Until July 2017, documenting the seasons of coastal Dorset. I'm a complete amateur so don't trust I'm always right. If ever you see I'm wrong - whether with identifications or in anything else - do say! Meanwhile . . . I've now moved to Halifax in West Yorkshire. Click on the link below to collect the new URL. Don't forget to follow there!

Monday 16 March 2009

I'VE DROPPED MY PHONE DOWN THE LOO

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Yesterday evening, I dropped my phone down the loo.
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I didn't mean to. I'm heartbroken. I fished it out and dried it off and rubbed it all over with lens cleaner which, I think, being a spirit (I think) will have killed off any germs which adhered to it during its short dive. I've been carrying it around all day, pressing the buttons in a vain hope that it may be restored to life. I'm not dead yet. But it still is.
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I've been to town to see about buying a new one. Samsung doesn't make them any more. The newer version is thicker and heavier and pink. I can't take photos on a pink phone! Quite apart from the indignity of it, it's shiny and 'd glare in the sun. The pictures would all be skee-wiff and I'd have a permanent migraine. To buy it in black, I'd have to pay twenty pounds extra!
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! ! ! ! !
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Twenty pounds for the colour black!
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I came home.
I went to bed.
I felt sick.
I had a headache.
All I wanted to do was sleep.
I slept.
I've woken up.
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Tomorrow, I'll be going back to town and paying twenty pounds for black.
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* * * * *
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Today's blog was going to be about primroses in an old churchyard. Wordsworth's brother is buried there. (He was shipwrecked nearby.) And there's a pirate tombstone. And celandines. And daffodils.
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But you know where the pictures for that post went? . . . Which is why, today, there isn't a proper bog - I mean . . .
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_____
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For the post before this - Roots and Water

23 comments:

Heather said...

Oh no! What a thing to happen :(

And £20 extra for black? Daylight robbery!!

Lucy Corrander Now in Halifax! said...

It's extraordinary isn't it!

And I suppose I'm not the only one who doesn't like the pink version.

I've been struggling with myself.

It seems ridiculous and extravagant to pay the extra but taking photographs is such an important and enjoyable part of my life, I'd be bereft if I couldn't do it . . . and wouldn't do it if I were doing it badly.

And I couldn't do this blog either, or PICTURES JUST PICTURES . . . so

Lucy

garden girl said...

Oh dear, what bad luck Lucy!

Hard to believe you have to pay extra for not-pink. I like pink flowers, but I'd draw the line at a pink phone too.

CiNdEe's GaRdEn said...

Oh no! One time I dropped my phone in a bucket of milk. I use to have a milk cow! I was really bummed and had to get a new phone too. Good luck with your new phone shopping!

Gary said...

Lucy, Before you buy a new one, take the back off it and give it a very quick rinse in some meths if you have some, it with absorb any moisture then let it dry out. It worked when I did the same with my old Nokia.

Good luck

Gary

Lucy Corrander Now in Halifax! said...

Garden Girl.

I'm glad you left that comment. I was a bit apprehensive it would turn out that everyone except me loves pink phones above all others - and say so!

(But don't let this put off anyone who would like to leave a comment extolling their virtues!)

Lucy

P.S. I probably wouldn't mind quite as much if it weren't that I want it for taking photos with. Although not hightly polished, it was shiny as well as pink.

Lucy Corrander Now in Halifax! said...

Cindee - and now I'm jealous that you had a cow!

The woman in the shop says lots of people drop phones down loos. (Especially women!) She said she has a friend who has done this to TEN in the last year. In some ways I find that consoling . . . I mean I thought I was stupid!

Lucy
Lucy

Lucy Corrander Now in Halifax! said...

Gary - I wish I'd been able to read your comment earlier but our internet was off this morning. (Something to do with changing from analogue to digital. The last time it happened, mobile phones and televisions went off in the area too and it was a bit eerie!)

(Read this as if I'm saying it in a cross voice because when the switch over happens I'll have to buy a new radio too!)

Anyway . . . I've just come in from buying the new (black!) phone.

Meanwhile . . . my usual phone is developing a life of its own. It's started turning itself on and off. At one point it started whirring wildly until I took the battery out. Sometimes it will respond if I press a button. Sometimes not. I've found a company on Portland that sends phones to Norwich to be mended so, now I find there is life of a sort in it, I'm thinking I might do that. I hadn't known phones could be mended so I'm pleased about that.

I think, when people in the mobile phone shop say phones can't be mended, they really mean they don't mend them. Which is different!

Thanks for the advice though. I hope there won't be another time, but, if there is . . . meths! (Sounds hairy!)

Lucy

Gordon Mason said...

I know I'm missing out on so many gags here, but all I'm going to say is I'm sorry. I'm missing your photos already!

Monica the Garden Faerie said...

LOL, I suspected you would not intentionally throw the phone down the loo, unless of course it was defective already!! My phone is black but I'd have liked silver or maybe green, but that costs extra here!!! :)

Monica the Garden Faerie said...

And while I don't like pink things in general (way too girly), somehow a pink phone is OK with me. ???

Plant Mad Nige said...

Whatever happens, don't stop posting your lovely and distinctive pictures.

