Aging stroke-survivor takes on incredible challenge

“Dave, Dave; don’t do this to me Dave. I feel my memory going.”

—Whereby an aging silver-haired stroke-survivor buys a Motorola Droid-X® Smartphone.
This upgrade was for two reasons:
—A) It’s largely my hairdresser’s fault.
He got a Droid himself, and showed it to me at his shop.
Gee whiz; apps galore, some silly.
What interests me most is it will do Internet direct from the satellite.
So I could be out in the hinterlands, and do Internet without Wi-Fi, and without a cumbersome laptop.
So I was gonna upgrade to a Smartphone anyway.
—B) My old Nokia 6205 cellphone (pictured below) was dyeing.
I guess the flopsie tech wannabee at Verizon recognized me; “Back again,” I said.
She was gone almost 10 minutes, far better than the 30 seconds last time.
“It’s your phone,” she said.
Uh-DUH!
“I see you have insurance,” she said.
“But I’d rather upgrade early. I’m due to upgrade next month, and the penalty for an early upgrade is $20. Insurance is $50 deductible.”
“I’ll put you in the sales queue.”
“Robert?” a lady asked.
“I’d like to upgrade to a Droid-X,” I said. “My old cellphone is dyeing. I gotta leave here with something that works.”
“Will your old cellphone turn on? What about your contacts?”
“They’re all upstairs,” I said. I had to explain “upstairs;” “Backup-Assistant,” I said.
Next was getting the Droid to be my phone, and downloading all my contacts. —I did this myself on my Nokia, but I figured there were too many unknowns with a Smartphone.
Now that I’m home our first goal is to get it working as a phone, and change that silly boogaloo ringtone.
My old phone did that too; rap as a ringtone. I just want it to ring, or better yet the 765 whistle; an MP3 I created of the whistle on restored Nickel Plate steam-locomotive #765.
The lady tried to sell me a box of appliances, namely a charger, a dock, a windshield-mount dock when using the Smartphone as a navigation device, and also a car-charger.
“All I need is that charger,” I said. “I ain’t havin’ some navigation device yammering at me while I drive.
I use pre-printed maps from Google,” I said. “I need to know where I’m goin’ before I leave my garage.”
“Your Droid will have a charger,” she said. “That charger would be a second charger.”
“And I don’t need no car-charger either,” I said. “My cellphone goes in my pocket when I drive.”
“How ‘bout a Bluetooth earpiece? The Droid is Bluetooth enabled.”
“No crickets in this kid’s ears,” I said. “When I get a car with a Bluetooth receiver I’ll be interested.”
“Beep-boop;” lotsa programming.
My RoadRunner e-mail was added; I can respond to my e-mails with the Droid.
I also had to create a GMail account; apparently Internet is via GMail or something.
Plus the Droid platform is Google.
I also bought a clip for carrying it while I run — although it’s big. It’s about 5-6 inches long by 2&3/4 inches wide, and a half-inch thick, with a rather large display.
Although the display is tiny compared to a laptop. You have to expand and then scroll.
She installed the battery. “That thing’s why I didn’t do iPhone,” I said.
“On an iPhone the battery is soldered in.”
Now I see the Droid-Xs often have display problems — imperfect technology.
That picture above is from a site recounting the Droid-X’s display problems.
If I’d seen that at first, I mighta upgraded to something else.

• “Dave, Dave; don’t do this to me Dave. I feel my memory going” is what the on-board computer HAL says as astronaut Dave pulls its memory-modules in the movie “2001.” (HAL had taken over.) —HAL is always signified by a glowing red eye.
• I had a stroke October 26, 1993.
• “RoadRunner“ is Rochester RoadRunner, my Time-Warner cable-service. My e-mail is over them.