SOS really means SOS

So, my phone bit the dust today. Or so I thought.

Penny called me this morning and as I was talking to her, my cell phone cut out. I thought that was weird b/c the battery was charged a-plenty. Then I saw a strange, hitherto unseen message on the little screen: Insert Sim. Now, fortunately, I knew what a sim was- the little memory chip thingy. But it made no sense to me. The sim was already there; I hadn't done a thing to it. My supervisor was in the office and asked what kind of phone I had, and when I told her, she said that she had the same kind of phone and that the sim card had fried and she had to get a new phone or something...Wah. Oh well, I thought.

I figured life has been too good lately...and I've been waiting for the other shoe to drop. Seriously. I have been having a lot of happiness recently - kind of these strange flashes of joy at having been selected by God to be born into this beautiful, terrible world and live my life...and I figured, if my sim card frying itself spontaneously is the worst thing that is happening to me right now, I guess I can handle that.

Then I saw another little cryptic message on the phone's screen: "Call SOS?" How thoughtful of Cingular, I thought. They are letting me have one free phone call to a tech support line or something like that, just like if I was arrested, I would get one free phone call to a lawyer...Even with its dying breath, my phone is reaching out to serve me, one last time. Maybe if I call this number, someone will help me figure out what to do to fix this thing. So I pushed "Yes." And the call went through and a very nice man answered on the other end and said, " 911. What is your emergency?" And I just about fell on the floor, I felt so stupid. At least it provided some amusement for the rest of the office, as I quickly explained my mistake so I could get off the line to make way for someone with a real emergency...

I got off the phone and let out a little mini-scream- for the second time today. ( The first time was when I saw a centipede scurrying across the floor of the office. I kept screaming until someone killed it. I do not suffer vermin to coexist with me, as those of you who have seen past video posts will remember.) The third time I screamed- sort of- was at the drive-thru ordering box at McDonalds. The woman could not hear me and so I had to SHOUT my order for all the parking lot to hear. Sigh. Yes, this is "Claire is a Buffoon Day." But that's okay. I'm STILL glad that I am alive.

After I got home, I figured out, with the heroic tech support of an amazing sister-in-law named Penny, that the back of my phone was loosened - probably by the way I was holding it between my head and shoulder while I was talking to her earlier- and that caused the sim card to lose its connection or something.

Anyway- it's nice to know that my phone is still capable of calling 911 even if it's not feeling totally up to snuff, if I ever get into a bind.