Monday 9 August 2010

Mobile Death Leap

It's a well known fact that mobile phones have a death wish, especially when in the vicinity of water. Over the weekend, my cherished Siemens A62 (a design classic in my book, if in no one else's) managed an impressive leap from an inside pocket of my jacket into the bowl of what is known in smart circles as the toilet. I'd scooped it out in an instant (the water, I should add at this point, was entirely clean), but it was too late: the poor old thing was, to all appearances, 100 percent defunct. After much vigorous drying, I established that the Sim card had survived its ducking, and, removed to Mrs Nige's phone (a Siemens A55!), continued to function. I hastily ordered a Siemens A60 off eBay - £3.99 Buy It Now price! - and there I left matters until yesterday evening when, on a whim, I though I'd try reassembling the old A62 to see what happened. To my amazement, the whole thing came back to life and I am now back where I began, though the dear old thing is a little slower on the button than it was. Despite their death wish, these old mobiles are surprisingly sturdy. Getting the old A62 back in my hands in working order was strangely moving - odd how attached one becomes to these things.

8 comments:

  1. Ah, the old A62 Nige, never could take going down the pan, unlike false teeth but we shan't go there.

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  2. A phone ad on the telly (was it Blackberry? I forget) the other day was boasting about how it had More More More aps! it was exhausting. "But I want less," I realised, and said. "A phone, text and the game 'Snake' is all a man ever needs on a mobile telephone." Retroprogressive, see.

    Okay maybe a camera too.

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  3. It's August, you see, and so time for them to return to their spawning grounds in the South China Sea. The instinct is so strong they'll jump into any running water.

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  4. Nige, I'm afraid I've been BlackBerried and I don't like it at all.

    I just downgraded when I traded in my trusted old brick of a Sony Ericsson for the latest BlackBerry (with that all important capital B) I spent three whole days trying to configure my email accounts on the damned thing and was close to a nervous breakdown afterwards. I've lost all the phone numbers saved in my SIM card and now my email access is totally BlackBerried (takes 10 times longer to retrieve than before) - plus all emails are duplicated on the handset when I open my webmail. There's more - failing eyesight and elegantly manicured fingernails are not an ideal combo for fast texting.. or any texting for that matter - Messages sent via the dreaded machine are BlackBerried too and people have started asking why I make so many typos.

    Apps?! I've only the memory of my dear old Sony-E - once cradled in my car - and now without handsfree. Urghhhhhhhh!

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  5. Oh Susan what were you thinking of? And you a Retroprogressive too...

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  6. Got to be a Sonim Nige...works underwater (or urine) to a depth of a metre; can be dropped on concrete from a height of 2m; -20C to + 60c no problem (ideal for country rambling);extra loud speaker phone (no comment); and Gorilla Glass for non-scratch, and a torch. What's not to love?

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  7. I'm sure it wouldn't work on all phones but the trick I've heard is to stash your wet cell phone in rice. The rice sucks out the water and moisture in the soaked phone. The phone I tried it on was a simple low end Nokia and it worked after a few hours of drying in its rice bed. My niece-in-law claims that her friend accidently went swimming with her cell phone and the rice tricked worked on that too.

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  8. Sonim! well I never - that sounds truly indestructible. And the rice trick's clever - like putting grains of rice in the salt cellar. Took me years to work out why they did that...

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