By Trina Machacek

This is for all of us that are not all that excited to get, or have need to get, a new electronic anything. Especially a new phone. Which is what I recently had to do. UGH!

Trina Machacek

In watching TV during the Christmas mad dash to buy and give gifts, through the after Christmas crazy dash to spend new Christmas gifted money, the ads for phones and phone services are as prevalent as the ads for the best deal at check cashing businesses. Yet another talk we should have at some point.

But! Yes, a phone booth sized “but.” We all seem to need to follow the leader of the biggest, best or cheapest provider parade. How in the telephonic world do you make the choice? One line or, two lines for just a few dollars more. Unlimited phone, text and data. Or, unlimited phone and text a whopping fourteen thousand mosquito bytes of data with an extra few pennies more for each byte after that. OH! Let me not get started talking about the death of the penny! Yet another talk to have—soon.

My phone started to act up in ways that I could not relate to the “help” desk. I would say my texts are disappearing and the response would be, “What do you mean disappearing?”  What part of poof they are gone, or the receiver never got them, or *&%*^$#^%$ texts did they not understand. Calls of help finally led me to a new phone. And away we go.

The little thing came and of course it was not the same size of my old phone. So out went my cover. I loved that cover; it has glitter in some liquid and was all girly and sparkly. Now I just have a pink dull thing. But it’s not about the cover, is it? It’s about all the “new” vices, uh I mean amazing new things the new phone can do.

Now I know people that have the $1000.00 phones. Oh they all get up and do the dance of the Internet Faries. I just wanted a phone that would make and receive phone calls. Texts when necessary and take a picture too. Let me tell you that my phone is what I call my “old- lady phone.” Bells and whistles are there, just small and quiet. I use it for business, sure. I have a way to follow some social media stuff. I have even, sadly, left my watch wearing self in the dust and use my phone for a timepiece. To be honest about that. I actually lost my watch one day in the grocery store in Ely, Nevada and never went back to lost and found and did not replace my watch either. I do miss my wristwatch. I still look at my arm to see what time it is, but the hair on my arm is not as good a timepiece as was my Timex! Yet another story to be told at another time- HAHA Get it? Tell the story about time at another time! Moving on.

As my old-lady phone and I got to know each other I noticed something new in the text section. Little check marks were popping up by some of the names I was texting to. Not all of them. Just some. Then there were those that had two check marks. Oh and some had little circles, or bubbles like you would see above cartoon people, like where they would be “talking.” Oh new stuff. Swell. Sometimes the marks were white, sometimes red. Sometimes the bubbles were empty and sometimes they were filled in. More often than not, there were no marks at all. Well, what the ding-dong was this all about?!

So off to Google I go, again. You know what I think is amazing about Google or other “tell me why” search engines? When I was a kid and needed to look up a word or reason for something, we had to use the dictionary. The world-famous cry was, “How can I look up a word when I don’t know how to spell the word?”  With google you just have to put something in close to what you want. Hit or click or touch a button, mouse or screen and the world is delivered. Oh, the days of dropping the five-pound dictionary on your foot are gone forever. Goodbye Funk and Wagnall and Encyclopedia Britannica. My that’s what? The fourth story to be discussed later? Cool.

Google told me these marks are telling me if my texts were sent, received, read, flushed. But only if the other person has the same type of phone as my old-lady phone. Apparently, most of my friends and text-mates are in the old-lady phone boat with me. Welcome aboard Matey’s.

Trina lives in Diamond Valley, north of Eureka, Nevada. She loves to hear from readers. Email her at itybytrina@yahoo.com