ot-first cell phone

[Tom Buchanan]

65 yrs old, and got my first cell phone today. Wife bought it for me cause I go down to our small 20 acre place about once a wk,50 miles away.My son said I don,t have to start every conversation by yelling" can you hear me?". Drives him nuts.The dam thing takes pics and has games(they say) but I,m happy just knowing how to turn it on and off.Can see how handy it would be if I broke down on the road.For sure, people don,t stop and help like they used to.As crazy as things are now, can,t say I blame them.

[mochinist]

I'm 30 and just got my first one this year, if it wasnt for work I would still not have one.

[Ries]

I was something like 48 before I broke down and got one- and I still dont like giving anybody the number- the damn thing scares me when it rings and its in my pocket.
Usually its my wife or kids- and for that, its handy.
I really do like it when I travel, though-no more searching for phone booths, which, in most towns, dont exist any more, or trying to find quarters.

[Weston Bye]

Try having the phone on vibrate and in your pocket while you are working on a live electrical circuit. Guaranteed to make you jump when it goes off, even if you dont touch a live wire.

[speedy]

Cell phones are a bane and a blessing. Mine stays off unless I need to use it and don`t ask me my number because I have never memorised it, 021 something
I don`t answer the phone if I don`t want to either; that is what the answer machine is for.
Some people get quite agitated when they observe others not rushing to the phone
Wes, you mentioned vibrating phones which reminds me of a character we worked with at the power station.
He was observed standing with his crotch against the pipe handrail as the turbine came up to speed through its frequency spots . After a week or so of this his shift mates sprung him
The greaser was seen doing other stuff.
Too much EMF?

[Mcgyver]

it's all what you are used to. my kids will call on my cell phone if I'm the garage shop (free inter-family calls) I use it out there for its notepad to make lists of all the little bits of crap i need to pick up, then next time I'm in the hardware or electronics store i never forget to get everything i need. even sitting in the the kitchen my kids and wife know they have to call the cell because i will never pick up the land line, it is simply never for me. two of four are too young ( 9& 11) for cell phones (not according to them mind you), otherwise I'd consider giving up the land line like other friends of mine have. Now with more people going to voip, I'm the dinosaur still on the cell phone

[Carld]

Best thing since sliced bread. We don't even have a land line anymore. I got mine when I retired at 62 and started building our new home and haven't looked back. Now, if I could get one of them Phasers from startrek.

[Evan]

I had a cell phone since cell service first came here in the 80s. I don't remember when that was but the phone was one of the big Motorola models that weighs about 1.5 lbs in a large belt holster. I later graduated to a Motorola flip phone. This was mainly for work and I hated the thing. People could never understand that just because I had a cell phone it didn't mean I could always be reached. The coverage here looks like this:



I live in Williams Lake. The red rectangle is the area I used to service. I would be out of range more often than not but people in the city have no concept of what this area is like. BC is full of lumps of granite and cell coverage is extremely limited. The cell phone was a constant source of frustration for expense accounting too. They couldn't understand that my territory was big enough that a majority of my calls were long distance which really racked up the phone expenses.

The cell phone was a huge pain in the ass. When I quit Xerox 9 years ago I cancelled the cell phone. I haven't had one since. I am considering getting one now as I am retiring and it could be handy for when I am in town and my wife needs to get a hold of me for something since I won't be in my office anymore. I can get one for $70 and ten bucks a month with 1/2 hour talk time and no other fees. If I don't feel like taking calls it gets turned off. It doesn't work at home either, we are out of range.

I don't place a great deal of importance on answering the phone. If I feel like it I might. More often I don't bother. I never use the answering machine for call screening and we don't subscribe to any of the extra calling features such as caller ID. It drives my wife nuts when I just let the phone ring but I spent far too many years on the phone, making calls and receiving calls that must be answered.

PET PEEVE

I hate it when I go into a business and start talking to the counter guy and the phone rings. He grabs it and begins taking that persons order or whatever. Pisses me right off. I was there first. That's what hold is for.

[pntrbl]

I go back to Motorola Flip Phone days. Them things were huge by today's standards but ya know, even tho the phone's have gotten smaller I don't think the service has gotten any better. The phone I have now has been decent but the one before that had dead spots in downtown Burbank. They're taping Jay Leno everyday right around the corner. It ain't like I'm out in the sticks.

That particular phone eventually started having battery problems that led to it's demise. It went dead after I charged it all night, again, and there happened to be a stick nearby. I just tapped it once out of disgust. That felt so good I hit it again. Right about I'm finding this hysterically funny ... so I just went ahead and beat it to death!

It was a flip model and I ended by breaking it in 2 pieces with my bare hands.

I have to have one for my customers to call and schedule work or I'd throw the damn thing away. One of these days I may throw one out the window of a moving van!

That being said, I sure like my daughters having them and I dunno how we'd get along in a modern world without them, but I don't have to like 'em.

SP

[Your Old Dog]

I had one of the first units in the Western New York area as I covered the press conferance announcing the service coming to buffalo. We got to use it as a trial. It sure made our business easier because we no longer got radio calls telling us to find a phone to call in with. Other stations and people on scanners made it hard to speak candidly about what we were covering.

When they start offering service like my home phone then I might consider getting one for family use. But the "Drug Dealers Special" of free nights after 9pm and weekends don't work for my family. Only druggies are up at those hours.

I know they had to make special offers to get the system up and running but they still don't need all the plans now. Everybody has a cell phone these days, the welfare line at county hall is full of them. When I get a landline phone for my home I don't have to have a 1 year plan, why do I need one with cell?