Is it just me…

…or does anyone else ever finally show up for Mass after a couple of months, and the homily may as well open with “This is directed specifically at Mr. Stag R. Lee of 72 Whooping Cough Lane, Googleburg, CA, who is married to the tall blond and drives a Rabbit”?

Huh.

In other news, I bought a cell phone. (World stops from shock.) $22 on eBay for a Nokia 1112, which is a bare-bones phone along the lines of my F3. The reason I bought it is because the F3’s battery dies in 48 hours no matter what you do. Even if fully charged and left sitting on a shelf, turned off, the battery will be dead within 2 days. Meanwhile, the 1112 has been on continuously with normal use for almost 24 hours now and hasn’t dropped even one bar of battery off the indicator.

(This is pretty damn bare-bones, folks: black-and-white display, NO internet connectivity, NO camera or bluetooth. Places and receives calls, sends and receives texts, has a speakerphone. The two big advantages over the F3 are T9 for texting and timed profiles (the amazing Nokia feature where you can set the phone to stay in silent mode until after the Mass/movie/teleconference/etc is over, at which point it reverts back to normal rather than staying in silent until you remember a day and a half later and realize you missed four calls and half a dozen texts).

So yeah, another couple of older phones going into the donate pile. I will probably keep the F3 a while, though, just because it’s a gift – and because it’s the ideal phone to use in distracting young nephews and their peers.

Meanwhile, in proof that God loves us and wants us to be happy, the marine layer has broken back through the Santa Cruz mountains and the temperature is in the low 70s. I never realized how much my mood has always been affected for the worse by heat. No wonder I’ve always been miserable in the summer.

Line of the day…

…from the sublime and spectacular Orson Swindle, at Every Day Should Be Saturday, the world’s greatest website:
“If/when the SEC [television sports -ed.] network happens in any form, the negotiations will likely consist of the words GIMMEH GIMMEH and sacks of cash and country ham being thrown over table in both directions excitedly. This describes most commercial deals of a large magnitude in the South, actually.”

Talent portion of the rant

(piano intro)

DA-DA Da DA-DA-DA DAAA..

I’m gonna get me a shotgun and shoot all the hippies I seeeeeee

I’m gonna get me a shotgun and shoot all the hippies I seeeeeee

When I shoot all the hippies I see

The hippies will not bug U-C…….

I’m gonna get me a shotgun and shoot all the hippies I seeeeeee

I’m gonna get me a Cal girl in a blue and gold sweater

I’m gonna get me a….

(mad love to Garrett Morris, obvs)

Not really my day

Today’s worse than I expected. It’s what I thought Thursday would be like – and oddly, Thursday came and went without too much angst or reflection or what have you, which was a good thing, all in all. I thought maybe for once I could pass a milestone without getting all bent out of shape about it. Then I woke up today, very late, and realized “nope.”

What’s done is done. Obviously, I’m not over it, or I wouldn’t be sullen in the corner counting the minutes until I can go down to the pub.

Happy Father’s Day, pops. Cast ’em straight and drive ’em long.

Ugh.

God knows I carried no brief for Tim Russert’s political capability, but to die at 58 – believe me when I say this – is just plain awful for everyone. Especially his family.
Hope he finds a better world than this. Hopefully one where Scott Norwood hits that kick.

Well, this explains it.

Free IPhone 3G: European Bastards to Get Free iPhone and Great Monthly Plans. This ultimately is not surprising, since the iPhone has essentially become just another smartphone in the eyes of the carriers. With O2 in the UK, you sign up for an 18-month contract at about $90 a month, and for your trouble get 1200 minutes, 500 texts, and free data, made even more attractive by the fact that your incoming calls and texts are always free AND by the fact that you get free access to TheCloud, which is the largest commercial Wi-Fi provider in the UK – basically the equivalent of getting free access to the T-Mobile Wi-Fi service. Long story short: 18-month obligation, $1620 total cost, because that 8 GB iPhone is FREE.

Meanwhile, America: $40 for the minimum service (450 night/5000N-W min), $5 for 200 texts a month, and $30 for the unlimited data service. So you’re paying $1350 for that 18 months, PLUS $200 for the 8 GB iPhone, PLUS you’re using up your alloted minutes and texts to receive as well, PLUS it doesn’t look like there’s any free service on otherwise-paid-for WiFi networks, PLUS you’re still on the hook for an additional 6 months because it’s a 2-year contract. If you actually wanted to replicate the O2 offer, consider the 900-minute plan ($60/month) and assume you’d use a lot of your free nights/weekends to make up the diff. Add in the next plan up, which goes from 200 to 1500 messages ($15 a month, and you’ll need those to cover the cost of what you would have received free) and the data plan (still $30) and you’re at $105 a month – or, when you factor in the cost of the phone, $2090 over the first 18 months.

It was a valiant effort, but Apple has failed to break the back of the steam-age telecommunications industry in the United States. The rest of the world has moved on, but between the kind of mobility offerings we get and the fact that 256kbps is considered “broadband” for legal purposes, the fact is that we’re a Third World country when it comes to 21st century communications, and that’s a disgrace.

Incidentally, upon further review, if I were to upgrade it would actually cost me $680 on top of what I already pay – I forgot to factor in my FAN discount from the last job and the additional text message costs. No bloody way am I paying that kind of coin just to add 3G and GPS – that’s 2/3 of a sweet big-screen TV.

Downsides

One other note about the new iPhone: it looks like it’s really just another phone now vis-a-vis AT&T. The data plans are the same (i.e. the extra $10 a month, or $25 a month for business plans – WTF?) and you can’t even order the phone online from Apple – it’s retail purchase and in-store activation only.
Sadly, Apple was not able to permanently shift the way cellular works in this country. But AT&T should be kissing their ass, because I can’t count how many people I know who only have AT&T because of the iPhone. And if I could shift it, I’d switch to T-Mob in a second, but I need the visual voicemail…