Wednesday, April 25, 2007

I.Am.Dumber.Than.A.Spoon

For absolutely no particular reason, which is why I do most things, I decided to send my first text message today. I had made tuna to have tuna sandwiches for dinner. My daughter just started a new job that requires 9 weeks of (8 hours a day) training. She loves my tuna. I figured since she is always reading text messages, it would be the easiest way to get her attention when she had a break or was finished for the day.
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It didn't start out well. I found the text message part on my cell phone easily enough but I couldn't quite understand the prompts. Also because my battery was low I decided to do this standing at the bar where I keep my phone plugged in. So I'm standing there pushing button after button trying to figure out what to do. After about 15 minutes, I think I've got it figured out. The only thing is, I don't know how to make spaces between words. So I typed: Madetunawantsome? I was actually pretty proud of myself for finding the question mark. Finally, I pressed the send button. My house phone rang immediately. I thought that was odd. Then I answered and a female computer voice said something like, "A text message has been sent to this land line. Would you like to hear it?" So I pressed # or whatever it told me to do and this female computer voice said "mad-et-oohna-want-some." I laughed and laughed. It sounded like an ancient curse (I've been watching a lot of "Buffy" lately). But I was very frustrated.
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After trying and trying to figure out how to change the phone number for the message, I decided to try a different approach. Instead of going straight to the texting part, I went to my phone contacts section of the phone. I scrolled down to my daughter's name, found a text option, typed out: Madetunawantsome? again and then hit "send." A screen came up and said message sent to ########. I can't put the actual number, but I had sent it to my daughter's home phone!!! At this point, I was sweating and flustered, so I went for a fresh beer and a smoke.
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I had probably wasted about 40 minutes of my life by this point. I came back in, sat on the floor, took some deep breaths and tried again. I never did find out how to make a space, but I found the period button. So after making sure I had Kate's cell phone number, I typed in: Made.Tune.Want.Some? It was enough. She got the message. A short while later, I got the message: Yes.
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When my daughter arrived I told her the whole story, which she thought was funny. She said, "It's like you were sending a telegram. I'm surprised you didn't put 'stop' between the words." Yeah, here's my next one:
Im.Stupid.Stop.Sending.Text.Messages.Stop

10 comments:

Jazz said...

Um, so was the tuna good?

And two words: Owner's manual.

Not that i would ever use the owner's manual myself...

geewits said...

Jazz,
My tuna is always good!
There's an owner's manual?

Jo said...

What no ham with something?

It takes a while to figure out how to use text messages. It's all shorthand. I sent my brother a text message and he phoned me back, "Please don't send me text messages, I can't be bothered figuring out to reply. You live right across the street from me, so just walk over and talk to me."

geewits said...

That's so funny! I can imagine your brother's astonishment. :)
Oh, and we are having ham and something else later this week.

Ian Lidster said...

I use my cellphone for phoning (and even then I have to think about it). For the rest, I'm sorry, I wouldn't even try.
So, what makes your tuna unique?

Ian

geewits said...

Ian,
Yeah, it's not worth an hour of your life to send a 4 word text message. As for my tuna, my ingredients are not special at all: some mayo, chopped boiled eggs, salt and pepper, onion powder and ground celery seed. I think the secret is in the texture. I put the tuna in a bowl and go at it with a plastic spatula until most of the fibers are separated and small. It ends up with a very smooth and consistent texture as opposed to having random lumps of stuff. We all love it.

Tai said...

Awww!
So sweet and funny.

(I LOVE tuna sandwichs!)

Jammie J. said...

Bwaaahaaahaaa! I get frustrated with texting because I type so much faster with all ten of my fingers than I do with one or two. Even with that word recognition feature turned on.

What's even funnier is, I didn't know you could text a landline. LOL

geewits said...

Tai,
Yeah, you're young. I bet you were rolling your eyes as you read this. (I put mayo on the bread then a heaping pile of iceberg lettuce then about an inch of tuna - it's a whole meal!)

Jeanette,
You should send yourself one with no spaces and see what your ancient curse sounds like.

JR's Thumbprints said...

You're one up on me. Maybe two up. I don't have a cellphone and text-messaging is beyond me.