Hi everyone! Hope you all had a wonderful Christmas! 🙂 I’ve been M.I.A for a few days and was forced to “unplug”…well…somewhat because my smartphone decided to quit on me 10 days ago which was exactly 10 days shy of its 2nd year anniversary. After spending hours with Verizon’s technical support trying to troubleshoot my phone after I had also done some troubleshooting myself, nothing worked so I decided to take it to the store but unfortunately they couldn’t fix it either and ended up ordering a replacement for me…..BUT… the whole thing got screwed up because my address was missing a unit number and when I called Verizon to update it as soon as I received the notification that they just sent the replacement nothing was updated and FedEx ended up returning the device to them. So I waited until they received the device which was after Christmas and requested that they resend the replacement for my phone and gave them a business address to make it easier. Well, guess what??? The exact same thing happened and this time they did not add the suite number of the business address that I gave them! Talk about TERRIBLE customer service! It’s really frustrating as I’ve been stuck with an old flaky smartphone where no apps worked with the exception of Facebook! It kept telling me to update the apps and when I try to it says that it’s not compatible with the device. Anyway, to make the long story short, I’m still stuck with my old phone in hopes that I can pick up my phone replacement today at the FedEx facility near my home. Now, I am seriously debating whether to renew my contract with Verizon or not. My contract expires in 8 hours. Maybe I should start shopping around for better deals and better service. Anyway, I’m so sorry for my rant. I hope that you won’t have the same experience that I did, where I spent hours with tech support trying to fix my phone and more hours trying to resolve an issue caused by people who weren’t paying attention to details. It was an unnecessary inconvenience on my part and very frustrating! 😦 The first mistake was forgivable but for it to happen again and it’s the same issue, I don’t know what else would you call that!

Aside from my phone issues, my computer was also infested with some pretty stubborn malware that hijacked any web browser that I was using. After a few days of trying out different softwares specific for malware removal, several scannings, manually deleting malicious registry entries, I found one that finally worked and it was actually the software that I’ve never even heard of until that day. I came so close to reimaging my laptop and thank goodness I didn’t end up resorting to that! Phew!

Because of all my gadget issues within the past week, I took that as a sign that the universe is telling me to unplug :D, which is what I did. Not 100% but I can say at least 90%. It’s actually nice in a way. I was more in the moment and I felt refreshed because I had no distraction. I wrote some quotes and poems using my pen and journal instead of using my digital journal or notepad. It’s a great way to catch up with old hobbies that were lately set-aside because of too much technology. Unplugging is now something that I’m thinking of doing as a part of my routine for the coming year. I know it’s a challenge but I’m actually excited about it too! 😀 I shall call it a “no technology day” or “gadget free day”. 😉 😀

In this media-drenched, multitasking, always-on age, many of us have forgotten how to unplug and immerse ourselves completely in the moment. We have forgotten how to slow down. Not surprisingly, this fast-forward culture is taking a toll on everything from our diet and health to our work and the environment.
– Carl Honore