The Real Cost of Cellular

First of all let me make a confession. I love my cell phone. It’s cool. It does a lot of really amazing shit. I like texting and sharing lives through social media. I run my business from it. It’ mind blowing to have access to nearly all the collected knowledge of humanity in my palm. I don’t even mind sending AT&T a check every month. Having said that I work hard to keep from paying the real cost of that connectivity and you probably should too.


Awareness matters. It’s the connection between your little monkey brain and the big wide world outside. If you aren’t careful your little hand computer can operate as a giant awareness vacuum, sucking up every one of your senses. It seems that way the hell too many people have given up experiencing reality in favor of watching and listening to it on their 5 inch screen. A tremendous amount of your humanity is being sacrificed, not to mention your capacity for joy. I’m sure we’ve all seen the idjits who buy expensive concert tickets and then watch and listen to the performance through their fucking phone. What the fuck is wrong with these people?


Last night at the pub I watched a young woman dancing and generally having a good time. She never put her phone down. Not once. I couldn’t help but wonder if she similarly kept it in her hands while she fucked. After I asked around I found that a disturbing number people have had sexual encounters where their partner stayed in contact with the old Iphone. Some answered texts, some took pictures or played music in headphones. WHAT IN GOD’S NAME IS WRONG WITH THESE PEOPLE?


I live in a building full of people much younger than myself. I’m generally and very friendly, talkative fucker but I barely know anyone here because they’re always staring into their fucking screen, usually with earphones on. I spend a lot of time in the gym but almost never talk to the other lifters since they’re plugged in. I’m not, by the way. I’ve learned the secret to awareness, phone control, and good old fashioned common courtesy…


Your phone comes with two incredibly powerful options. Turn it off and leave it home. These options should be exercised whenever possible, and they’re usually possible. Do it. Turn it off. Put it in a drawer. Don’t let the useful, seductive little sucker steal the universe away from you. If you can’t do this you’re paying too much.


There’s another really excellent reason not to live in your Samsung. Threat assessment. If you aren’t aware of the world round you then you’re begging to be a victim. More on this later this week.


In addition to awareness I value a certain level of privacy. I like looking at naked pictures of my wife but that doesn’t mean I want every body else to see them. There are things in my life that just aren’t anyone else’s business. Besides that the world is full of dishonest fucks who’d love to have my bank accounts, passwords, and the like. I’d prefer to keep all of those things to myself. My private life is a cost I’m not willing to pay too.


In order to keep from losing my privacy I take a number of reasonable precautions. I don’t use a cloud service. Ever. I have a fancy ass phone that has very good encryption software. I have a remote wipe service that will clear the phone if I lose it. Everything is password protected and I change it often. These aren’t perfect solutions and some of them are a pain in the ass but for the most part they keep me from having to lose my privacy to get connectivity.
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I get why some people just refuse to have them. They see the cost and don’t want to risk it. Okay. But they are wonderful little gadgets. Just make sure you contain their real cost. Saor Alba, Vaya con Dios, & Viva la Revolucion.