Tag Archives: cell phone

rants

Fighting with technology

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I had one of those days. One where I considered disposing of all forms of technology and adopting a life of pen and paper and nothing more high tech than a transistor radio.

It all started with my laptop. I have a love/hate relationship with my laptop. I love having it and how it lets me work from anywhere. I hate it because sometimes it seems determined to not let me work at all.

My power cord hasn’t played nice with my laptop in a couple.months, so that’s been an issue. Then it decided to shut off randomly (despite actually be plugged in properly!) on its own without warning. Then it decided not to read CDs. Then it locked up forcing me to hard reboot… three times.

Finally I got it to work, but not before losing hours of work time.

Then my phone failed me.

My husband played the Opry tonight. Since I am out of town for work, I knew I would listen via the Opry Droid App. Worked fantastic last time!

I tuned in about 10 minutes early, getting a little bummed to not be there. My husband’s group took stage and I cranked up the volume. Not even halfway through the first song, my phone peeped low battery and locked up. Music stopped and nothing was bringing it back.

I dashed to my laptop to listen online. I kept clicking “listen live” and nothing happened. Then I noticed I had to choose a player. I didn’t care! Just PLAY. My first player choice didn’t work. The second started, but was so low in volume it wasn’t worth it.

I went back to my phone. Finally it reloaded the app and let me listen… halfway through the second song. I was soooo glad to be listening in again, but I’d missed so much I still wanted to cry.

I heard the last of their set, and as I closed the app, my phone locked up so bad I had to pull the battery out to reboot it!! All while pouting for missing so much of the Opry. It was the last straw.  I am planning to avoid technology for awhile.  Technology hates me today, and, frankly, I hate it right back at the moment. I think we need to take a break for awhile. Don’t call me, I’ll call you kind of thing.

So a break it is…

…for a few hours.

about-me, fears

My dumbest phobia

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Telephone phobia (telephonophobia, telephobia) is reluctance or fear of making or taking phone calls, literally, “fear of telephone”. (From Wikipedia)

Yup. That’s me. You’d be surprised how hard I have to psych myself up to make a phone call. I am not as bad about taking phone calls, but there’s that issue, too. I have to REALLY know the person on the other end of the line to be okay with talking on the phone in general.

I did a Google search for “fear of making a phone call” figuring I wouldn’t find anything. Much to my surprise, there are a lot of web-sites out there about it! Even some self-help sites to help people get over it. Suddenly, I don’t feel so weird to be like this.

The invention of the Internet and text messaging was made for someone like me. In fact I wonder if the inventors of the Internet were fellow telephonophobics. And text messaging is like a blessing. I’m never without my cell phone specifically because text messaging rocks so hard. I wish I could text for everything. I imagine some things would go like this:

Me to doctors office: “Hey, I need an appointment. What do you have?”
Doc: “How is Friday at 11. Be here by 10:45.”
Me: “Cool. I’m there. Thanks!”

Or maybe:

Me to restaurant: “What are your hours?”
Restaurant: “11am to 2 pm”
Me: “I need a reservation for 4 at 6 pm. Name, Musicians Widow.”
Restaurant: “Gotcha! See you then!”

Yeah… you can give your cell number to vendors and let them text you specials, etc. That’s not the kind of thing I am talking about (and its also something I steadfastly refuse to do). No, I mean the things that are two minute conversations and not a big deal…

…BUT ARE A BIG DEAL TO ME.

The last time I had a doctor’s appointment, it took me ten minutes to talk myself into dialing the number. That is not a lie or exaggeration! If I make a call and my husband or my parents are around, I’ll quiz them for a long time after I hang up as to, “Did I do okay?”

Like I said, I don’t let my “phobia” hold me back (much), but its definitely something I want to work on and totally rid myself of having. Or, if I don’t rid myself of it, I was to at least take my psych-up-time down to 30 seconds versus 10 minutes.

Any words of wisdom out there? Anyone have any advise? Or… better yet… does anyone else deal with this, too? Talk to me! (Just don’t call me… ha!)