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Technology Magic
10 years ago
Didn't sleep well last night... I've been fighting my phone/charger each day now to get it to charge at night. Who knows what combination of age + pocket lint + gremlins is causing the poor connection. Even if I have to fight it, it eventually always starts charging at some point. Always.
Well, last night when I went to bed, it wouldn't start charging at all no matter how I twisted or positioned the cable. I got up several times in the course of trying to fall asleep; after giving up in frustration the first time. Each time - no luck. Only way I was able to fall asleep was by convincing myself that this morning I would try two things to solve the problem. First, I would try just the USB end of the charger in my laptop [I usually use a wall unit]. If that failed, I would go online and see if I could locate a retailer that sells wireless charging pads for my phone model [and pray that they're not a million dollars].
Laptop charge failed this morning [and while I was at it, I tried my husband's charger as well - no luck], so I went online to look for wireless charging pads. Walmart has them...but not for my model of phone. Best Buy has them...but only if you drop $120 on a cell phone case + wireless charger combo. And even with that, I couldn't confirm if they have them in store or online only [keep in mind, it's like 6:30AM when this scenario is unfolding, so there's no calling the store]. SO, I gave up on that and pulled up my cell phone provider's website instead to try and gauge how much a repair would cost and how long it would take.
I suppose I should have prefaced all this by saying that I'm on vacation this coming week. Not going very far; just back to the beach. We leave tomorrow though and I will NEED my phone to communicate with the person I'm going with, as she will be driving to pick me up before we proceed together on this trip. My phone was at 18% battery this morning and I would only have today to try and find a solution...even if that solution was ordering something and having it shipped where we will be going [much as I absolutely do not want to do that].
I would have to go to my cell phone carrier's store front today to initiate a repair. After that, I'm sure it'd probably take a week between shipping it out and getting it back in [with an $80+ price tag]. So...not really a solution for my immediate problem of needing the phone for tomorrow. Completely and utterly defeated, I closed the laptop and just sat here for a moment...I'm embarrassed to say, very nearly in tears. There's just something so inconsolably frustrating about when technology refuses to work the way it should.
In the course of this whole process + online searching, I had turned my phone off and back on again maybe 2-3 times. It's comforting in a way that no matter how advanced things get, rebooting when there is an issue still works a decent 70% of the time. So, in one last desperate attempt, I plugged the charger in again and tried to position the cable so it would accept the charge. NOTHING. Angrily, I power the phone off to conserve whatever tiny bit of battery life is left. I'm not sure why, but I tried the charging cable one more time while the phone was off...
All of a sudden, the screen lights up and the phone starts waking itself up again. It was getting power! I'm not sure what combination of things was finally able to get it to work, but it is now off in the corner charging contentedly. I'm not going to touch it or use it much at all today in case it would decide to be finicky again while charging tonight. It's such a relief to know that I'll have it for the initial part of the trip tomorrow. And I sincerely hope the charger will continue to work while we're away. I guess I'll look into solving the charging issue when we return...even if it means ultimately replacing the phone.
Anyways, sorry about the long winded post. I just felt the need to share as it has been a rather stressful night/morning of trying to force technology to DO. And, as it often goes, things have begun working again just as inexplicably as they had failed...and with no real reason as to why or how. Hurray for technology!
Well, last night when I went to bed, it wouldn't start charging at all no matter how I twisted or positioned the cable. I got up several times in the course of trying to fall asleep; after giving up in frustration the first time. Each time - no luck. Only way I was able to fall asleep was by convincing myself that this morning I would try two things to solve the problem. First, I would try just the USB end of the charger in my laptop [I usually use a wall unit]. If that failed, I would go online and see if I could locate a retailer that sells wireless charging pads for my phone model [and pray that they're not a million dollars].
Laptop charge failed this morning [and while I was at it, I tried my husband's charger as well - no luck], so I went online to look for wireless charging pads. Walmart has them...but not for my model of phone. Best Buy has them...but only if you drop $120 on a cell phone case + wireless charger combo. And even with that, I couldn't confirm if they have them in store or online only [keep in mind, it's like 6:30AM when this scenario is unfolding, so there's no calling the store]. SO, I gave up on that and pulled up my cell phone provider's website instead to try and gauge how much a repair would cost and how long it would take.
I suppose I should have prefaced all this by saying that I'm on vacation this coming week. Not going very far; just back to the beach. We leave tomorrow though and I will NEED my phone to communicate with the person I'm going with, as she will be driving to pick me up before we proceed together on this trip. My phone was at 18% battery this morning and I would only have today to try and find a solution...even if that solution was ordering something and having it shipped where we will be going [much as I absolutely do not want to do that].
I would have to go to my cell phone carrier's store front today to initiate a repair. After that, I'm sure it'd probably take a week between shipping it out and getting it back in [with an $80+ price tag]. So...not really a solution for my immediate problem of needing the phone for tomorrow. Completely and utterly defeated, I closed the laptop and just sat here for a moment...I'm embarrassed to say, very nearly in tears. There's just something so inconsolably frustrating about when technology refuses to work the way it should.
In the course of this whole process + online searching, I had turned my phone off and back on again maybe 2-3 times. It's comforting in a way that no matter how advanced things get, rebooting when there is an issue still works a decent 70% of the time. So, in one last desperate attempt, I plugged the charger in again and tried to position the cable so it would accept the charge. NOTHING. Angrily, I power the phone off to conserve whatever tiny bit of battery life is left. I'm not sure why, but I tried the charging cable one more time while the phone was off...
All of a sudden, the screen lights up and the phone starts waking itself up again. It was getting power! I'm not sure what combination of things was finally able to get it to work, but it is now off in the corner charging contentedly. I'm not going to touch it or use it much at all today in case it would decide to be finicky again while charging tonight. It's such a relief to know that I'll have it for the initial part of the trip tomorrow. And I sincerely hope the charger will continue to work while we're away. I guess I'll look into solving the charging issue when we return...even if it means ultimately replacing the phone.
Anyways, sorry about the long winded post. I just felt the need to share as it has been a rather stressful night/morning of trying to force technology to DO. And, as it often goes, things have begun working again just as inexplicably as they had failed...and with no real reason as to why or how. Hurray for technology!
When it works?
After all that, I went to plug my phone into the charger last night and it started charging immediately. So who fucking knows.