Pearls Before Swine by Stephan Pastis for August 09, 2021

Maybe she’s listed in the phone boo…

Don’t you remember your mom’s number? Shame on you, Pig!

I know this is probably an OK Boomer observation, but the scenario reminded me of the early Beverly Hillbillies (saw the later ones live; the early on DVD and Roku streaming) where they’d be yelling into the phone without dialing.

I remember the Wall Phones, the Rotary Dials, and the Flip Phones. not to mention the Answering Machines. Yes I’m That Old!

Sadly, I have to admit this could happen to me. But I still have a land line as backup.

True that. I don’t know my wife’s cell phone number. It comes us as M******N whenever I need to call her. My very smart phone tells me her number is M******N.

I have a flip phone, an address book, and a functioning brain.

All hail Basil!

even if my iPhone were to go dead and needed repairs (or replacing), I still my father’s number memorized

A.I. has taken control of so many folks who willing gave away their own intelligence to artificial objects.

I’m bummed that this probably means I won’t get to see Pig’s mom. I’m sure she’s fabulous.

I know my mom (who’s been dead for more than a decade) phone number. The last four digits are 3232, and the first 6 are none o’ your business!

I saw an NCIS where Gibbs gave the team old school burner phones when their smart phones were compromized. The young agents could not fathom only having 12 numbers in memory and having to remember the rest. As a Community College chemistry professor I laugh when I see the students use their smartphones to do simple math and fractions.

These two have iPhones? They must be really rich.

Don’t worries, Pig. Just ask any call scammer or spammer. They knows everyone’s numbers.

Dependency can be worked with until your agency is too far removed from being able to cause actions…..and as a user and consumer of ‘net’ I’m just at the tail end of a very long line…my choices are only pre-set options, not choices at all…..LIFE hasmuch to recommend it…..this simulacrum is really quite weightless, affectless, and evanescent. The ‘net is what machinesdo for amusement when there’s really no purpose other than distraction from confronting essential nothingness.

All the numbers on my smart phone are automatically listed in the contacts, which is also accessible from my laptop. That has saved me more than once.

Pig you have a mind like a steel trap that is rusted shut .

I have the numbers written down! Now, I only have to find out where I put it!

“Smartphone own us.” In far more ways than most people can possibly imagine…

Think a COVID shot will inject you with a tracker? Ridiculous & hardly necessary. That “smartphone” you’re carrying is a tracker that’s 10,000 times better than that already. Unlike in Orwell’s novel 1984, Big Brother hasn’t forced himself on us and terrified us into compliance. Rather, Big Brother has seduced us with convenience. His sinister motives are much the same, however. The intention still is to track us and know everything about us and to use that info to control us and rip us off. On the most fundamental level, if one hasn’t privacy one hasn’t freedom.

I keep a handwritten list of important phone numbers just for this reason.

But it’s true!!

Pig, just go to “Da Google” and type in her name, you’ll be surprised. Larry can tell you that Da Google knows all, sees all!

I’m all about technology, but this is one thing I miss. I used to know by heart my family and friends’ phone numbers. I still remember my childhood phone number. And everyone was in the phonebook. Now, I don’t know anyone’s number. Phonebooks still exist but they don’t list cell numbers so if I want a phonebook I have to pay for a phonebook website.

I used to remember at least a hundred or more telephone numbers in the old days of only landlines. I can still remember a few mobile phone numbers, especially those of family and close friends, but the total is dwindling. Luckily, have managed to retain my list of contacts over at least six changes of mobile phone handsets, through careful back-ups. But still, I understand Pig’s dilemma.

I’m surprised that no one so far has commented that the Address book in Pig’s iPhone should have been synced to iCloud. So he can log into icloud.com with the Apple ID he used when configuring the iPhone, and get all his contacts’ info there.  And, if he has other Apple devices, those would also have a copy synced to them.

That is, unless he actively disabled the syncing feature. But in order to do that he would need to have some technical expertise which implies that (a) he knows that he should make a backup and how to make it, and (b) he is not Pig anyway because we know he’s not bright at all.

Of course there is a similar feature via Gmail for Android users, which you can also use on Apple devices if that’s what you prefer. I point to iCloud because Pig said he has an iPhone.

Amen, Goat.

Universe: ‘Would you like me to tell you a joke?’

Oy! PIG lives in LaLa land

I do KNOW my mom’s phone number in my head, my home phone number, and of course my own phone number. Before cell phones, I knew most people’s phone numbers by heart when I was kid. Then caller ID came in, and I started forgetting certain phone numbers by heart

If Pig got the vaccine with the nano-chips, he could just ask The Cloud.

it is a little known fact that the universe runs Siri, so.. ‘the hippopotamus can run up to 19 mph’

Don’t worry, Pig, there are fifty-eleven websites out there on the interwebs that list all of your mother’s contact information, relatives, former addresses and favorite food for anyone who wants to pay $9.95…….and a few websites who hand out the information for free.

There’s a frightening thought I said in that last panel… I can relate sadly.

One major EMP explosion and Western Civilization is doomed…..

While I was reading the comments, I got two incoming, “unknown callers” I googled the area codes…

Does anyone Remember phone numbers anymore, or birthdays, anniversaries, addresses lose your cell lose your mind.

That first happened to me way before cell phones. I got an “office” phone with like… 50(?) programmable buttons. Which I programmed for everyone… family, doctors, pizza, etc. etc. …and then promptly forgot all their numbers.

I’m sad to admit – I don’t know my mother’s cell phone number, either! (But I can still tell you what her land line number was 20 years ago. Now, I just say “Hey Siri – call Mom.”

My smart phone often hides very smartly and I have to call it and say “We’re not playing hide and seek.”

Ha! You need a device now. Recently you didn’t. The dynamic is funny! This, then that, then whaaaa!?!? Funny stuff.

I know the most important numbers (although I might end up calling a different child than I had intended!)My issue is passwords. Just had to change the easiest one (which I used on many, many sites) after it got compromised somewhere. It wasn’t guarding anything financial or essential, but I don’t want anyone else logging in as me. If I try not to use the same password twice, the list of passwords is HUGE! If I try to keep them written down (as well as saving them in the Keychain or whatever) it’s still a major task to keep everything updated. Convenience comes with a cost.

Why I call them dumb phones. I’ve never owned a smartphone. Have I owned a cell phone? Yes, but cell phones and smartphones are not automatically one in the same thing. All the cell phones I’ve owned have only ever been phones, can’t get on the internet with them, can’t take pictures, can’t make videos, can’t listen to music, can’t watch anything.

“OH, you’re on a smartphone now! How else can you be typing that?” I’ve answered that dozens of times. It’s called USING A TABLET!!!!. I use my laptop and my tablet (now usually just my tablet to read GoComics and post comments) to get on the net with.

Not “Universe,” Pig; Siri!

But in a more profoundly sad sense, Goat is right….

I can’t remember phone numbers. If I didn’t have a smartphone, I’d have a tiny phonebook instead. I did, actually, for a time. It was miserable.

true

I know my mobile number, home landline number, and the number for the house that I grew up in but left 43 years ago.