Moderately Confused by Jeff Stahler for June 02, 2022

I can remember trying not to forget 4 pence for the pay phone.

Yeah but back then there was a payphone on every corner so now with no cell your shat out of luck and in trouble if you break down on the road.

Obsession of the cell, too much information, not enough of one’s attention to their surroundings, and to others, constant pinging, beeping, and twanging….I’m so done, with it!

Well, we didn’t have a choice, it was wired to the wall.

I do make it a point to make sure I leave the house with a cell phone (sometimes it’s my wife’s as she is carrying it). For as much mayhem as people cause with it, it IS a safety device – as long as you are not using it while in motion.

I am particularly paranoid about carrying it when I am out walking alone at 5 AM.

I just have a flip phone and I leave it at home most of the time.

About 2008, our granddaughters came to dinner and brought their first phones to table. They moved silverware to make space, so they could divide their attention between food and phone, but not family.

I told them to turn off the phones and put them in another room. They whined and moaned: But, but, what if somebody calls?!?!? they shrieked. I said, You are 15. All your family is here. Who is going to call that you need to answer while at our table?

Finally cut the clamor by holding their phones over a pot of soup and just looking at them. Never had that problem again. They also never chatted on their phones when in a family gathering until they and I were much older. Just became too tired of it to argue anymore.

Oh, and did I say I was a curmudgeon about the digital evolution? Yeah, I know. Some say revolution but, to me, that usually means something that corrects a wrong or improves matters.

My evaluation is that digital technology is a very badly mixed blessing. There is tremendous knowledge at one’s fingertips, and that’s great. But the medium is tilted more toward being an outlet for the meanest, lowest kinds of human behavior, while it provides no consistent way to punish those who misuse it. An ugly imbalance.

I dreamed the other night that I checked out without my shoes, but i had my phone…

You can borrow someone else’s cell phone, but good luck remembering any phone numbers.

If it wasn’t a phone it would be something else….like it used to be.

I still do.

Leaving the house without one’s phone is like drifting into the deep end of the pool without a lifeline and not knowing how to swim

They really should just be called a leash.

I’m lucky if I don’t forget my pants when I leave the house.

And then you panic when something happens and need to find a phone. A lot harder these days, unless you can find a kind stranger.

Got a pay as you go flip phone… but only because you can’t find pay phones anymore.

I will carry it (in a bag with other stuff I might need for whatever trip I’m making) and it’s TURNED OFF unless I need to make a call. It does gets turned on every 90 days because I have to add more minutes at that interval. And every once in a blue moon I’ll call someone with it and talk for a bit just to run down the old minutes.

Used a work provided cell phone, when I still worked, because I was a network admin and had to be reachable at all hours. Now I’m retired and there is no need to reach me so quickly. Anyone that wants my attention can call the landline and leave a message, just like we did before cell phones.

We got by just fine, back in the day, with out cell phones. We did have pagers for us really important types (I was stuck carrying one because of work). Perhaps not quite so convenient for the caller but useful when circumstances warranted.