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Monday, September 16, 2013

I swear there are forces that work against me

For the past couple of weeks, I had noticed that my Samsung Galaxy Note was really, really, really slow to charge.

I own other Samsung devices so I started swapping out cables and wall chargers but no dice, the phone still took over 12 hours to fully charge. I called Rogers who told me to call stores that accept repairs and make sure loaner Android phones were available before I brought the device in.

As of Friday, I was ready to go phone-less entirely if it meant remedying the situation.

Today, despite my MacGuyver method of balancing the phone on the edge of my desk and using a coffee cup to weigh down the cable so it bent at a 15 degree angle, which is how the phone would charge at all, the phone finally decided to quit this bitch. It died a slow, ugly death at 2 pm this afternoon.

After spreading the word around the office about my wireless woes, a colleague gave me her old BlackBerry circa 2006. I am so rocking this beast.

It's pretty awful. First world problems right here, folks.

Out of 12 Rogers stores, seven of those being within a 55-minute drive from my home and the rest being in the downtown core, only one had loaner phones and none of them were Android. Beggars can't be choosers, so I took my colleague's BlackBerry which required no $50 deposit.

At the very least, I can still watch episodes of Breaking Bad, which is what will save me from complete and total boredom on the train/bus rides for the next two weeks.  What I can't do is Tweet, Facebook, blog, surf, play Candy Crush Saga, cream my friends in Scrabble or slaughter pigs. Without a BlackBerry plan, I have no data.

All this and still paying $64.99 a month!

I have no idea why the phone decided to circumcise itself. I just hope it can be fixed.

I have a friend who went through this with her iPhone. Turns out something had come loose inside the phone and it was welded back on or something like that. I'm hoping my problem is that simple. I didn't realize how attached I had become to this phone.

I really miss it. The train ride home was torture.

12 comments:

Anonymous said...

probably just a loose cable. or you can upgrade to the Note 3...which is coming out in the next few weeks...

C.J. Smith said...

I plan on asking Rogers about the Note 3

George said...

I had an older Samsung that I would use to watch episodes of Archer and Futurama on the train ride. Yeah I know but I love cartoons made for adults. I used to watch another called Quads about a (rude and crude) group of people with disabilities. It was hilariously crude and now cancelled.
Anyway one day I was riding home and the screen looked like an old-fashoined TV with a malfunctioning vertical setting making the show unwatchable before finally dying altogether. I wanted to do the thing where you fall to your knees, spread the arms out wide and holler "NOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOO!!" but that might be inappropriate on the train.
I got an upgrade and rather than watch TV now, I read books on my phone. It's pretty cool.
I did lose my entire contact list when the SIM card fried.

Harith said...

Books are pretty awesome

C.J. Smith said...

They are. Haven't bought one in so long... and gave mine all away once I went digital.
Libraries are beautiful things.

MATT said...

Chances are it's just a loose solder point or a busted component that controls the flow of electricity that they can fix for you pretty easily, but that you don't want to fuck with.

Last time I screwed around with the innards of an electrical device, I ended up FUBARing my laptop that I use for business purposes, while on vacation, away from my files and backup devices, with client-work still to be done. Don't be like me.

C.J. Smith said...

I never even bothered to try.
I left it alone and took it in for the nerds to look after.

Anonymous said...

Get an iPhone.
Problem solved. I pay less than $50/month.
Rogers will probably set you up with at least a 4S for only $99.
Might even be less since the new iPhones were announced.

C.J. Smith said...

The iPhone is too small for me. And I've looked into them and we do own one but I prefer Android. Thanks for the advice!

Unknown said...

You got text

Anonymous said...

Really? You can watch video's on a BlackBerry from 2006? Pretty awesome that it still works after all those years.

Get a Z10, in a couple weeks there will be a big sale on them, and it doesn't need a BlackBerry data plan.

C.J. Smith said...

I'm guessing the Pearl was ahead of its time?