A lot of us are loath to admit that we might be addicted to something – especially when it’s something that is totally and completely legal, but seems to be interrupting every day life. Such is the way of the smart phone.

The phone that I just gave back to my boyfriend, Samsung Galaxy S.

About two weeks into dating, my boyfriend at the time decided my phone wasn’t good enough (I was, at that point, using a MyTouch as an experiment with my Dad. The MyTouch had a few issues but was an okay phone, and a complete upgrade from the phone that T-Mobile thought I had – a Nokia XpressMusic.) So I get this text – “Hey! I got you a phone.” Being only two weeks into dating, I went positively berserk. “You what?!?!?!?” Phones come with contracts and expectations of being together for a long time – commitment. And, to be totally honest, my longest relationship at that point was about 3 months. Suffice it to say (the total tech geek that I am) when I realized it was a Galaxy S, I was mostly mollified. (I had some lingering fears about letting go of my old phone number, especially since between my parents moving and the new cell phone, it would be two phone numbers that I would dearly miss lost.) Lesson now learned. We broke up about two weeks ago, and of course, not wanting to pay a cell phone bill to my boyfriend, the phone had to go.

There was no immediate problem to this. My parents had, thank god, left my old cell phone line open, so I could just switch back to my old phone with my old provider. (And I admit, I have some company loyalty when it comes to T-Mobile anyway.)

However, my Nokia XpressMusic is also in today’s terms a “dumb phone”. It makes calls. It texts – though using the number pad. This phone lacks a QWERTY keyboard – but that’s just fine. I am a T9 champion when it comes to texting (though if I ever send “home” instead of “good”, I’m clearly not paying that close attention). And just in case you were wondering – the MyTouch just won’t stay on at this point… And it’s still running Android version “Eclair”. So the MyTouch is kind of out of the question at this point.

But as far as phones go, I’m not as lost as I could be.

My T-Mobile XpressMusic 5130

The problem is not that I’m not connected to the world 24/7. It’s that something in my brain keeps wanting to check my phone. For what, I have no clue. It cannot receive emails. Access to “T-Zones”, the old “dumb phone” ringtone/wallpaper/phone theme shopping store, is completely cutoff (probably because no one has “dumb phones” anymore). I can’t browse the internet. I can’t check Facebook. So really, my options with the thing are quite limited. But it’s original intended purpose (the one purpose that it needs to serve because the rest I can do via computer) is still very much in tact. And it will outright tell me if someone texts or calls. It is very good at that. It makes noise and everything. Even vibrates when I put it on silent. But no. I must check it every 30 minutes because my brain insists something must have happened since the last time I checked it.

And I swear, I’m killing the battery faster because of this incessant need.

And to be honest, what the phone is capable of – including the ability to play music, if the name of the phone didn’t give it away – is pretty good. The only thing that bugs me about the alarm clock settings is that I can’t set more than one. (And I have this awful tendency to turn alarms off in the morning. The snooze button has never once registered in my radar since I started using an alarm clock at age seven.)

So yes, I am apparently addicted to my phone. And checking it every 30 minutes is not helping. Even if there is nothing on the screen.

I’ve even started playing music on it because it’s something it can do.

Sad.

I love that little phone, even so.

And will continue to do so after I’ve replaced it.

With a Galaxy Note II.

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