Eventually, one’s true nature is revealed. Although I was not an early adopter of the cell phone, I did get one, thanks to my job, relatively early in their life. I had the responsibility to procure cell phones for my company, so naturally I needed to have one for testing purposes. In those early days I tried most of the (at that time) major vendors, GTE Mobilenet, Cellular One and Nextel. Although I personally did not have one, I purchased cell phones from Cingular for use by employees. Of course, none of those names exist any more. Cingular and Cell One merged and eventually became AT&T, Nextel is now part of Sprint, and GTE was acquired by Verizon. Sometime in the late 90′s, we decided that Verizon had the best service in the Bay area, and I have been a Verizon customer for about 12 years now.

Over the years, I resisted the ‘enhanced’ phones. I ignored the texting phones, and the music players. When Iphone appeared I was able to resist it. (probably because of my dislike of Apple and their closed world). I ignored the early Android phones. I kept telling myself that a phone is just  a phone. But….

My Verizon contract was getting close to expiration. And, I had been having some issues with Verizon’s reception in my area. So, I started looking around, at other cell carriers. I figured I would go with one of those no-contract companies. However, my Verizon plan is a family-plan, 2 phones and a shared pool of minutes. I’ve had the same plan since at least 2003. It is so old that they no longer have that plan. The newer family plans have more shared minutes but at a higher cost. And, none of the no-contract guys offer anything similar. So, I would have to replace my family plan, with 2 no-contract plans. The cost of 2 plans was basically the same as my current plan.

Then I started looking at getting a smart phone. I figured that a no-contract smart phone would be more cost effective. But, when I added the cost of a smart phone, with the basic phone for Irene, it wasn’t much different than keeping my existing Verizon plan and adding the required data plan. So, I started shopping for a smart phone. I was finally pushed over the edge, when I went to a meeting of our community association’s board and discovered that I was one of only 2 board members who did not have a smart phone. And, they were all retirees like me! So, without further ado, here it is:

HTC Droid Incredible 2

I know, I know. The model is a year old, and the new models will be out in time for Christmas. And, it doesn’t support 4G. But, have you looked at the 4G map for Verizon. That big blank spot on the bottom left of the map is New Mexico. And, neither El PAso, Las Cruces, or even Albuquerque is included on the ‘future’ list. Maybe in 2 years when my contract expires…

By the by, if you are looking for a new phone, try Costco. The price was $120 cheaper than Verizon, and even included a starter kit that had a belt case and car charger. Oh, and even though I am a Costco member, they never asked for my membership number, so it looks like you don’t need to be a Costco member to buy a cell phone online. Only drawback was that shipping took 5 days.