I have a new cell phone. I’m not really happy about this.

On the one hand, my family and I have had a chronic problem with going over our minutes, partly because we were all sharing the same plan and Ian and I used a lot more than Mom and Caitlan. We only had 800 minutes between the four of us, which didn’t work out that well. So it’s nice that Ian and I have our own plan, so Ian can ruin my credit instead of Mom’s. Also we have twice as many minutes to use, and now that I have Cingular unlimited wireless-to-wireless, I should be using significantly fewer minutes anyway.

On the other hand:

• I have to transfer all my contacts from Layla. Manually.
• This new phone is not Layla; it seems flimsier and less shiny, and definitely can’t be used as a flashlight.
• One nice thing is that it doesn’t have a broken extendable antenna. Then again, it doesn’t have an extendable antenna at all, so when I have bad reception there’s not a lot I can do.
• Oh, and the new phone is not red.
• Plus its keypad buttons are that annoying two-in-one rocker style, which makes it more difficult to use without looking.
• And there aren’t as many of them, which means reduced functionality.
• But I can google from my pocket! Which is something I’ve always wanted to do.
• But that’s going to end up costing me a lot of money, at a cent per kilobyte.

I don’t know, maybe I’ll learn to like it. I did with Layla. I still have Layla, in fact, although she doesn’t connect to anything anymore. I’ll probably take her battery out once I’ve got all my contacts and stuff transferred, to use as a backup, since it’s the same kind as the new one.

In many ways I still hate having a cell phone, but I’d grudgingly accepted Layla. This newcomer is not so easy to handle. I feel like a friend has moved away, and a smaller, more annoying person has taken her place.

The new phone does J2ME apps, though. I better get cracking if I’m going to port rfk.