Juddmansee.com

Since I got home at a reasonable hour on Friday, Brian and I had time to go shopping. First on our list was a new grill. We had been using a hand-me-down that I got from a co-worker circa 1998. It had done good strong work, but by last year, it only worked on one side, the handle was cracked and pulled out from the lid, it listed about 30 degrees to the right, and the shelf kept peeling off layers of wood, making it rather flimsy. We put it in our dumpster last fall (but the main grilling compartment did get recycled at least one more time, as some youth grabbed it out of the dumpster to use for beach grilling).

We went to Kelly’s True Value to see what they had, realizing the Friday of Memorial Day weekend might be one of the worst times to go. In reality, it was fairly calm and they had a large array of Weber grills. We settled on the Q200, because it has the added bonus of being portable. First, that means it’s easy to get in and out of the garage for storage; second, we can take it car camping or to a friend’s house for additional grilling capacity. We also got the accompanying cart/stand, so it sets up very nicely on the patio and doubles as a cart to wheel it around.

Based on our early success, we also went to Radio Shack to get me a new phone. I have been using my Sanyo SCP-4000 cell phone since at least 1999. It’s the only cell phone I’ve ever owned. (Well, I did spill OJ on my first phone a few months after getting it, so technically this is the second one, but it’s the same style of phone.) The phone battery no longer lasts through a conversation with my parents, so I decided that was the tipping point, and it was time for a new phone. Sure, I could have gotten a new battery for the phone, but phones are so much smaller now, with speakerphone capability, so I was ready to swap. The timing is also good right now because the days of phones without cameras are dwindling, and I don’t want a camera on my phone (I can’t bring it into some of the defense and classified facilities). I did a little research on line and asked a lot of my friends what phone they have and which ones they like.

We walked into RadioShack, started handling the phones, and sure enough a young man came over to ask if we needed help. He pitched the Life’s Good phone, and despite my annoyance at LG for mimicking my favorite happy brand, Life Is Good, the phone seemed like the right choice. It was small, didn’t have a camera, did have speakerphone, and wasn’t pink. We took them up on the offer to set up the phone and continued shopping for headsets. That’s when a second employee finished up with his customer and started chiming in to help us too.

A humorous digression – the 2nd RadioShack guy was the quintessential stereotype. He’s the guy you expect to meet behind the counter at RadioShack – clearly tending toward nerdiness but trying to cover it with some quirky pseudo-“cool”ness. In this case, he had an eyebrow piercing and several earrings. He’s thirty but has never had a driver’s license (he did show us his state ID with a photo from when he turned 21). He knew the exact model number of my old phone as soon as he saw it, and of course he owned that same phone the year it came out. He was very quick to point out that I would be saving $5 with the new phone because Sprint no longer has to support the old standard something-or-other. He chatted away about the various features of the phone even after I had decided to purchase it. He was both helpful and slightly annoying. It was a classic RadioShack experience, which seems to be nationwide in its consistency.

Because my old cheap headset wouldn’t work with the new phone, we decided to really get me into the 21st century by going the Bluetooth (a.k.a. Lasertooth for the benefit of IRC readers) route. We bought the one that the guys in the store both had, and although the initial Juddmansee reviews are iffy (“garbled” and “buzzing” from Mom and Brian, respectively), I’m going to give it a try for a few weeks.

Now to go read the user manual on this new gizmo! Already I know it stores 50 calls in the call history (my old phone saved 10). The ringers are a whole different world. If I ever need a boost, I can hear “We are the Champions” or “SuperFreak” or “Let it Be” anytime (they are one of some 20 default ringtones). I’ve got it set to the most inocuous semi-professional tone I could find. I’ve set up voice dialing for “Beej!!” – note that Brian’s voice saying “Beej” or a calm Susan saying “Beej” does not work. Only “Beej!!” Feel free to ask me for an exuberant demonstration.