Why Are Cell Phones So Shitty?

This is the question that has been on my mind for a long time. With today's lifestyle, a cell phone is close to a necessity for almost everyone, yet they are like a plague on society. You need one, yet it will never work as you want it to - at least that's my experience. For example, today, since I'm at home now, I had to change my number to a local one. First, I called Rogers, and faked being my mom (since she's the main name on the account), but unfortunately got her birthday wrong by one year (errrr). When I was informed of this, I told the girl on the other line that I was her daughter and I was just trying to change my phone number to a local number since I'm now home from school. She told me that I was an authorized user, but that I could not do that. Huh? Since 6 months ago when my mom made me an authorized user so that I could make changes to my account, I have not been allowed to do anything. I've tried changing my plan to save some money, which I was not allowed to do (actually they told me I wasn't an authorized user, and my mom later called greatly displeased with their idiocy), but now, something as simple as changing my phone number was not a possibility.

When I was able to change my number (by being oh so resourceful and using facebook as the source for my mother's birthday, and then again pretending to be her - except having all the right information this time), it was time to send my new number to my contact list. Most phones have the convenient option of sending out mass messages to entire contact lists, or creating a group with your entire contact list to send a message to, but unfortunately not the fine piece of technology that I own. I start adding contacts to a message ONE BY ONE. After a bunch, I realize there might be a cap on the number of people you can send to, and maybe my phone is not telling me (highly likely considering just how quality it is) so I send off my first batch. Once I start my second batch, the message gets sent back to me "Unable to send - Too many". Okay great. By now I've realized there is a way to create groups, so I go ahead and make one, but of course to add contacts, it is done ONE BY ONE. The cap is at 50 so I add people until I reach 50. Back to composing a message, I send it out to the group - sorry, max 20 recipients for one message. At this point I've dropped numerous F bombs, and I'm at the point of giving up, but since a) I'm a huge loser and worry that people actually even care about my new phone number and b) I'm a huge loser and had nothing better to do with my time I decide to make groups of 20 people. I'm finally able to send out the message to my eagerly waiting contact list. I can finally relax, a little although I'm not pleased with my phone. After a few minutes, I receive a message back "Error - too many". This is it. Not only have the messages not been sent, but since my phone does not keep track of outgoing messages (seriously - I know you probably didn't think this existed) I have no idea who didn't get it. Fuck it. This is so over - I have now finally come to the conclusion that whoever didn't get it, probably did not care.

I have never been so fed up with a phone, and previous to this phone I had one that shut down every 7-10 minutes and had to be turned back on. I am so ready to give in and buy a blackberry - not only did my phone cause me all this stress, but like I said above it does not save outgoing messages, AND it does not save words in my t9 - yes these are not that big of problems, but it's seriously annoying when you have to type fuck in by hand EVERY SINGLE TIME. I've always been against blackberries for many reasons. First I am a drunken idiot, and have lost my phone on numerous occasions, but being oh so lucky to have such unfortunate phones, I have always gotten it back. Secondly, I do not like the idea that people know when I have read their bbm. This is a trap to keep you in a conversation, or to stress you out in answering something that really you needed more time to answer, but are feeling time pressure due to the person waiting on the other end.

I went up to the mall to rogers, and looked at the phones. A blackberry was definitely out of the question - my mom wasn't allowing me to resign any contracts, and they were way too expensive anyways. I looked at the other phones, but since I'd had some time to calm down, I asked the guy working there if maybe he would help me make my phone slightly less shitty. He was able to figure out how to save my outgoing text messages, which is a slight upgrade. I walked out of the store fairly satisfied, and I was glad I had not given into the blackberry.