They never give you the cell phone manual you really need

I just gave my grandson Edison a smart phone for his birthday; no 11-year-old can compete in today’s hectic fifth-grade world without the ability to text, email and play Angry Birds. My granddaughter Rosie—two years younger than her brother—is still using a “dumb” phone, one that has only the ability to text, email, take photos and sort laundry into lights and darks. Somehow, she squeaks by.

My own cell phone boasts the ability to remotely pilot a space shuttle and find the flaws in Einstein’s GeneralTheory of Relativity. The deluxe version of the Relativity ap also allows you to correct Einstein’s flaws and achieve time travel, but that costs 99-cents and there’s no way I’m paying for an ap when I can download Angry Birds for free!

With Christmas just around the corner there are sure to be lots of new cell phones under lots of Christmas trees. Most of these will come with a manual that shows you how to download aps, perform speech recognition functions and—should the need ever arise—make a phone call. To make things easy, these manuals offer instructions in several different languages, one of which might or might not be English.

This may prove frustrating for some users, but it shouldn’t be. Why? Because those manuals don’t tell you anything you really need to know about your new cell phone anyway. I’ve gone through a lot of cell phones since purchasing my first brick-sized, battery sucking Motorola back in the Pleistocene Epoch and over the years I’ve learned what you really need to know about cell phones.

In fact, I’m thinking of coming out with a cell phone manual of my own, a general use kind of thing that applies to all brands and models. Here are some excerpts. If enough people are willing to shell out five bucks for the complete manual, I’ll write the rest.

CHAPTER THREE—SAFETY: Your new cell phone has been coated with a moisture attractant that causes it to gravitate toward water. If you place your phone near any liquid, it will eventually fall in. If you sit your phone on a restaurant table, your beer will tip over and drain into the unit’s most delicate electronic components. If you take your phone with you on a fishing boat so you can pretend you’re working should your editor happen to call, you will fall in the lake. This is especially true if you have been drinking beer and are too lazy to motor toward shore to make room for more. Attempts to “go” over the side of the boat will end in disaster, for both you and your new phone.

CHAPTER SIX—INSURANCE: Insurance for your new phone will seem inexpensive until you factor it out over the life of your phone, at which point you will realize you could have purchased four new phones and Trump Tower for what you’ve paid in premiums. Also, after covering your insurance faithfully for 15 months, your payment will somehow be “misplaced.” This will happen the same day you fall out of your boat, thereby negating your coverage. Oops.

CHAPTER NINE—PROPER PHONE HANDLING: If you hand your new phone to your grandson so he can say hello to his mother, he will drop it, usually on the pavement of a large parking lot or over a bridge and into a river. You will not be allowed to kill him because he is your grandson and you’re supposed to love him.

CHAPTER ELEVEN—OBSOLESCENCE: Your new cell phone is obsolete. Yes, even if you haven’t received your first bill yet. If you waited in line for three days to be the first person on your block to own the latest uber-mega-genius-phone, it will still be an antique by the time you get it home and out of the box. You might as well be using a wall-mounted unit with a crank on the side that only gets Mayberry operator “Sarah,” who will then put your call through to Mount Pilot.

CHAPTER TWELVE—SECURITY: This chapter includes information on choosing a screen protector, a silicon sleeve to protect the screen protector and a hard case to protect the sleeve. A large, steel gun safe usually serves to protect the hard case. This can in some ways negate the unit’s portability factor, but owners of fancy new cell phones like to keep them looking nice right up until the moment they fall out of the boat.

That’s it for now, I guess. I’ll come up with additional “indispensable” information if enough readers agree to shell out five bucks for my omnibus manual.

Buy Mike Taylor’s real book, Looking at the Pint Half Full, at mtrealitycheck.com or download the Kindle edition at Amazon.com.

Is there anything but socks that a modern cell phone can’t do?

I broke down and picked out a new cell phone the other day. My contract was up and in order to keep me locked in like a 1950s housewife, the phone company offered to give me a way cool phone at a low, low price (after mail-in rebate, of course).

The phone is one of those touch-screen jobs, with only a couple “real” buttons on it. Lacking the usual bevy of buttons, the phone looks deceptively simple to operate. I like simple.

The girls at the phone store, Kimmi and Monique, both use the same model and raved about it at length.

“It can do anything,” Monique enthused.

“You can go on the Internet, get your email, and even watch TV!” Kimmi said.

“It will do everything but wash your socks!” Monique added.

“Do you have one that will wash my socks?” I asked. Since the departure of the Former Lovely Mrs. Taylor I’ve discovered that laundry is not as much fun as it at first appears. A phone that would wash my socks would be a welcome addition to my collection of consumer electronics.

They do not, it turns out, make a sock-washing phone.

But considering all the other stuff the SUHX-500* can do, I was willing to continue doing my own laundry, at least until I can find a new Mrs. Taylor.

“I’ll take it,” I said.

Monique proceeded to go online to set the phone up with my existing service. Because the SUHX-500 can do so many wonderful things, setting it up took a loooooooong time. I perused other cell phone models, accessories and the dozen or so informational pamphlets lying around the store. My beard grew longer. The sun passed across the sky a few times. Summer turned to autumn, autumn to winter. (In other words, time passed.)

Finally Monique returned with my new phone, all charged up and ready to make my first call, which I tried to do as soon as I got to the truck. Turns out that – because the SUHX-500 can do so many things – I now have to navigate through a series of menus just to get to the on-screen, virtual “dialer,” then I punch in the appropriate ten digits, then press “send,” then press “yes” when my SUHX-500 asks me if I’m sure I want to make a call. I went through the menus. I opened the dialer. I punched in the appropriate ten digit number. I hit send. So, yes you stupid phone, I am sure I want to make the call.

Sorry, I’m ranting.

I grew up in an era when the family phone (there was only one) was leased from Ma Bell (look it up in the history books, junior) and it did one thing – make phone calls. It was heavy, built like a tank, and almost as attractive.

You couldn’t use it to watch TV, surf the Web (which Al Gore had yet to “invent”), or listen to digital music files.

But it never, ever asked if I was sure I wanted to make a call.

Our gizmos and gadgets get smarter every day, while we poor humans remain about the same. I saw those “Terminator” movies; I have a feeling this is all going to end badly.

* Not the phone’s real model number. If they want free advertising here, they can pay me up front and I’ll give them a rebate form good for 10 percent back.