Are You A Phone Addict?

Are You A Phone Addict?

Granddad Al has never had a smartphone, he’s quite happy with his £9.99 analogue phone, you should see him typing never mind texting! I get random letters when he texts as he often hits the send button before he’s actually wrote anything legible. He would not answer yes to any in the list below.

Makes him sound like an antique but we grew up without the use of technology. I remember having a house phone fitted when my older brother was 18, I’d be about 15, it was such a big step for us as a family, previous to that we had to walk to the phone box, in the centre of the village.

The actor Eddie Redmayne ditched his smartphone in favour of an analogue phone to help him live “in the moment”.

The Academy Award winner said that he discarded his smartphone early last year because he felt the constant stream of emails had become too great a distraction.

“I tried switching back to a simple, old-fashioned handset in place of a smartphone,” he said. “It was a reaction against being glued permanently to my iPhone during waking hours. The deluge of emails was constant and I found myself trying to keep up in real time, at the expense of living in the moment.”

So how do you know if you are addicted?

1. You check your phone as soon as you wake up, to see what notifications you have.
2. You check your phone as soon as the ads come on television – heck anything could have happened in the last 15 minutes.
3. Feeling bereft or anxious if you can’t get a signal on your phone.
4. Going to sleep takes ages as your phone keeps telling you of notifications.
5. You often wake up in the night to check what has been happening.
6. Genuinely not enjoying Strictly/X-Factor/Bake Off unless you’re watching AND following on Twitter.
7. That time you left your phone at home still ranks in the top 5 worst days ever.
8. So does the time that Virgin Media made Facebook and Whatsapp go down.
9. Not being able to remember the last time you used your mobile for an actual phone call.
10. You don’t actually know what your ring tone is
11. You have a text or WhatsApp conversation with someone sitting at the other end of the sofa.
12. You text goodnight to the person in the next room.
13. You use an app to make decisions in your life.
14. You carry spare charges in your bag, just in case!
15. You never wear clothes without pockets – where would you put your phone.
16. Someone without an addiction suggesting a smartphone amnesty at a dinner party while looking at you.
17. You’ve bumped into a lamppost, bench, person, bollard etc more than once & accept it as an occupational hazard.
18. That time you got no likes and insisted Facebook/Instagram was broken.

So are you a phone addict? How well did you do with our list above.

Nanna Jane
Photo credit: gdcgraphics via VisualHunt.com / CC BY-SA