A Positive (mostly) Family Story

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robert k
Posted
Posted

I am glad things worked out.

I have stopped buying a phone for anyone. I never bought the top of the line phones because I never saw the utility as being that high  and the cost benefit as being low. I do appreciated that they are a communication device which is vital, an entertainment device often which may be sorely appreciated at times and the only camera available when life's moments need to be captured. But I will not buy anyone anything more than a bottom of the line dumb phone because invariably if it's a decent/good phone, someone always wants to borrow it and it gets demolished because they don't care, they will not be fixing or replacing it when it breaks and so their two year old wanders around trying to smash the concrete floor with it and nobody pays attention.

I'm not even going to pass down my old phones anymore because I hate to see a decent piece of kit abused so I will just stop doing it. I wouldn't loan out a motorcycle or a car and now $100 and up phones have just become the lower extremity of things I don't consider a fungible good, which I used to do, largely because I used to expect that some small amount of energy would be exerted to preserve them in working order. I no longer have any such expectation.

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El Negrito
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Posted (edited)

@robert k I couldn't agree with you more.

 

@everyone I have lived in Mexico for 10 years and bought my first smartphone shortly after arriving. I asked my, then fiance and now, late wife if she wanted one too. She said no until I got mine, then she wanted one. Shortly before our wedding I had a friend coming for the wedding bring one for her that I had bought on Ebay, it was exactly the same as mine.

Long story short over 10 years neither of us lost a phone and we always had protective cases for them (I mean for goodness sake they only cost 5-20 dollars). I usually went with the heavy duty "armor" types but my wife always preferred the silicon rubbery ones. She NEVER broke, lost or lent a phone out, in fact I still have her last phone in storage. I only ONCE broke one on a visit to the states, I dropped it on a wooden floor and it was a very short drop, I was stunned as I had once or twice on concrete and nothing happened. I guess it was just the right angle, anyway I was able to buy a new screen for about $10 and replace it myself, good to go.

So for 10 YEARS I have only taken minimal precautions and only had one incidents, here in Mexico I have seen a LOT of people lose or break their phones. I have a lot of friends in the Philippines who often message me saying something like "Sorry I haven't messaged in a while, I broke/lost my phone." I just don't get it, just a small amount of energy and precaution is needed to preserve these darn things.

Buy a protective case, if someone asks to "borrow" it the answer is "NO" (I mean unless it's just for a few minutes to make a quick call because they are out of load or their battery has no juice.) Especially in the case where someone has given it to you as a gift. All you have to say is "No you can't borrow this for a week, your sister or her husband have given it to me as a gift and I can't take the chance that an "accident" might happen." Sure they might get pissed, but oh well too bad for them, they will get over it.

I can't name the amount of times my late wife and I had to say no to loans (of money) to people we knew had even a slight chance of not paying it back. My late wife's brother was the family cash cow and everyone tried to borrow money from him. One time my nephew broke his arm because my other deadbeat brother in law wasn't watching his kids. He asked for money for the hospital bill and my brother in law was just like my late wife and said no because he knew that, first of all it was the deadbeat's fault, second he would never see that money again and MOST importantly, he knew his brother had to wake up and man up. I know that seems extreme but you had to be there, it really wasn't cruel and he told us later that he would have paid in the end but he just wanted to see what his brother would and if he would man up, which he eventually did.

I'm not saying never to borrow and my late wife and I have asked for loans but we paid them back immediately. If you are dealing with responsible people then I see no problem, with lending money. A cell phone or anything else then no way. (One exception is to lend a car to someone who has had an accident or whose car has broken down, but again they have to be SUPER close to you and SUPER responsible.)

OK, sorry about the rant, you may now return to your regularly scheduled programming. :thumbsup:

P.S. What happened to partial quotes and multi-quotes?

 

Edited by El Negrito
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robert k
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I have no problem in driving someone wherever they need to go, within reason. A few minutes use of a phone is no problem. Out of my sight for more than 5 minutes. Nope, not happening.

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mogo51
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I am still trying to work out why the sister who borrowed the phone and then broke it (albeit indirectly), did not replace the phone?

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El Negrito
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Posted
1 hour ago, robert k said:

I have no problem in driving someone wherever they need to go, within reason. A few minutes use of a phone is no problem. Out of my sight for more than 5 minutes. Nope, not happening.

Amen! Preach brotha'!

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El Negrito
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Posted
1 hour ago, mogo51 said:

I am still trying to work out why the sister who borrowed the phone and then broke it (albeit indirectly), did not replace the phone?

Million dollar question. I'd be like you broke it you bought it. Don't want to pay? I will just take something you have of equivalent value, than you very much, good day. (Make sure you are in their house when that happens.) :hystery:

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Tukaram (Tim)
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Posted
1 hour ago, mogo51 said:

I am still trying to work out why the sister who borrowed the phone and then broke it (albeit indirectly), did not replace the phone?

Any number of reasons.... she does not have money.  She knew someone else would pay for it.  It was not her phone, thus not her problem (I think that is more common that I would want to believe).

I had a Leatherman multi tool I carried with me at work, for times I did not want to go back to my truck for my tool pouch.  We were under a building one day and one of the guys asked to borrow it.  I loaned it to him and then saw he was going to cut a live wire.  I told him to stop but he cut it and melted the tip of my Leatherman (burned his hands too but I did not care).  When I told him to buy me a new one he laughed and said I should not have loaned it to him.  I had the supervisor remove him from my truck. He had been kicked off numerous trucks and got in a knife fight with someone already.  Of course he never paid me for the tool.  There are jerks all over.  :tiphat:

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davewe
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Posted
16 hours ago, mogo51 said:

I am still trying to work out why the sister who borrowed the phone and then broke it (albeit indirectly), did not replace the phone?

It was probably a money problem, but as with all things we will never know for sure.

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