Saturday, July 14, 2007

A Tale of Two Cell Phones

Some time last Spring I ran my phone through the washing machine with a load of blue jeans. The jeans came out looking spiffy. And the phone still worked, though the battery died in the flood. Since The Boss Lady and I had identical cell phones, I was able to test out my phone with her battery.

An aside, yes, it is indeed true, having the same cell phone as your spouse does qualify as one of the worst decisions you can make in a marriage.

I was able to dry my phone out and get it working again after buying a new $60 high capacity battery. Which sucked, because this was the freebie phone from the cell phone company. I wouldn't have paid $60 for it originally. But the company would not let me upgrade phones unless I bought one of theirs at full price. Of course, they did not sell one for less than the cost of the battery.

Months later I read in an online group that our local Costco, where we had bought the phones originally, had generous phone return policies. One of those guys had swapped a broken phone that was a couple of years old for a new freebie. So I kept thinking I would put Costco to the test.

Several months have gone by since then. And I finally remembered about the plan to swap out my worn out old phone. But I made a rookie mistake. I told the wife.

So yesterday she dealt with Costco and the phone kiosk guys to get my phone swapped. Though it took about an hour and multiple explanations to numerous people about how the phone would not work properly, when she walked away she had a new phone in her hand. For herself.

Huh? But I was the idiot who washed my phone. I should be getting the new toy.

It worked out like this. Costco swapped MY phone, minus that $60 battery. We swapped that into her phone first. And when we got home I spent an hour and a half getting the phone numbers switched so that The Boss Lady's number would be assigned to the new phone.

That was rookie mistake #2. If only I had told her "Sorry they can't do it..." So now The Boss Lady has my new Blue-tooth enabled phone with a camera.

And all I got this month was a new car, a working shower and some new clothes. But if anyone calls me to ask about my great month I have to talk to them on a crappy old cell phone. What a gyp.

3 comments:

Ginger said...

Mike, you are starting to sound like a kept man!

Ginger said...

The princess was probably already thinking about hiding cheat sheets for preschool in her calculator.

Anonymous said...

Yes, I hear what your saying about the phones. We have the exact same phone-- smart and not smart all at once. At least we both understand how the phone works, but getting them mixed up for the day makes for more work for each of us.