I dropped the lid of the toothpaste down the loo yesterday morning. You're supposed to just flip the cap, but I refuse to be up to date and always unscrew it, hence, the accident. It cleaned up OK, and I'm the only one who knows it happened!

Have you considered the total, unadulterated joy and delight of an iPhone?

Lucy Corrander Now in Halifax! said...

Hello Gordon.

If the new phone takes photographs as efficiently as the old one then I will be happy and the gap will be short.

If it doesn't . . . well I'll be stuck!

Tomorrow, I'll see.

(Which probably means it will rain.)

Lucy

Lucy Corrander Now in Halifax! said...

Hello Monica

Green would be good. I don't think I've seen a green phone.

The whole thing's daft. My understanding is that the pink version is cheaper because it came onto the market first and the older the phone, the cheaper it is, regardless that it is the colour alone which has changed, not the technology.

It's been quite a challenge this phone thing because, although the main reason I don't want shiny pink is because I think it would be a distraction when using the phone as a camera (which is the only way I do use it) I know there is an element of prejudice here. I've walked all the way to town and into the shops and home again with a tear on one of the legs of my trousers. (It caught on a bit of wire.) I haven't been in the least bit embarassed. Yet I would be mortified to be seen in public with a pink phone.

Perhaps I should buy one on purpose . . . as a kind of spiritual exercise . . . to overcome my self-consciousness in this regard?

(Fortunately, I've got the camera excuse as cover, so I won't!)

Lucy

Lucy Corrander Now in Halifax! said...

Hello Nigel.

For a bit, I did think I'd have to stop - and the thought was agony. (I mean it. It really was. I quite shocked myself by how upset I was.) But, hopefully, everything will back to normal tomorrow.

As for the unadulterated joys and delights of an iPhone - as with other quite a few other joys and delights, finance (lack of) gets in the way.

Do you have one? Have you tried photographing with it? What are the results like?

Lucy

petoskystone said...

oh you poor bereft photographer!!!but extra $$ for basic black??? wow--no other stores in the area?
i'm not a fan of pink either.

Mr. McGregor's Daughter said...

Someday they'll invent phones that are waterproof and inexpensive. I've had to replace phones for my husband, as he keeps forgetting to take it out of his swim trunks pocket before jumping in the pool. I don't blame you for not wanting a pink phone - it's too Paris Hilton! Your dignity is definitely worth 20 pounds.

Gary said...

Lucy, I use an iPhone and love it. It takes great photo's but, there's always a but. No zoom, No flash and you cannot attach pics to SMS messages (or open any that are sent to you!) A laot of my blog pics are taken on it.

Gary

Lucy Corrander Now in Halifax! said...

Hello Gary - I'm just working out what settings I want on my new camera / phone and am just about to transfer a couple of test pictures to my laptop.

Although it's a 5GB and the one I dropped was only a 3.2, on the phone screen screen at least, there is much less detail and the colour isn't so good. I'm hoping that will be different when I print the pictures or transfer them to the computer.

With my last phone, what I could see through the viewfinder was precisely the same as what I could see with my eyes. With this one, I can have it on 'auto' in which case everything goes rather cold and whiteish, or 'daylight' in which is goes warmer but yellowish. I wish there were a setting which simply said 'accurate'!

My last phone didn't have a flash, just a useless light that sent out a little jet. I tried it, but found it gave things an unnatural blueish tinge so I didn't bother with it after that - and things worked perfectly fine, even indoors (and down holes!). This phone does have a flash but I haven't tried it yet.

About the iPhone . . . how very odd about the SMS and photos. I wonder why that is.

Also, it seems rather large for carrying all the time in one's hand, which is what I do.

Oh, this is all very alarming. Things are still in the balance!

Lucy

Far Side of Fifty said...

Oh Lucy, What bad luck, hope your new one takes decent photos:)

Lucy Corrander Now in Halifax! said...

Hello Petoskystone.

Other stores in the area . . . I phoned one and it went straight on to playing music - no recorded message even, so I hung up.

I phoned another and they were very rude and said I had to come into the shop before they would give any advice. They even lectured me about the customers who were walking in and out of the shop all the time . . . (I've been in that shop . . . they aren't very nice in person either so I'm buoycotting them.)

Two other shops recommended the same you-have-to-pay-extra-for-black phone.

Joy!

Lucy

Lucy Corrander Now in Halifax! said...

Hello Far Side of Fifty.

I bought the phone . . . charged it up . . . it takes rubbish photos. Awful. I've taken it back and have bought a different one from another shop. It's massively more expensive and I kept waking last night and asking myself 'oh, what have I done?'! It's charging still but, when I try it out, I'm hoping that what I've done is bought a good one . . . but I'll need to give up eating for a few months in consequence!

Incidentally, I thought of you several times while I was talking with shop assistants . . . no-one offered me a dog though!

Lucy

Lucy Corrander Now in Halifax! said...

Hi, Mr McGregor's Daughter.

The only reason I can think of why they don't make waterproof phones (I'm sure it's within their capacity) is so they can keep selling new ones . . . or insurance. The shop where I've bought this latest attempt offered me their standard insurance which specifically includes dropping the phone in the loo!

I suppose it would be indelicate to ask what you say to your husband when he jumps into the pool, yet again, with his phone?

Lucy