The Death of Penelope Phone

For those of you that have spent any amount of time with me in the real life human world over the last fifteen months, you've probably noticed the incredible cellular telephone I carried.  I called it my penny phone.  I called it this because it cost one penny.  I am a good nicknamer of stuff.

Fifteen months ago I got promoted at work.  Prior to my promotion I had a work Blackberry.  I did not need a Blackberry because I had the least important job a human being has ever had.  I had a Blackberry though because why not?  The problem with having a work Blackberry is that one's work boss can get in touch with one whenever he/she/it wants to.  I did not like this.  I did not like that my boss knew I checked my email before bed, so he had no problem sending out a meeting announcement for a 6:00am meeting at 10:00pm the night before.  Because of situations like this, I developed a hatred for the Blackberry which, in typical me fashion, caused me to hate all "smart" phones.

When I got the new job, I no longer needed a Blackberry, even though I actually had a job that mattered a bit more.  Logic, thy name be Corporate.  Anywho, I went to the local cell phonearia to purchase a brand new phone.  They showed me phones with cameras and Facebooks and GPSes that sure looked neat, but they looked too smart, and I hated smart phones. 

So, I settled:

You may recognize this phone as the latest version of the first cell phone everyone on Earth had ten years ago.  It was designed by Nokia.  Nokia is still a company!  It came with a sixty-four color palette, T9 texting (with the capacity to hold 70 messages total), an alarm clock, and a calculator.  It could not receive photo messages (they appeared as blank text messages).  With the exception of the sixty-four color palette, this phone actually had less features than the first phone I ever had.  It did not have Snake or that strange game that was supposed to be like skiing.

Features aside, my Penny was actually a great phone. I never lost service. It never stopped working. Sure, it was held together with electrical tape (which is the greatest product on Earth), and it was covered in paint (long story that really doesn't need to be told...really...I painted the upstairs of my house last year and the basement of my house this year...I'm a messy painter...that story really isn't long at all), but it was small and easy to tuck away in my pocket.

That brings us to last night.  My wife's phone, which we bought about three weeks after we bought My Penny, inexplicably died last night.  It looked like it might have been stepped on, but that doesn't make any sense.  I blame it on the, "phones just seem to break all the time for no good reason," corollary.  Science.  We went to the cell phonearia to replace the phone tonight, and we were told by a former high school classmate of mine that we could only get the discounted phones if we added a data plan. Of course. Obviously. The only way to save money now is to spend money later. Thank you America for being awesome, as always.

BUT...we both sort of wanted data phones. I'm sure we had our reasons, and that those reasons don't matter because they ultimately boiled down to us just wanting to be cool in order to find social acceptance from our peers.  We were only going to buy Kelsey a smart phone, but of course the store was having a buy one get one free sale, and there was no reason for me to hold on to Penny.  So, with little fanfare, I killed her.  I didn't even tell her I loved her.

Let the world know: Penny died because her Samsung mate expired without reason or warning. Penny could have soldiered on in this world, but like all old, out of date things, I justifiably euthanized and replaced her.  When I go to bed tonight, I'll have a new phone by my side. I'll be woken up by a new, different sound instead of the tinny, heartful sound of the Nokia.