Planned obsolescence

I hate cell phones. I talk all day on the phone at work, and the last thing in hell I want to do when I get off work is talk on the phone. I don't take pictures with phones, download music, text or anything else. I pretty much have a phone as a way to talk to someone in an emergency. So don't text me. It costs me every time you do it.

Three weeks ago my phone started loosing its charge after a few hours. I went back to Verizon and the tech there told me that I needed a new battery, but because my phone was so old (a year plus) that they no longer carried the batteries and I'd have to go to Batteries Plus. $39.00 later, I had a new battery. Within a few days, that battery wasn't holding a charge, either.

Verizon has this new every two plan, where you get a new or reduced price phone every two years. The catch, the phones just don't seem to last two years. And... you have to get a Verizon phone, and they hose you on the cost.

Since my plan two years was April, I checked out Best Buy. Yep, Best Buy had phones for $29.00. Exactly what I wanted... a vanilla phone. Nope, wouldn't work for me, because it was a different company phone. Huh? Old phone was LG, new phone LG. But the service provider was different.

Now any 12 year old can hack the phone and change the programing. Look what happened with the Iphones. Except I'm not 12, and I can't program ANYTHING. Grrrrr

So I head to Verizon, que in the line and finally get to a very young sales girl who tells me that I have to buy a new phone and the cheapest phone is like $180. I told her to just get the manager... no sense negotiating with someone who has no power to negotiate...

After an hour plus, I walked out with my new, free phone. Except like free puppies, a free phone isn't free. All the charge cords for the old phone of course don't fit the new phone. I'm on the road, I have to have a car charger. Thats almost 30.00. Grrrr. I refused to buy anything else.

So now I have a new phone. I can't wait to see how this one is going to die. My first one allegedly got wet. Not from water, but from water vapor. My $29 Timex is water resistant to 50 meters. Its not waterproof, but it can sure as heck sustain water vaport. What is water vapor, think humidity. The tech guy said that it was probably in my truck on a hot day. No kidding. (Actually, it was probably in my cycling jersey on a hot day.)

So if your phone hasn't died yet, you better make friends with a 12 year old. You're gonna need one soon.