Yes, I got a new phone. The old one was going wrong after many years of faithful service so I contacted Tesco, asked about a  free upgrade and spent forty minutes on the phone typing a conversation that would have been a lot easier, and quicker, if we’d spoken. Having badly underestimated the time needed to do this I had to hand the conversation over to Julia because I was due at the doctor. Having allowed 15-20 minutes, I ws surprised it took over 40 minutes just to arrange an upgrade.

It arrived a day later, which was brilliant service. I opened it, and that was where everything went wrong.

I couldn’t get the card out of my old phone. I couldn’t find any way to get the back off so I resorted to the internet. There were several You Tube videos about it, but none of them were quite right. Finally I found a video from seven years ago and that told me. It involves a great deal of brute force. And that was just the start . . .

My phone seems to have gone wrong because the maker withdrew support from it, which explains my trouble with texts. On a planet full of electronic waste, they are selling phones and then deciding when it will become obsolete . Without the intervention of Motorola, it would have lasted for years..

Then I found I needed to be linked to the internet to do anything, and needed a Google account and a Microsoft subscription.

It’s like a tightening net. You pay for a phone, but someone else switches it off. You just want to make calls but you have to sell your soul to corporate America and tether your life to the Internet by a data umbilical. So far I have resisted but it comes at a cost of multiple messages about finishing setting the phone up. I’m also having to enter all my phone numbers manually. I am not going to live my life as an appendage of the internet just because everyone else does. One day I’m sure I’ll wake up and find that most of the rest of the world has been taken over by zombified users of so-called smart phones.

And just about finally, I rang Julia this afternoon. I didn’t get hr but a message came up on my phone  screen about signing up for video calling. It must be the worse thing in the world. I don’t want people ringing and having a look at the clothes I wear when relaxing at home, or the woeful state of the housework. Anyway, I still hold my phone to the side of my head,  all the caller will see is a section of moving beard. Or my ear. Neither is a great view.

My new phone case arrives tomorrow. I’ve been walking round all day with it wrapped in bubble wrap as it is  big delicate screen. You never had any fear of breakage with a Nokia.

And did I mention it took me over 24 hours to even find the clock?

Pictures are selected because they cheer me up.