Texting

If I start raving about something chances are the rest of the world has been excited about whatever it is for years. The latest example? Text messaging. I always thought texting was stupid. Why not just call the person? Why not just send an email?

Ever since I got my iPhone I've fallen in love with texting which, if you think it through, is really saying something since I can send and receive email on my iPhone. But texting is different. It pops right up and greets you with a friendly little chime. It's a nice, easy way to send a quick thought to someone (or to get ahold of a husband in meetings or wherever and unable to answer his phone).

So, texting. It was the thing to do five years ago (or more). And I am just now realizing how great it is.

iPhone

When my cell phone broke a few weeks ago I was perfectly content to renew our contract and get whatever free phone the company we went with had to give me. But Joe has wanted an iPhone for awhile. He has used a Blackberry for a few years now and he does need the email capabilities for work purposes and so last week he finally convinced me an iPhone was the way to go.

I sent him off to the AT&T store to figure it all out and bring home whatever for me. Imagine me surprise (and delight!) when he arrived home with not one, but two iPhones-- one for him and one for me.

I didn't ask for an iPhone and I didn't even think I particularly wanted one but, I have to say, it's really, really cool. It actually does a lot more than I thought it did and I am pretty excited to have it. So much for all my rants against technology, now I'm just as hyper-connected as everyone else. At least my hyper-connectivity comes in a pretty pink case.

Cell Phone

Last week I dropped my cell phone in my coffee cup-- my full of coffee coffee cup. I was outside trying to help one of the kids with something with one hand and balancing my phone and coffee cup in the other and my phone just slipped into the coffee. Whatever. No excuse necessary, it was stupid and now my phone won't work.

The silver lining is that our cell phone contract is up anyway so now we can renew and get some sort of free phone deal. But what's killing me while I look is all the extras these phones have. Sure I'd like to be able to check email remotely, but is it necessary for a home-schooling mom to be available to everyone eighteen different ways? No. I just need a phone that makes and receives phone calls. That's it.

Why does that seem like too much to ask?

Random Stuff

Our phone works again. Whew. I never realized how many people only had our home phone number and not our cell phone numbers. On the bright side, though, voicemail was able to screen out the 8 gazillion calls we received Monday and Tuesday telling us who to vote for and I never had to listen to the robo calls.

Holy week was wonderful. Each year I am more and more thankful for such a wonderful church, church family and the family and friends we have and who share in our Easter Sunday festivities with us. My house hasn't recovered yet and physically I'm exhausted, but I am so thankful for all our Holy Week services, for a joyful Easter service and breakfast after and for everyone who celebrated at our home with us later that day.

The forecast predicts that we might hit the sixties by the end of the week. Horrah!

Still waiting on a renovation versus moving verdict. I wish our builder would hurry and call back. If we're going the addition route I want to hurry up and start!

Really having trouble deciding on a name for our new daughter. Joe and I just aren't reaching a consensus and while we still have lots of time I wish we had a shorter short list. I feel as if I scour our family trees in vain one more time that I just might scream.

Wonky Phone

Something is wrong with our home phone. It's not working. See the problem?

I've yet to bite the bullet and spend the requisite number of minutes on hold with SBC, press the right buttons, talk to their automated phone service and then, ultimately, schedule a service call, and many of you may have noticed this if you've tried calling us over the past few days.

It's annoying but, for now, call my cell. Sooner or later I'll deal with this. I promise.

Digital World

When I was growing up my mom had a large, black, rotary dial phone next to her bed in addition to the main phone the rest of us shared in our downstairs hallway. I thought that clunky old rotary phone was the cat's meow because you could use it while lying on a bed. I mean, really, how great was technology, right?

My children don't know what a rotary dial phone is. The only place they've seen one is at a museum. They know a world where cell phones and cordless phones rule. They know they can email me from Daddy's phone. Elisabeth has four discarded cell phones among her collection of very favorite toys.

When I was growing up pictures where taken on rolls of film that you had to wait days or weeks to have developed before you could actually see them. Unless, of course, you were lucky enough to have have a Polaroid camera (I wasn't) and then you could see your pictures instantly (or, after five minutes, which seemed instant at that time).

Anytime someone takes my children's picture they immediately run behind the photographer so they can see the photo on the camera's display screen. And the picture is always on ready display because nearly everyone has a digital camera. Including, now, my seven-year-old daughter-- and she knows how to use it ("Let's review the pictures now, Hank, OK? ")!

We've gained a lot as a society but, sometimes, I feel as if we've lost a lot also. Remember the days when if you weren't available at work whomever was trying to reach you would just leave a message with a co-worker? On paper? They wouldn't have a five alternate numbers to try before giving up or, as a last resort, be able to email you anytime, anywhere.

Even more incomprehensible these days, if you tried to reach someone at home and they weren't there you had to simply try back later and hope you reached them. Frustrating, sure, but wasn't life a bit calmer and simpler before having three different voice mails to check and analyzing a caller ID log? Wasn't it more relaxing when you weren't expected to be reached, and respond, instantly?

I can't talk, really. My family and I have bought into all the digital devices that are supposed to make our lives simpler. It's just that, at times, I wonder if they really do.

Cute Video, II

Elisabeth's new favorite activity: talking on the phone. She's thrown her first, honest to goodness tantrums over seeing someone speaking on the phone and not instantly giving it to her the moment she reaches her hand out for it (which is, as a matter of course, the very second she spots someone using it).

Following is a very amateur video showing her engaging in her favorite past time. Forgive me, you have to watch this video sideways since, apparently, there's no way to turn a video once it's been shot. So, turn your head to the side and enjoy.