Sunday, April 10, 2011

Dear British Phone

I knew you were trouble from the moment I saw you. You look all harmless, all tiny and violet, but it wasn't long before I realised that you were only hiding an 'n' from each of those adjectives, which would have clued me in to your evil. Tiny and violet you may be, but you are also TINNY and VIOLENT and I hate you. That's right- I hate how you sound and flinging yourself out of my hands when I try to use you is not cool. Someone's going to lose an eye one of these days, and it's probably going to be me.

But I'm not a phone racist, nor do I hate you for your diminutive size. No, I hate you for much deeper reasons than that.

Has it ever occurred to you, Phone, that your job is in your name? Yes, you're supposed to phone people. This means putting the call through the first time, not emitting that stupid little cheerful chirp that means you have, for the fourth time in two minutes, neglected to even let their line ring before dropping the call.
The worst case of this, Phone, was yesterday, when I tried to call a theatre. You gleefully hung yourself up six times and when I finally reached the box office, you cut off the call just as the manager was finialising my credit card information. I don't think you understand how serious this is- I have wanted to see The Complete Works of Shakespeare: Abridged for six years. Don't EVER pull a stunt like that again (and I got my tickets anyway, so nyeh.)

What is almost as annoying is when I want to delete an old text message. The following exchange occurs every time:

Me: Delete.
You: Are you sure you want to delete this?
Me: That's why I hit the button.
You: You really want to delete this message?
Me: Yes.
You: Because, just so you know, if you delete it, it will be, like, deleted.
Me: Yes.
You: You won't be able to read it again.
Me: Delete.
You: Ever.
Me: DELETE.
You: Like, ever ever.
Me: DE.LETE.
You: Fine. God.

But you don't always look on text messages with such love. No, the ones you do not cherish are my responses, the long ones that took me forever to write out because you don't have a keyboard like my American phone, instead requiring me to hit the same button up to four times before I get the character I need. When I labor over these messages and hit send, you love to present the "SENDING FAILED!" screen and then display a blank document. This makes me go all Hulk-style angry, Phone.

I won't even detail your other faults: your lack of a memo option and calculator (don't just assume that after sixteen years of school that I can do simple sums.) Your affinity for allowing me to butt-dial. Your loud and insistent ring even when I silence you. Your camera timer that sounds so similar to a bomb counting down its final seconds that I can't use it in the tube for fear of being tackled by security. No, I won't go into these, Phone. I've devoted too much of my time to you. And when June comes, oh, we are finished. We are over, Phone, OVER! There was never anything between us. Anyway, I never broke up with my American phone before I left home. You were just a bit on the side.

No love at all,

Rachel

Script Frenzy update: 46/100 pages. I love write-ins.

0 comments:

Post a Comment