*published Nov. 17, 2005
It started with the laundry. My husband, Dale, has a habit of leaving his clothes in places other than the hamper. When I was a full-time engineer, this bugged me; now I consider it a challenge to find where he has stashed his dirty socks. In this spirit, I picked up his favorite pair of shorts from the rocking chair and tossed them into the washer.
When that load progressed to the dryer, I noticed an odd thumping noise that came and went persistently. Opening the dryer, I checked for loose things that could bang about, and found none.
Once I started folding the same load, I found out what was causing the thumping. It was Dale's new cell phone, stored neatly in the pocket of his favorite shorts.
Yes, I DID check the pockets, but apparently those blasted cargo shorts have hidden recesses that I overlooked.
After browbeating myself because I didn't do a forensic examination on the shorts before washing them, I confessed to Dale. He was nonplussed, and left the problem for me to resolve. Me, the "capable" gal, questioned his judgment, but stuck the phone in my purse and drove to Verizon.
At the phone store, a whole new level of browbeating began, because I had declined to pay for insurance when I bought it. I didn't buy insurance because of what happened with Dale's previous phone. I paid the extra $5 a month for that phone, which he lost within a year.
The insurance company would not replace our phone unless we filed a police report to say it was lost. I told Dale that he needed to file this report, but in typical spousal miscommunication, he thought I meant he had to tell the police that his phone was stolen. Dale refused to lie, and kept looking for his phone.
I gave up on the whole thing after a year, and bought him a new one for $49.99. When the Verizon salesman asked if I wanted insurance, I told him it hadn't really worked for us.
Now I had to walk into the Verizon store and confess. Confirming my fears ("the computer chips inside the phone are fried, ma'am"), I was pointed toward the wall of phones with the decree, "You'll have to pay full price."
It was repeated loudly by two other sales reps, as I looked at the $180 full-price tag hidden to the right of the $49 "plan" price. Picking a new phone, I paid for it and left. The girl didn't try to sell me insurance with this phone, and I didn't ask.
After all, the only thing that will happen to Dale's phone is that he'll lose it, right?