Dial M For Misanthropic

Viagra for phone conversations - that's what I need. I don't know what happened to my phone stamina but I just can't gab like I used to. The ingenious design of the iPhone offers no inspiration - it's about as comfortable as pressing a toolbox to my ear. Who's ear did they design it for anyway, Van Gogh's?

Actually, my conversational debilitation started way before the iPhone. It's probably safe to assume that the adversity started right around the time "Baby Brain" kicked in. Keeping a train of thought was becoming increasingly difficult and if I had to rack my brain for a word, I'd often just replace it with a four-letter one to keep the conversation going. Okay for talking to friends - not okay for clients and co-workers.

I was feeling like Barbara Stanwyck in "Sorry, Wrong Number," answering calls with wide-eyed dread.

It's also the text conversations of social networking - the ideal way to socialize for a socially inept moron like me. No longer was there a need to hold thirty-minute conversations catching up - all you had to do was update your Facebook status or Tweet the latest bowel activities of the fam.

Instantaneous, perfect little comments about what's going on, regardless if you wanted to know. No more twirling telephone cords around your finger as you blah, blah, blah - now it's "Hey, call my phone so I can find it."

A kid at my old job once asked me what a land line was. I explained, he nodded and then he said, "cuz this dude asked me if I had a land line at home...who the heck has a land line at home?"

"Well," I said, "during the Flintstones era, about the time I grew up, anyone who had a phone in their home had a land line."

"No shit?" He said incredulously.

"That's right."

"What's the Flintstones?"

I've felt prehistoric before - like when I watched "Toy Story" and realized I've played with most of the secondary characters when they were originally manufactured - but this was ridiculous. It hadn't been that long since the cell phone graduated to ubiquitous accessory status surpassing Bic lighters.

Just wait, in another six months, you'll probably be able to light that Dooby with an application on your iPhone.

But Texting Is QUIET

It's called regressing but I want to get rid of my iPhone and go back to those ancient flip cell phones. Why? Because I never get my calls. And when I do - the other side can't hear me. I could be standing outside in my front yard with nothing blocking me but Zuki's zinnias and still get no signal.

The only reason I keep the darn thing is because of unlimited texting. As much as I abhor the keypad on the iPhone, it's still a heck of a lot easier to text than a regular phone's keypad - I could never get the hang of it. As a result I never texted until I got an iPhone and no, I still don't use Emoticons or end every bitchy sentence with "LOL".

Texting should be free - why do consumers have to pay five cents or whatever the price is to receive a text message? If I don't have to be subjected to the conversation between smelly-construction-guy-at-the-bank and whoever it is he's arguing with about fitting in the Lexus, then our nightmares are over.

Texting is the ability to intrude without interrupting. I text my husband all the time during work, "Stella $17 pls replace the $$ in Spiderman bank". Translation: I just picked up a 12 pack of Stella on sale and you need to replace the cash in our beer fund. As my five-year-old loves to say, easy-peasy-lemon-squeezy.

Nobody else hears our conversation and everybody who needs to get the memo - gets the memo.

So speaking of memos, Apple iPhone, here's my ultimatum - fix the damned bugs you have with your reception and knock off that extra $40 I have to pay for texting and just having it in general.  I may never switch to a PC but I sure ain't squeamish about flipping phones!