Cell Phone Re-Install Fun

Yesterday morning I dropped my old cell on the Mailroom floor at our senior mobile home park. It broke – split, broke, no life left in it. It was 8 years old – it was my nephew’s first, and when he died last year, I took over. It’s a very old flip phone which I only paid $9.98 for back then and we only used it for roadside emergencies.

Two weeks ago, my Friday morning charity crafters took pity on me and showed me how to text on it. My lowly $20 pre-paid plan covers that, so that was cool.

While I do not use the phone except for when I’m out in the car, for emergencies, I do use it from time to time for long distance. I had cut off my expensive long distance from my landline. So, between needing it on the road, and for the long distance (my brother and a handful of others on rare occasions), I had to bite the bullet and get a new one.

I checked online and found the few that worked with my plan. I checked Walgreens first, online, to see if they had the two I’d settled on in stock. Nope. Then I checked Walmart online. Cool – In stock in several nearby locations. I headed out at 6:15 a.m. this morning to pick one up.

Price was great, for me. $14.48 plus tax. Once again, it’s a flip phone. And this time, it came with a camera which is good for roadside emergencies. That’s all I’ll use that feature for.

NOW, here’s comes the fun. My old one was extremely bare and basic – no memory card – I didn’t even know they came with one. And the new one doesn’t have one either.

So, I’ll be spending downtime over the next few days (weeks?) re-entering the contacts. 

One good thing is I didn’t have to re-set my voice mail – that came over from the old one. Cool.

Although I hated putting the cash out for this, the newer model does have an advantage. My old plan gave me, for $20 a month, pre-paid, 400 minutes and texts at $0.15 each. The new one comes with, for $20 a month, unlimited phone calls and 50 free texts! For me, that is far more than I’ll ever use in any one month – I’m in cell-phone paradise!

Of course, I still have to enter all those phone numbers and the cat doesn’t seem interested in helping...oh, well.