Dead Phones and Air Conditioning

"Gonna be hot tomorrow" says HeWho keeps up with weather trivia. Great. The air conditioner in our living quarters is dead. I am thankful for the cool nights and hope they continue. I am not replacing the air conditioner. The one in the store works and I can stay cool in there, take a nice cold shower and go to bed.

Things were going along like any other Friday in a campground when it occurred to me that the store phone had not rung all day. I like it when it doesn't ring every two minutes, but this was odd. It was dead, out of power, despite being on the charger all night. I take it off every morning and it becomes my constant companion all day long. Goes everywhere I go, even to the bathroom. Not one ring today.

I can't remember how long I have had this phone. When I started making regular trips to see my dad, I forwarded the number to my personal phone so I wouldn't have to keep up with two phones. This had more advantages than that. The store phone is an android and my personal phone is an I-phone. It is unfair to expect a woman of my considerable age to have to be adept at both phones. I have zero interest in learning to use another device.

I have spoken about passwords and HeWho can't manage to remember or record the ones he makes. He set up the store phone and when I asked how to retrieve the voice messages he discovered that it required a password that he had no recollection of making. Was I annoyed? Yes, I was. At least when I forwarded the number I could listen to messages and answer them!

The phone has been unforwarded for some time now and I am forced to go to "recent calls" and figure out which calls were answered and which were not. When I return a call, I simply say that I am returning their call to Kan-Do Kampground. Don't have to know the name of the caller or what they want. They will tell me when I call.

The drawback of calling from my personal phone is that the number is a Minnesota number and I end up having to leave a message and then they call me again. Even more calls. So, now that we are about to retire, HeWho decides to pay a visit to the AT&T store to learn how to use the phone! I know!

Apparently, while holding his chair down and playing on his phone he actually learned some things. Today when the phone died, he was able to access all the voice mail from his personal phone.

It was already close to 7 when I made the discovery of no phone calls and I was tired and hungry. I had ladled out a bowl of the soup I had lovingly prepared for nourishment, altering a recipe to lower the sodium and still taste like something good when he started listening to the voice mail. Fifteen calls. He listened to them, all of them without benefit of paper and a writing implement. Then again, volume on extreme while looking at me as if I should be dialing away. I was eating! I handed him a pad of paper and a pen. He would listen, then go back and listen again and write down illegible names and what he thought they wanted. I swallowed my last bite and dialed the number while he was trying to write it down and took care of the first call while he was still listening to the second one for the fourth time. I interrupted him to tell him to just write the number down and forget the rest ... making him go back to the beginning of the call.

I may have mentioned that he can't hear and refuses to go to an audiologist (costs too much) and will order them on line. I may also have mention how very much this annoys me. If I heard a name on a call that was already here and tried to tell him to just erase it he would wave me away and turn his back to me and GO BACK TO THE BEGINNING of the call again.

I seriously thought I might lose my mind! Just think, soon we will be spending ALL of our time together. He was still listening when I made the last call and left a message for a call back. 

The day is over and I am tired and I am sticky and sweaty. I see a shower and a bed in my immediate future!