IS THE TELEPHONE DEAD?

I just read in Reader’s Digest (original article by Pamela Paul from The New York Times) that nobody talks on the telephone anymore. And they aren’t talking about just landlines. They are saying that nobody uses the phone to just “chit-chat” anymore, they are only using their phones to text or use email now. Talking on the phone is a nuisance to most people and is avoided at all costs.

In fact, the line is, “Phone calls are rude. Intrusive. Awkward.”

Really? Wow. I respectfully disagree.

Unless that call is from a telemarketer.

But if that call is from a friend or family member or neighbor or credit card company telling me my card has been used suspiciously, I welcome that call.

Maybe I’m just a “chit-chatty” gal, but I like to TALK to my friends and family, not have only a written relationship with them. How can you console a sad friend with a text? Or relay a funny story in an email? How can you catch up after a couple of weeks without actually talking? You need to HEAR their voice to know if everything really is “fine” when they say it is.

So, if you’re my friend, I’m going to keep calling you until you tell me to stop (at which time I’m guessing we won’t be friends too much longer!). I’ll call your home, I’ll call your cell, and if I can’t find you, I’ll text you and tell you to call me so we can TALK! Texting is fine for certain things, but not to sustain a friendship.

If Reader’s Digest, the New York Times or Pamela Paul would like to discuss this further, they are welcome to CALL me!

Karen

Oh, and yes, I just realized that today is Thursday, not Wednesday! I’m sure Melissa will get a kick out of the fact that I’m a day late in blogging this week. Let’s just let her have her fun, shall we? Do you think she’ll call me or text me?

OH, THE DRAMA OF A NEW PHONE!

I am not one to get “obsessed” with technology. But I got a new phone this weekend, and have literally not stopped playing with it since I brought it home. Well, maybe “playing with it” is not the correct choice of words. Perhaps it’s more like, I don’t know, trying to figure out how to make a telephone call and send a simple text. And then moving on to the next step of trying to import my Outlook contacts into the phone, which I was ASSURED by SEVERAL salespeople that it was an extremely easy process to do. Lastly, putting my music and photos on.

So let’s start at the beginning: making a call. Okay, I exaggerated on this one. Yes, once I figured out how to bring up the dial pad, I was good there. Then texting. Nope, kept getting an error code. Well, I decided to skip that and move onto getting my contacts in there. Hmmm, didn’t see anything in the book on importing anything from Outlook. Okay, got my emails set up, but my contacts aren’t in my email accounts. Kept reading, but no, nothing there. So I decided to wait until morning and call them.

I was on the phone with Sprint for (and I am NOT making this up NOR am I exaggerating on this one) OVER 2 hours. The end result? After going up FOUR levels of technical support, I finally got my texting fixed, and I found out (now get this) that there actually is NO WAY to import anything from Microsoft Outlook. Really! The only thing I can do is export my contacts to my newly set up Google account (which you must have for these new Android phones, because Google actually designed the software) and then Google’s address book will sync with my phone.

Now truly, this is a pretty easy process, but WHY did the salespeople tell me it could be done directly from Outlook and WHY did it take 4 technical support reps to come up with this solution? One of the reps actually even conferenced in Samsung, the maker of the phone! (Which, by the way, I thought was very service-oriented of him to try to find a possible solution for me. Who would have thought that the Samsung rep would know even less about the phone than the Sprint rep?)

Okay, so I get over that hurdle, and attempt my music. Coming from the iPod world, I’m a little worried, and sure enough, I can’t figure out how to manually transfer songs from iTunes to my phone. But I was pleasantly surprised to find that all my music was also in my Microsoft Media Player. No playlists, but at least it’s all there. I’ll work on playlists later.

Lastly, I try to put photos on, but find I’ve already run out of memory. Crap! So now I have to get a larger SD card and pray that when I change cards, I don’t lose everything that’s on there already. Maybe I’ll call them to ask them to walk me through it. Any guesses on how long I’ll be on the phone?

Oh, and by the way, if you call or text me and I don’t answer, sorry. I haven’t learned my new ring tones yet!

Karen