noises of typewriters, traffic and trains!

No, I’ll sick the old type of phone, preferably one with a proper dial and a curly piece of cable. You know where you are with those!
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I wrote a piece a while back for Fiction Friday about texting. Do take a look - click HERE
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23 comments:

  1. I'm in total agreement! I remember one of my daughters sat on the settee with two friends, supposedly visiting me. Almost throughout the visit they were all manically texting various people.
    Madness, and infuriating!

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  2. Glad we agree! I thought I would be a lone voice. I work in a pub and it's not unusual for someone to come to the bar to order a round of drinks, then phone his friends on a table a few feet away to check the order! Madness indeed!

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  3. Hey there this is a great post. I too do get very irritated with people constantly on it. I think that it is very distracting to have someone out in a public place who is so loud and obnoxious on their phone have respect and keep you damn conversations private. I was recently in a library where someone was very loudly using their cell me and the librarian just smiled at each other and shook our heads.

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  4. I Can't even go there Keith! Cell phone use SO annoys me.. I knew not to write about THAT, or I would be the one using profanity galore!
    AS for YOU and telephones....
    Stick to pen and paper my friend,
    there you are an expert! :))

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  5. I would consider myself a technophile in general. I love computers and all aspects of the internet.

    But I agree with you about cell phones. My engineering genius husband and I once had one, I think we made one call on it, then forgot the initial instructions and floundered thereafter.

    I still would like one that could teach me how to use it...

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  6. I don't have a cell phone. Hubby has one from his work, which is pretty crucial since he has to go to job sites a lot. We're thinking of getting me one since I'm in the car a lot and we live on pretty deserted roads. But texting? No, can't handle it. A friend of mine got rearended by a girl who was texting while driving. Stupid stupid people.

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  7. So I'm guessing a mobile video conference would be out of the question ;-)?

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  8. Mobiles we call them here in Aust, I hate them too, don't want one. I once saw a young male driver,on a provisional license, driving into the late afternoon sun, around a round about,talking on the phone, steering with the other hand and trying to change gears as well, not clever. The young think they are invincible.

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  9. We too call those mobiles. Mine has a camera which I have never used. I make calls, recieve calls and never have smsed. Mine is supposed to be a better model than the basic one. It was a gift from my eldest brother. I still do not know most of its functions. I have had it for almost two years now!

    indolence?

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  10. By the way, we call them mobiles too! Guess I've been reading too many American blogs!!!!

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  11. I understand very well what you say...:)

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  12. Keith, I hate my mobile too. Alas, it is my only form of communication with Steve, when I am at work, and for that reason alone I rely on it immensely.
    As for the doorbell, I have been know to run and lock myself in the en suite (but that's another story all together)
    Shaz

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  13. Very amusing list of anti-cell arguments!

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  14. Oh cellphones are an extension of my daughters arms. I don't know how to work it either I always let my kids or home kids let it handle for me. Too much buttons to push.

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  15. I'm really surprised to find so many technologically-savvy people who are so stumped by mobile phones, and so anti-mobile. I think I'm somewhere in the middle, because I use one. I can (and do) text, but wouldn't use it in company in that way. I get really annoyed to see drivers using their phones, though. REALLY annoyed.

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  16. Oh, it's a love-hate drama between me & my cellphone. I hate the spotty connections, the crummy reception, its inconvenient buzzings (not to mention the awful ringtones) and the feeling of being tethered to the thing, but then, I'm out so often that it's almost the only way to reach me.

    Plus, living as I do in a rural area, I love it on those days when I find myself caught in town longer than I expect... instead of arriving home -- inevitably at the dinner hour -- to hungry eyes and growling stomachs, I simply place a call for our favorite carryout. I let my family know what's coming, and the table is set when I return, and my husband has poured me a drink. Perfect joy.

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  17. This piece could have been written by my husband - right down to his inability to access text messages! He has a cell phone, but only due to pressure from family members and it would be unseemly not to have a cell number listed on his business card. :)

    I agree with you about the bad behaviour cell phones have spawned. People just don't know when to turn them off. I really don't want to hear about Aunt Millie's gastric by-pass whilst dining in my favourite restaurant!

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  18. old faithful phones.....predictable and zero learning curve!

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  19. It's all about manners. I have one purely for safety reasons and quicky calls. Much like you I am a bit slow on the groove when it comes to cells. Call it disinterest! Lately it has been losing it's charge before I get a chance to use it. I pay as I go, and only close friends have the number. You didn't even bring up the costly aspect of it. People have bills as high as a mortgage payment and wonder why they're broke!

    Great post!
    Hugs Sherrie

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  20. great post keith,

    i wonder we managed so long without a cell phone, could we not hav managed longer...?

    my son knows my phone better than me...and keep schnaging the damn ring tone...so much so that i'm always not answering my call thinking its someone else's phone...sigh

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  21. yeppers, i agree... nothing worse than listening to somebody else's phone conversation in a store... or in a line.. on a bus... awful!!!... you sorta remind me of my dad... he looks at it like he's never seen it before... he turns it off until he needs it so he misses all the calls... we don't call him on his cell phone... we call him on the home phone lan line..

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  22. You grump away... My pet peeve is teens with cell phones in church - texting each other IN THE SAME CLASS... so rude. :S

    So funny too when people ask you for your cell number and you reply "I don't have one"... :D

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  23. I'm going to agree and disagree with the cell-phone controversy.

    They are great for calming a mother's nerves when she has imagined all kinds of catastrophes regarding her college-aged children or wants to know just how close her older daughter and son-in-law are to home because she is taking care of their children.
    My son calls his cell phone his "electronic leash".


    They are terrible for circumventing parental wishes for a teenager's relationships. As long as they have that phone in their hand they have a direct link to anybody who chooses to call them or text them, and it is very difficult for a kind, gentle person to push the reject button.

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