Don't Call Me

I've got this super-duper new Smartphone that can do everything but make my coffee in the morning (although there's probably an app for that, too).  I spent a great deal of time in the beginning learning what I could about this amazing piece of pocket technology.  I went browsing through the app store and I developed a nice relationship with Siri, chatting about the weather and politics and stuff.  I played with the map app to find out how to get to places I'd no intention of going just to see if I could.  That was before I discovered the difference between phone minutes and data minutes.  I set ringtones for everything under the sun.  I can check the weather from Chino to Seattle.  I'm hell on wheels when it comes to texting and can make smiley faces in three languages.  Thanks to the manual Linda sent, I can video the turkey wars should they bring the fight to the front yard again.  I can take still photos in several different color styles and in black and white.

It's a far cry from the ten-pound black-only telephones with cloth-covered cords without curls of my childhood.  Back in the day, there were nice human operators to answer when you dialed O, and prefixes were two letters (ours was BUdlong) and maybe four digits to follow.  In the 1940s there were no such things as area codes (or zip codes, either).  My mother in California called her Aunt Florrie in Illinois and Aunt Florrie got so flustered at getting a long-distance call that she put the receiver down so she could run and get her glasses.  The world has become a much smaller place.

I can type and I can swipe, I can tap and I can delete.  What I cannot do is answer a phone call.  Most of my communication is done through texting.  Almost all my real conversations are held on the house phone.  That's a good thing, as Linda has found out.  She calls my Smartphone - and I hang up on her.  I do this on a regular basis.  It's gotten to the point I laugh hysterically.  "Oh crum!  I did it again!"  The phone rings (well, it doesn't ring, at the moment it plays a horn like those used by fox hunters, but that could change), I swipe past the security bar and a red dot with a phone icon shows up.  Trained to tap to gain access, I dutifully tap the icon and say, "Hello?"  And there's no one there.  The red dot is to end the call.  I do that before the call can begin.  Linda is very patient.  She knows I'm in the learning phase and is willing to let me practice.  She calls, I hang up on her, and now she waits until I've regained a modicum of composure and call her back.  I'm beginning to think Linda calls just to get her laugh for the day.  At least she doesn't take it personally.

The moral to this story:  Don't call me.  That's not what this phone is for.