Friday, March 23, 2007

A Scary Package, A Recent Read and A Movie to See

A Scary Package

It happened again this week. I arrived home to discover a delivery company had tried to deliver a package but no one was home to sign for it. Only I have no idea where the pick-up depot was for this company and I wouldn't have a chance to get there until Saturday. But when I got home my neighbour had once again signed for it (nice to have retired neighbours!) and I got the package the next night.

She came in for a few minutes and at times I'm stupidly polite. I asked her if I could open it. She kind of gave me a strange look, laughed and said "it's you're house."
"Right!" I said. "I guess that's a dumb question." So I opened it. And what I found inside terrified me.
Nope - it wasn't filled with dead spiders - or live ones for that matter. It was worse. Much worse. It was a..........


Cell phone


The cell phone I currently have expires in May - analogue or something like that. The cable company sent me a notice that if I called a certain number I could get a new one free of charge or a different one for $30 and a three year plan. Well - who's going to go with option 2?
Now regular readers know that "Cable
Guy" and I have a unique relationship. I call, he answers, I sound like an idiot and I hang up shaking my head over what I dufus I was (like the time I called because I couldn't get into my email only to discover I had the caps on). Then I'm sure he and all the other "Cable Guys" laugh at me. So I had Ryan call to order the new phone. He doesn't know about the unique relationship "Cable Guy" and I have so he gave me a strange look and called. He answered one question and then handed the phone over to me. I had to deal with "Cable Guy" and it went OK. When I hung up Ryan said "now was that so hard?"
Well after that brief explanation, I opened the package to see it was the phone I had ordered. It was later in the day and I was tired, but as I looked at the phone and read the instructions, I began to recoil in horror.

It text messages!
It interfaces with M3P players
It has games
It has call forwarding
It has call waiting.

It has 2 cable cords
It has different ring tones that I can customize
It does something with the internet (
I couldn't read any further than that without breaking into a sweat)

Arrrgggghhhh!

I can only thank the stars above that it doesn't take pictures or movies. I was afraid that it might.
Now, most people (in fact probably everyone in the world but me) would think these fine things. But I still can't figure out how to work a simple basic cell phone. A few months ago, after standing in line for almost 2 hours to get a passport, I was finally at the desk to meet with the government passport lady to hand in all my stuff. I had forgotten to put down Ryan's phone number as contact person. I don't know Ryan's phone number. I don't know anyone's, in fact I'm lucky if I remember my own some days! I knew that Ryan's number was stored in the cell phone somewhere but I had no idea how to get to it. So I had to hand it over to the government passport lady to figure it out. Luckily she knew how to use cell phones and retrieved it for me - and surpringly enough they still gave me a passport after that embarrasing experience. It's not the first time I've depen
ded on the kindness of others to get cell phone numbers out of it.
So now - with all these features in the new cell phone, well it's not a pretty thought! And scariest thought of all, it's going to take a phone call to "Cable Guy" to activate it.
Thank goodness Lisa is coming over tomorrow. Even though she's younger, she understands cell phones. And I don't think she's scared of "Cable Guy".

A Recent Read

Voices of the Night by Lydia Joyce

From the publisher:

Desperate to escape the underworld's treacherous grasp, Maggie of King Street finds a patron in Charles Crossham, Lord Edgington, who must transform a street girl into a lady to win a high stakes wager. Charles has never met anyone like the fierce and ardent Maggie, and Maggie's defenses are useless against the seduction of the jaded lord.Their association quickly ignites into a consuming obsession. But both passion and the bet are threatened by a ruthless villain from Maggie's dark past, who has plans for her that imperil everything she's ever cared for-and her very life.

I loved The Veil of Night, Ms. Joyce's debut book. I wasn't quite as fond of The Music of the Night although I applauded the author for her unusual setting. I haven't read The Veil of Night. That brings us to Voices of the Night. Sometimes I think I almost sound like a broken record or a Pollyanna or something, but again, I really enjoyed this one. Ms. Joyce writes an historical with such a breath of fresh air! The writing is intelligent and the stories are intriguing. At first you think Charles is a bit of a fluff cake, making odd wagers just to amuse himself and get back at his sister, but as we get to know him, he had a good reason for the wager of making a 'silk purse out of a sow's ear'. And it's great to see his consciousness level raise as he begins to realize the difference in the privileged life he leads as opposed to those less fortunate. And Maggie King was a real treat. Brave, vulnerable, strong, frightened, she was such a different kind of heroine that normally populate historicals and I found myself routing for her that she would show them all and somehow defeat the fear that haunted her.
There's a great review at AAR, but I think I liked this one even better than the reviewer. This one is very good.

Grade: 4 out of 5


And A Movie to See

I've become very picky (cheap) in my old age and there are very few movies that I want to pay the cost of popcorn for. It's not the movie price I object to, it's the pop and popcorn!! But this is one I think I'll gladly pay for - both movie and popcorn. In fact if I can't find someone to go with - Lisa, Janice, Deb - anyone? I'll go by myself.

