New phones, blessings

I spent a few hours in the office yesterday late morning to early afternoon. Each quarter I prepare a report of the instructor led classes we have given through that quarter. Doing so at the office is much easier with the internet available there as well as the multiple screens I have at the office. Anyway, I got the report done and submitted. It shows a lot of activity on my part as well as on the part of three other instructors. In twelve weeks, I taught eighteen classes and the other instructors taught twelve classes. A total of thirty classes in the first twelve weeks of 2021. A busy schedule for all of us. Next quarter looks even more packed than the first quarter. It should be interesting. There are steps being taken to increase the number of instructors for the classes we are giving most often, but that ill not happen quickly. I would be shocked if we have that done before the end of the year. Until then I will continue to average two classes per week.

Victoria was off early yesterday having gone to work at 6 am. Once she was home, she met Mama and the two of them went to the AT&T store in Denton to get new phones. I hate getting new phones. Even though the process of cloning the new phone from the old phone is helpful, it still takes a long time to get the apps now indexed on the new phone downloaded to the new phone. With three of us doing so last night, none of our phones completed the downloads required to install and activate all the apps – mine especially. Fortunately, we have our old phones for a couple days while the downloads are being completed so that I have access to the apps I need via the internet. Cellular service is active on the new phone, but very little else is working. Or should I say, everything else is a work in progress. It will eventually complete the downloads, but I am not sure when. Maye today. Maybe tomorrow.

The other thing I do not like about cell phones is the expense of the phones. Whether or not they are worth the exorbitant price is questionable but there is little alternative to having one. I feel constrained by the requirement of cell phone use. Work requires it. Life demands it. I dislike it. I do like the convenience of having a computer at my service in almost any situation, but I still wrestle with the requirement to be constantly connected to that service. Constantly available. Constantly expected to be available. It is hard for me to find the balance between the requirement and the convenience. Were it not for the fact that there are apps that are of immediate benefit to me, I would be more than willing to carry the phone with me only during work hours. Sadly, that is not going to happen regularly, but I might try it from time to time.

Victoria is carrying four phones on her account. Hers, mine, Mama’s and Grandma’s. I am not sure how much she pays per month, but I am reasonably sure her first bill is going to be a whopper. She will let me know our portion when that time comes but it reminds me of the time that I was paying for seven cell phones on one plan. In those days texting was a separate charge. No free ride for alternate forms of communication. I would get bills totaling more than $600 on a regular basis. I was not the one texting. I was barely making phone calls. An iPod was required for all the extra features because cell phones could make calls, take and send pictures – they were not quality pictures – and send and receive texts. Oh, how far we have come. The phones we were using almost twenty years ago cost less than $100 each. Now each phone costs far more than the sum of all seven phones I had to buy to meet the “needs” of our moderately well-connected family. It was an ongoing issue with me to pay the bill which was a fun surprise each month since I could never anticipate the cost in advance. After twenty years of having to do so, paying for a cell phone still stings.

Meanwhile, our children and grandchildren are healthy. Mama and I are relatively healthy. The goats are getting bred. The pig is gaining weight. The chickens are laying eggs. The garden is growing. The sun is shining. All is well. If not, I do not know about the problem yet so I can relax for a moment and enjoy the blessings of the Lord we have right now.

Honestly, right now is all we have so we might as well try to enjoy it.