I’ve never never had much use for phones, except when they act as a modem to get on the internet. I’ve been very lackadaisical about keeping an active cell phone unless I have a very specific reason for needing it on (eg. my PR person at the RV show needed to be able to keep in touch with me). I lived most of my life without 24/7 access to a phone and I just don’t rely on the technology that much. When I’ve needed a phone in an emergency, it was just a matter of minutes to get it reactivated. I don’t remember missing access to a phone when I was traveling through the US last year.

On this trip, I wanted to have internet access, so I was very grateful that Donna gave me her LG phone that can be tethered to your computer and act as a cellular modem:

I was irked that I had to buy a voice plan so that I could get the data plan, but jumped through the hoops and got the smallest phone plan, 450 nationwide minutes. A few days later, I decided to pay the extra $20 and get the nationwide+Canada plan. This means that I can make calls to anywhere in the US, Puerto Rico, and Canada, and receive calls from anywhere in these locations, without being billed beyond my monthly amount as long as I don’t use up more than 450 minutes.

Needless to say, I have been very grateful for my phone since the accident! I haven’t had to worry about being able to reach people or to be reached. I do only have about 120 minutes left, but at least I will have used up all my minutes, making the expense worthwhile.

I did find it fussy for going online, but suspected the cable was bad. I spent all of $2.50 on Amazon for a genuine LG cable with a cell phone port at one and and a USB port at the other and, voila!, problem solved.

This phone has a touch screen and QWERTY keypad (the phone opens up like a book to reveal the keyboard), which is useful for texting, although I have to pay for each text (it was $10 to add a texting plan). I will confess that I have used the phone to check my email and to do internet research! The phone also has a pretty decent little camera.

I love my easy-to-remember North Dakota number and am thinking about keeping the voice plan active when I get back to Canada, although I will be turning off the data plan to avoid incurring huge charges. I am amused that I am considering keeping a $70 cell phone plan active when I’ve resented paying the $17 minimum fee to keep my Virgin mobile phone active. I think that part of it is that I will be able to use this phone everywhere I travel and that I’d need it active anyway in the US to get the data plan. Might as well keep it going all the time.

Verizon seems like an okay company to deal with, but they are a little clingy. I just made a payment online using my credit card and I immediately got both a text and an email thanking me! I won’t even get into the mountain of paperwork they sent me thanking me for signing up, for changing my plan, for switching to paperless billing (as my friend says, oh, irony, it burns!). Hopefully, that will calm down a little.