Texting While Driving

Did you know that texting while driving is more dangerous than drunk driving? According to a study by Car and Driver...that's what they say.

The Obama administration is bringing together individuals next month (reports call it a summit) to discuss what to do about this. Hope it's better than the beer summit he just had (which I thought was really stupid). In one study of truckers, the risk of collision was 23 times greater if texting. Dialing a cell phone or reaching for an electronic device put the risk at 6 times greater.

I hope teenaged drivers aren't doing this (they're probably the biggest group that would?). Combining new driving skills, texting, and the erroneous thinking that you're going to live forever is a bit scary to me. I wouldn't let my teenaged stepdaughter (with the new driver's permit) drive my Durango before...now that I realize texting is a major issue (and she's a huge texter), that just put her chances at driving my truck even further away.

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Motorola v3 Razr Cell Phone Car Cords

I have two Motorola v3 Razr Car Cords (supposed to conserve and charge the battery), unopened. The price on the tag is $24.99 each. We had the Razr phones and then took them back, which left us with these two accessories still in their box.

What do I do with them? I don't know much about selling on eBay and would have no idea if these would be worth it. Anybody have any ideas?

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DH ran his cell phone over

My husband ran his expensive cell phone over (on accident...seriously). Yeah, I know...I am not going to say anything more than that, lol.

I found him a free flip phone from somebody else that they weren't using. It was a bit beat up looking, it didn't have a QWERTY keyboard (which he now insists on having despite years of not having one of those until this year), and it could only be charged in the car. Yeah, guess it was a bit difficult but it worked and it was free. It's not like he's on it for hours every day...or even an hour everyday. Not good enough. He wanted a new phone.

It was more expensive to buy a new, replacement phone for him than to add another line to our family plan so that is what we did so he can get a new phone. DH gets a brand new phone (a "touch" phone similar to what "I" wanted...grumble, grumble) with a new phone number and we now have a 4th line on our plan. Maybe I should go run my phone over eh?

Actually, he was willing to swap phones with me so I could have that Touch but I decided not to. Why? Because I want the Instinct when the price comes down, that's why (and didn't want dh to martyr himself)!

Advantage: Now dh's old line is going to our son (though he doesn't know it yet...might save it as a xmas present...haven't decided yet). After deciding this, I was able to get our son a brand new phone for nothing after rebate so he'll now get a brand new phone since dh's old line was eligible for upgrading to a certain dollar amount. We should've just done that for dh right instead of getting a 4th line? Well, yeah, but he wouldn't get a QWERTY keyboard with that one... *sigh* Spoiled?

I still want to run my phone over so I can get an Instinct!!! Kidding. I'll wait patiently for the price to come down and for all of our bills to be paid to get this awesome new phone (think Apple's iPhone but not an Apple).

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Don't Buy Palm

We bought two brand new Palm smartphones on our cell plan, one for me and one for my husband around March of this year. I have the Treo and my husband has the Centro. They have been problems for months.

Let's take my husband's Treo...

Last month, it stopped working entirely. It was stuck on the Palm logo page and that was all it would do. Couldn't phone anybody, couldn't text, couldn't get into the schedule - nothing! I went through with Sprint and Palm all the soft and hard resets that you have to try first. It didn't work.

Then they want you to do one of two things:

1. They will send you another phone out with a $300 hold on one of your credit cards (it would've been our bank card which means they'd hold $300 of our checking account money) until they receive the broken phone back; or
2. Send your phone in, they promise to fix it within 5-7 days of receiving it and will send it back to you.

We went with option #2 because who the heck has an extra $300 to give a company to hold onto for who the heck knows how long when you are supporting six kids? We sent them the phone according to their instructions and waited. And waited. And waited.

I called them because it'd been longer than the 5-7 days they'd claimed. They apologized and said they'd take care of it within 24-48 hours and send the phone back to us. We finally got the phone back to find that they didn't fix the one we had sent them. They sent us a refurbished phone back. We bought a brand new phone from them a few months ago and they send us back somebody else's repaired phone? Hm.

So, it should be all good now right? WRONG! The dang phone they sent us didn't work. We could barely hear who was talking...seems the ear piece was bad. So they sent us a bad phone after waiting weeks for them to fix the phone to begin with! Nice.

*sigh*

So I call them back and they'll fix the phone. They think they are being considerate in agreeing to waive the $25 fee to fix this phone. Huh? They sent us a broken phone so why the heck should I pay them to to fix it or be grateful to them for waiving that fee?

THEN....wait for this...

They want us to send that phone back into them and wait weeks to have this one fixed or replaced. Again? Do they not realize that we bought a new phone from them just a few months ago, that we'd waited weeks already for them to fix it, and they sent us back a bad phone? I tell them that isn't agreeable, for us to be inconvenienced for their mistake.

They tell me that they will send us another phone but will have to hold $300 of our money until we get the phone from them and then send ours back to them. What? This is THEIR mistake remember? I am livid at this point and ask to talk to a supervisor.

I get the supervisor who won't budge so they send me to corporate. They won't budge either. Why should I let them hold $300 of my own money for THEIR mistake? I basically tell them where they can put their Palm phones. They keep their patronizing tone on the phone with me while I hear some man laughing his backside off in the background at Palm. GREAT customer service!

I will NEVER buy a Palm phone from them again. Never. It'll be a cold day and pigs will fly before that happens. They have horrible customer service - sending us a bad phone and then refusing to fix it without totally inconveniencing us. What kind of customer service is that?

BUYER BEWARE! Their customer service was terrible to deal with and their products break down. After this happened, I went online and it seems like this "freezing up" like my husband's phone did is a big problem with the Palm phones. You'd think they'd have a better customer service response than the one they had with me.

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Nokia N82 Silver Cell Phone

I love my cell phone but I wish it had a better camera. The pictures, no matter how advanced I thought my phone was when I bought it, are very low quality. Then I run across this cell phone that has up to a 5 mega pixel camera! Five! That's better than a lot of cameras on the market! It's called the Nokia N82 Silver.

I am a photography nut so I wish I had a better camera on my cell phone for those moments when lugging my digital camera around isn't possible. I miss a lot (like seeing two loose cows go down the road in front of my house last week when I live in the village, not out in the country). I really would've liked to have had a camera in my hand then!

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Sexting - The New Danger for Kids

Is this the new "thing" with teens and texting? I've not heard of it before but as a parent of a pre-teen with a cell phone, this is something I am definitely interested in learning more about for prevention.

"Sexting" is more than just a flirty message sent via text/cell phone. Teens are sending erotic messages and pictures via texting. It is more private than talking on the phone and can be hidden from parents easier.

My pre-teen has a cell phone with texting capabilities but I monitor her useage. She has rules she must follow and I DO check her texts and call history regularly. I also check her contact list as she is only allowed to phone/text certain people (family and a few select friends). It's worked out well so far. We'll see what we get into as she becomes a teenager and starts whining about her privacy (that will be when I take away the phone we have given her the privilege of using:) The cell phone is not "hers" - it is a privilege given to her by us with the understanding that it can be taken away at any time.

For information on how to keep your children safe on this subject and others, check out Netsmartz.

This is not a sponsored post.

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