Mars and mobile phones.... worlds apart

I just love gadgets. Oh yeh, they give me proper excitement butterflies. In light of this, it is quite shocking that I have put up with this (see below) for so long.......

Pic.No.1 My old telephone

"Bloody hell!" I hear you cry, "is that phone plugged into the wall........ with a wire?"

Oh yes. How times change. Not just ten years ago, nearly all phones were plugged into the wall with wire,  spawning furniture designs like .... [drum roll].... the telephone table.

Pic.No.2 How retro is this? A telephone table

So how come, ten years hence, I (the gadget queen), was still tethered to the wall everytime I answered the phone, punctuating conversations with; "can you turn the volume up at your end, I am struggling to hear you." [it doesn't help that I am slightly deaf - caused by years of riding motorbikes without earplugs... now they tell me.]

It's quite simple really. For a long time now, I have positively sneered at landlines for being the predilection of  technophobes and the elderly. I mean, come on..... everyone has a mobile phone these days...... who on earth would want to use a telephone that involves you being in a specific geographical location in order to take the call?

The answer is simple. Despite the fact that a Mars landing is anticipated within the next 25 years, my mobile phone provider (Orange) can't produce a phone that can pick up a signal through the 500 year-old walls of my house. This means that everytime I walk through my front door, my mobile phone morphs into a very expensive paperweight.

So, like it or not, I am a slave to the landline every minute I spend in my house, prompting an imperative investment in a new gadget (ooh lovely).

May I introduce...... [drum roll number 2] ...... my Wharfedale cordless handset.........

Pic.No.3. My new phone. A cordless Wharfedale handset with blue backlighting (my favourite feature)

It's got polyphonic ring tones, an answerphone (landlines don't have 'voicemail' for some reason), number storage and a speed-dial function. But more importantly, I can actually talk to people on the phone whilst I am at home.

It is all now set up, and I have been sat staring at it for the last two hours willing someone to call me so that I can hear my 'Mozart's Musical Joke' ringtone........ why has everyone gone quiet when you need 'em?

[Update: my fault. I had been so excited with my cordless phone that I had forgotten to plug the base unit into the wall. Please try ringing me again].