Hello everyone!  Sorry I've had a lapse in posts here lately.  Mostly this was due to the Thanksgiving holiday, however, I've also been connect-challenged for the past few days.  Here's the whole story, with commentary.

 

While traveling up to see my family in Milwaukee, my cell phone lost all knowledge of the Sprint network.  No voice signal, no data signal, nothing-- doesn't even seem to know that it's actually a cell phone anymore.  Funny how you come to take that little device for granted, now that I use it not only for voice calls, but also email, calendaring, pandora radio, and keeping up with the various social networks that I participate in (mostly just Facebook and Twitter).

 

 

It really hit me on Monday morning, when I was heading out the door to go to a client office, went to start my car, and realized that I had left a power inverter plugged in all through the holiday (no cranky).  So after rushing to do a quick jump-start from my wifes car, I knew I was running a little bit behind.  Crazy thing was, I had no idea HOW far behind, because of course the car's battery had discharged, meaning the clock said 12:01 and the radio was asking for a security code.  I don't wear a watch... why?  well because my cell phone always has the time!  But since it had crossed timezones and been off-the-network for 4 days, it had no clue either!  Anyway, I did make it there with 5 minutes to spare and had a great story to open with.

 

 

After swinging by the Sprint store afterwords, they told me since I had insurance on my phone, I could get the newer model of my phone for free (Treo 800w), but it would take 5 days for them to order it in (because they of course couldn't give me one of the ones already IN the store).  So it looks like I'm gonna be "disconnected" at least through the end of the week.  One thought I just had-- they said they'd "call me" when the phone was in... I wonder what number they will try?

 

Normally this wouldn't be a huge deal, except this week I'm in and out of the office quite a bit, so running around with no cell is a bit harder than one would expect (I have since set the clock in my car, so at least I know what time it is).  Before you all start feeling too sorry for me (fat chance I know), I do have a USB Cell data thing that I can plug into my tabletPC to stay somewhat connected.  That's been saving me so far (haven't missed any appointments yet), but it's pretty hard for me to imagine doing the other alternatives (printing out my calendar?).

 

I guess something I'm thankful for though is that all of these "things" I'm disconnected from, are actually meant to be disconnected- email, twitter, voicemail (hope I'm not missing too many of these), etc...  the "cloud" is perfectly content to hold onto my stuff until I get reconnected.

 

So anyway, one big choice I'll have when I do get the new cell phone is keep it (it'll be a brand new Treo 800w), or finally give in to the pressures of our controller and get on board our corporate cell plan (which is AT&T, so I'd probably get an iPhone).  Anyone have opinions?

 

And speaking of clocks- here's a very cool one: