Seriously. Repeated attempts around seven on Friday and a couple of times tonight have all met with a busy signal. I know the immediate family has a gift for gab, but this is excessive.

19:33 : From busy signal to answering machine. O_o Will try for a more substantial (read: two-way) conversation early in the coming week.

(note to self : call earlier next time!)

20:58 : Hahah. Dad called me back (an hour and nineteen minutes ago, according to the call log). Mission Accomplished!

... and it turns out the A. Bertram Chandler compilation I picked up at Eljays last weekend has a Grimes story he hasn't read in it! :O

I just realized that I'm older than my dad was when he married my mom.

I've known that bit for awhile - I just never really thought about it.

The real zinger is I haven't had a date since I was my mom's age when she married my dad.

That, I think about a lot. The time it's been since I've dated, that is - not the age correlation (took four tries to spell that right) thing.

Dad - 1950.
Mom - 1955.
Momendad - 1978.
Me - 1979.

My excuse (which is real, valid, documented and totally pulled out of my ass so mom doesn't think I'm gay* and will continue to hope for grandchildren) is I've been busy with ATC.

Really busy, apparently.

I'll be 30 in 9 days and I'm wondering if I can voodoo up a date. Though I doubt Giant Eagle deli turkey would impress Papa Legba as much as a recently-very-alive chicken... and if it did, I'd use it to cure my insomnia. 2am and I'm not even a little bit tired, gotta be up for work in six hours. Priorities get a bit jumbled this time of {night|life}.

On the off chance... how does one ritually sacrifice deli meat?

Is there a form I have to fill out?

* I'm not, mom! It was a joke!

This weekend my phone pulled a trifecta - ran out of battery, ran out of minutes, went BOOP! and died on me as a friend was halfway into giving me his current location.

So, money to refill the minutes, which I won't have until Friday.

Today, Apple drops the price of the current gen iPhone from Gastronomical to Reasonable.

This Pay-As-You-Go thing worked in the pinch I needed it for... but it's a real hassle to refill, and the finite nature of the beast is such that I use it only for drunk dialing or the very rare call home. Cost for refill minutes vs. cost of a Real Captain Kirk Flip-Phone from any provider but Verizon, vs. the 100$-200$ down and 80$/mo for two years for the iPhone.

Chicken and egg - I don't know how much mileage I'd get out of such a device because I've never had unlimited access to such a device. I never made long distance land line calls because the fees were annoying. I never make calls on the burner because refilling it is a pain in the ass.

Bills out the ass right now - but if I get off of that ass and haul the garbage I have in storage out of storage, it's damned near paid for. Or in the case of a flip-phone, more than paid for.

Apple or Star Trek?

I'd throw in an "or silence," but I've hit a point in my life where that's becoming less and less desirable.

What I really need from a phone is the following:

1. The ability to place and receive phone calls.

So the iPhone is overkill. But it comes with a lot of other funky bits that make a Day Out Without Internet less.... itchy. Better to have and not need, or something.

Addendum - the iPhone interface is the big attractor. Not necessarily the forty trillion "it's a smartphone! it's an n-gage done right!" features. Every mobile I've ever used has an interface designed from the ground up by Complete Retards. I pay a lot extra to run an OS that isn't the bastard child of Motif and CP/M, so I'm not uncomfortable with the idea of paying for a phone that was designed by somebody who gives a shit about the experience.