Oh, the horror?!

 

 

 

Can you imagine heading into 2015 without a mobile device or tablet at your beck and call?

 

 

 

 

I  can.

Come January and the foreseeable future, welcome to my quieter world. I haven’t coddled a personal mobile marvel in my knotty palms since July. No texts. No calls. No apps. No selfies. 

 

 

 

 

 Oh, the humanity – how do I live?

 

 

I’ll tell you how I live. Quite normally. Absolutely splendidly. Look Ma, no hands.

It’s total freedom. No fumbling around in the car or frantically searching the kitchen for that darn thingamajig that seems to disappear at the most inopportune times. Don’t miss what I don’t have.

 

 

 

 

 

So, you’re probably wondering, how do I communicate? Like Fred Flintstone in a Zuckerberg-ian quarry.

 

 

 

 

 

Brace yourself. I make almost 100 percent of my outgoing calls on a land line! Explain that to your teenagers? One more dinosaur revelation – I still have an AOL e-mail address?! Had it since I first plopped in that floppy disk and dialed-up the world. Rolling your eyes, eh?! The old standard works just fine – like a turntable in an Ariana Grande sound check. Many friends have changed their providers and e-mail addresses like I change my underwear. You know who you are.

 

 

 

 

 

With much respect to crossover country-popper Kenny Chesney – I re-purposed one of his most-memorable 2002 ditties for the purpose of making my point. Nothing but The Good Stuff. Mobile iContraptions and other hand-holders in the category have become so commonplace and intrusive that folks are snubbing basic etiquette.

 

 

 

 

 

Case in point. On a recent Thursday I was in Save-On Foods around 11 AM. Turning down a new aisle I came across a woman talking rather loudly on her mobile manipulator. She was oblivious to the ruckus on what sounded like a business call. Was she in sales? In retail? In a coma? Her cacophonous call was an unappreciated annoyance to those of us who stumbled upon her.

 

 

 

 

I quickly zipped past Mama Mobile and headed down the aisle. Oh, geez. Second verse of the same song – Louder Linda. She was yapping into her phone like her hair extensions were on fire. With a baby in her cart. Perhaps she was calling Gerber for advice on the split-pea or strained-carrots mush for her toddler? Doesn’t matter – rudeness needs to be rooted out!

 

 

 

 

A few blog posts ago I wrote about Adjustments vs. Compromises. Without an open work permit or job, I don’t really need all that mobile connectivity. Elaine knows where I am almost every hour of every day. And vice-versa.

Life is wireless-ly uncomplicated. Don’t miss the monthly cell-phone bills.

 

 

I imagine getting re-connected sometime in the Spring. BlackBerry was my weapon of choice with provider Sprint back in the day. My wife is ga-ga over her latest famous-fruit rectangular reader. She’s a magician with it. No problem for me eventually stepping back into the mobile quagmire.

 

 

 

 

 

Canadian mobile-service providers – come and sell me. Don’t be rude.