Chatty Cathy
I never realized just how much I am on the phone until I became responsible for paying my own cell phone bill. A few months ago, my company switched the billing method for our company provided cell phones. Previously, I never saw the bill and just chatted happily away without any thought as to how many minutes of peak air time I was racking up. However, all things must come to an end (seems to be especially true in corporate America) and I was told that I needed to obtain my own plan, pay the bills, and then submit them for reimbursement. Ugh.
So, I talked to the friendly Verizon representative and determined that a 900 peak minute plan should work just fine for me. 900 minutes - 15 hours a month - surely that would be plenty of peak air time for me.....
Boy was I wrong, my first full month bill came in and I had logged a whopping 1,492 peak minutes! Of course, the amount of the bill was also a shocker - $246.12 - I guess the phone companies and auto finance companies wrote their "overage" policies based on the same book - charge out the a**. I was in shock - how could I have talked almost 25 hours during peak hours? I went to the internet and downloaded the detail of all my calls into Excel. Turns out I was averaging just north of 60 minutes per day.
I had to walk through my daily phone use in my head. I came to realize that I am almost always on the phone while driving. In the morning on the way to work, I am talking with one of three friends (or the boyfriend if he is not at work), and on the way home from work, I am talking to the boyfriend or a friend. The sad thing is: my commute is only 15 minutes or so. However, if I am in conversation when I arrive, I will keep it going until I get into the office or, if I am at home, I will continue to talk while I do all of those "just got home things" like getting the mail, opening windows, etc.
Whatever the case, I realized I am a talker. Of course, my first reaction was to pull back and end this madness. However, as I thought about it, talking on the phone can be much more productive than other pursuits. And, hey, most of it is during "down" time anyway..... So, I will modify a few things - probably the biggest not using my cell phone when I am at home, but I will continue to enjoy my daily conversations with multiple folks and continue to live up to my status as a "chatty cathy."
So, I talked to the friendly Verizon representative and determined that a 900 peak minute plan should work just fine for me. 900 minutes - 15 hours a month - surely that would be plenty of peak air time for me.....
Boy was I wrong, my first full month bill came in and I had logged a whopping 1,492 peak minutes! Of course, the amount of the bill was also a shocker - $246.12 - I guess the phone companies and auto finance companies wrote their "overage" policies based on the same book - charge out the a**. I was in shock - how could I have talked almost 25 hours during peak hours? I went to the internet and downloaded the detail of all my calls into Excel. Turns out I was averaging just north of 60 minutes per day.
I had to walk through my daily phone use in my head. I came to realize that I am almost always on the phone while driving. In the morning on the way to work, I am talking with one of three friends (or the boyfriend if he is not at work), and on the way home from work, I am talking to the boyfriend or a friend. The sad thing is: my commute is only 15 minutes or so. However, if I am in conversation when I arrive, I will keep it going until I get into the office or, if I am at home, I will continue to talk while I do all of those "just got home things" like getting the mail, opening windows, etc.
Whatever the case, I realized I am a talker. Of course, my first reaction was to pull back and end this madness. However, as I thought about it, talking on the phone can be much more productive than other pursuits. And, hey, most of it is during "down" time anyway..... So, I will modify a few things - probably the biggest not using my cell phone when I am at home, but I will continue to enjoy my daily conversations with multiple folks and continue to live up to my status as a "chatty cathy."
posted by The Random Gay Guy at 11:24 AM
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