(for those on dial up)

Amazing Grace
starring
Ioan Gruffudd (I adored him as Horatio Hornblower)

Gruffudd plays Wilberforce, who, as a Member of Parliament, navigated the world of 18th Century backroom politics to end the slave trade in the British Empire. Albert Finney plays John Newton, a confidante of Wilberforce who inspires him to pursue a life of service to humanity. Benedict Cumberbatch is William Pitt the Younger, England's youngest ever Prime Minister at the age of 24, who encourages his friend Wilberforce to take up the fight to outlaw slavery and supports him in his struggles in Parliament.
Elected to the House of Commons at the age of 21, and on his way to a successful political career, Wilberforce, over the course of two decades, took on the English establishment and persuaded those in power to end the inhumane trade of slavery.
Romola Garai plays Barbara Spooner, a beautiful and headstrong young woman who shares Wilberforce's passion for reform, and who becomes his wife after a whirlwind courtship. Youssou N'Dour is Olaudah Equiano. Born in Africa and sent as a slave to the Colonies, Equiano bought his freedom and made his home in London, where he wrote a best-selling account of his life and became a leading figure in the fight to end the slavery of his fellow countrymen.



'til later

10 comments:

CindyS said...

HA!! You come over to my blog and dangle the bait of a Stuart novel in my face and what happens? You get a scary package!! That's karma baby ;)

I will be blogging tonight about the mad frenzy that happened here tonight after discovering your comment - Bob would like to remind you it's Bobby week and me running to the bookstore to buy a book that has nothing to do with him is rude ;)

Hey, my cellphone does a whole bunch of stuff I don't know about either but it's not to scary - just push buttons - one thing though is to try not to get on the internet (so if it says it's going to connect to the web hit the END button) because one of my friends went to download a song and was told by the phone it would cost 58 bucks to download. Yeah, no thanks!

Mine has a camera and can take video but I don't know what to do with it after that.

Okay, off to read the rest of your post - sorry had to come and gloat about karma ;)

CindyS

Anonymous said...

I never used to bother with all the functions on my cell phone UNTIL I wanted a device to read ebooks. I didn't want to carry around more than one little machine, so I got myself a phone that is a phone, camera, computer, ereader, palm organizer and a couple other things. I found that if I tried to understand *one* function at a time, and to give myself plenty of time to get it before I went on to the next one that I could actually figure stuff out. Even if you need a month between functions, just do them one at a time. Believe me, before long, you will be looking at those phones that play DVDs! Most of it is just changing your view that you're incompetent.

reviewer said...

I have that book in my TBR. I'll get to it one of these days.
I'm glad to hear you liked it.

ReneeW said...

I used to be that way about cell phones, but now I test cell phone software so no fears now. If all else fails use it just as a phone. Then go through each application one at a time and read up on it. Don't try to learn the whole thing at once. I rarely use all those damn features anyway. Too much for me too. I just finished Voices of the Night too and looks like we're on the same page. I gave it a B. That movie sounds great. I had a crush on that guy from HH. yum.

Anonymous said...

I'll go but I've never heard of it..let me know....deb

Jennie said...

I actually wish my cell phone had more gadgets--especially a camera. But I know how you feel about figuring out new ones. They never seem at all logical.

I have been thinking I should try Lydia Joyce--always ready to try a new historical author. And my mom was just telling me about that movie. She said it was one of the best she's seen in a long, long time--a real feel-good movie.

Jenster said...

I totally feel your cell phone pain. Or at least I used to. But my kids (12 and 14) are very cell phone savvy and have taught me a ton. LOL A week ago my son and I downloaded a ton of free ringtones and then assigned them to different callers. It was so much fun!!

I want to see Amazing Grace, too. I'll go with you! Too bad we can't meet in the middle. But with the price of gas the way it is...

Mad said...

I still don't use half the stuff that comes with my cell phone and I'm supposed to be upgrading to another one in June/July. But I have to say...I get a kick out of the ring tone...just to embarrass my girls, I've set it to Bon Jovi's You Give Love A Bad Name. Never will I get tired of their moaning and groaning and the "Mom, please! Will you change your ringtone?" when the phone rings in public. ROFL

Kristie (J) said...

Mad: LOL - mine is Blaze of Glory by Bon Jovi! Can't take the 80's girl out of us can you?

Jenster: My sons are probably coming over today so I'll get them to help me. So far it doesn't seem to hard, other than the fact that I've called them by accident - and no one has called me on it - and I haven't used it myself yet - but other than that... And *sigh* to bad you live so far away.

Deb: You're on! I think the only place it's playing is at Westmount.

Renee: There's just so much to them isn't there???? And while I loved HH - my heart belonged to Archie Kennedy (aka Jamie Bamber now playing Apollo in Battlestar Gallectica)

Chantal: Those TBR piles are pretty intimidating aren't they? I have scads of excellent books I need to get to - but I'm glad I got to this one.

Robin: I figure if I can work a digital camera and upload pictures, work a blog, load tunes on the M3P player I should be able to figure out a cell phone - but it sure is intimidating at first!

Cindy: LOL Tell Bob I'm sorry I was rude :-( But I couldn't help it when I saw it was there

Anonymous said...

When you master your cell phone, tell me. I can dial out and take calls on mine. Even got it to ring so I can hear it :)... beyond that... I've had it over a year and I've never programmed it and taken about 2 pics with it.

S