STYLETHREAD -- LET'S TALK SHOP!

Luv2Shop · Kate Spade

My husband talks too much

Elle · Hermes

RE: Girly Husband

BargainQueen · Marc Jacobs

RE: My husband talks too much

Luv2Shop · Kate Spade

BargainQueen wrote:

Ring tones, though . . . that's a whole other story.

What is the deal??? Yesterday my 23 year old brother was sitting at the dinner table with my parents and me and DH and he was texting his GF like every minute. I was like, what are we in Junior High at the lunch table writing notes??? CALL HER!! SPEAK WORDS TO EACHOTHER!! I just think it's really silly all this phone crap you have to pay extra for and people fall for. He also has all the different downloaded ring tones. In my opnion, yea it's cool to have a song you like as a ringtone, but it never even sounds good and in most places it's really annoying. My brother's does the crank yankers "I've got mail, yeaaaay" every time he has mail or gets a text message. The first 3 times it was cute, but now I want to throw it on the floor!

laken1 · Hermes

I hate hate hate my cell phone. I don't like the concept of being hunted down like a dog. I guess it stems from being tied to it for work, even during vacations & such. So I understand your frustration - I just don't get it. Aren't you cutting back on your cable to save $$? I'd be PISSED. Sorry i'm no help, just thought i'd let you know you are right.

blubirde · Chanel

Ouch. I'd tell my hubbie to go out and sell something on ebay or something because he has a helluva phone bill to pay!

For the future though, I personally gave in on trying to keep my minutes under a certain amount. I just bit the bullet and got a bigger plan. I never go ever and if I ever start, I'll upgrade again. It's not too terrible and it's way better than getting hit with a multi-hundred dollar phone bill.

Eurodaisy · Dooney & Bourke

Or you could go with prepaid cell plan, so no more surprises.

NCshopper · Hermes

laken1 wrote:

I hate hate hate my cell phone. I don't like the concept of being hunted down like a dog. I guess it stems from being tied to it for work, even during vacations & such. So I understand your frustration - I just don't get it. Aren't you cutting back on your cable to save $$? I'd be PISSED. Sorry i'm no help, just thought i'd let you know you are right.

You hit the nail on the head for me. I HATE cell phones. I have one with a plan that has a gazillion minutes, but I use about 15 minutes a month because I hate it so much. I don't like that my boss can reach me whenever and I hate when I'm out to dinner with my husband or just out and about and I get interrupted by the phone. As a result, I just don't give out my cell number.

Sorry for the hijack, Luvs2Shop. $600?!?!?! I'd be piiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiised! I'd make him pay for all of it. And I'd start looking into getting a pay as you go phone or upping your minutes so you don't get penalized like this again.

erin · Chanel

on another message board i post on, someone was mentioning they have a plan where they are just cut off once they go past their minutes. i'm trying to find the information, but i can't find it on the search.

maybe suggest instead he get one of those prepaid minute phones, and once he goes over, that's it?

lilyann · Dooney & Bourke

I dont have a cell phone, never have, never will. I think they are so intrusive. It is mainly the fact, as others have stated, that I dont think that I should have to be at others disposal 24/7. It is "Big brother" in my most paranoid and pissed off frame of mind.I am saddened, yet amazed at the love affair our society has with cell phones, and the accepted rudeness that many people display: while they are driving, in the grocery store, at the movies, etc... Have you noticed people walking around, cell phone in hand, totally oblivious to everything going on around them? Its like I want to scream... " Life is also going on around you, there are people in front of you, people behind you, look up and participate!" We wonder why people seem to have lost connection ( by connection I mean both closeness in proximity, and the resulting bond that is established with friends and family by time spent together) in this day and age.To me, these cell phone absorbed individuals are also missing out on all opportunity to meet potential friends, mentors, husbands, wives- how can they possibly ever know? Their whole attention is centered around an inanimate object. Missed messages, to be sure.

Luv2Shop · Kate Spade

Good! I am glad I am not alone in hating them! I think we are going to look into the whole pre-paid/pay as you go thing, that way, once he's used up the minutes, he's done.

And yes, laken we were cutting back on things to save $, the phone was one of them. We had his plan switched to one with less minutes, but he just talked as much as he usually did and now look what happened.

gruiz · Kenneth Cole

Maybe try a plan with free nights and weekends and restrict his calling to those times. Do you think he'd go along with that?

Do you have a land line in your house? Maybe you "suggest" to him that he use the home phone for lengthy calls.

Renee · Kenneth Cole

We're thinking about giving up our cell phone. We both hate them, plus it's a sizeable chunk of money that could be spent otherwise. When you have the phone you're tempted to use it.

luckylily · Gucci

I don't even understand how someone could talk on the phone that much. I guess I'm just a face to face person tho. If I need to talk to someone for more than 10 minutes, I ask them to meet me for coffee or something.

I did have one thought. Is your husband involved in paying the bills and setting your budget at all? In my house I handle all of that. Since my husband doesn't deal with it he really has no clue where the money goes and why we don't have more of it. For example, he wanted to buy something last week that we didn't really have the money for. When I commented that we didn't have enough money in our debit account he said, "But I got just got paid last week." And I basically had to point out that after I paid the rent, cable, phone, blah blah blah, we really don't have that much money left. So trying to keep him involved and up to speed on how much the bills are really helps. Also, my DH needs consequences, so I try to provide them without nagging, like "If we spend $100 for a nice dinner out tonight, we won't have the money for the hockey game next week." I'm sure your DH would be really upset if you couldn't affort his b-ball league fees because the phone bill was so high. It is a fine line tho. You want to educate about the financial sitch without laying down ultimatums, which rarely work.

Anyway, that was just a thought. If he isn't already involved in the budget, he might truly not understand how tight money is right now.

erin · Chanel

luckylily wrote:

I did have one thought. Is your husband involved in paying the bills and setting your budget at all? In my house I handle all of that. Since my husband doesn't deal with it he really has no clue where the money goes and why we don't have more of it. For example, he wanted to buy something last week that we didn't really have the money for. When I commented that we didn't have enough money in our debit account he said, "But I got just got paid last week." And I basically had to point out that after I paid the rent, cable, phone, blah blah blah, we really don't have that much money left.

feels like a page out of my life! i handle all the bills and my husband thinks the money just grows on trees!

boobaby · Kate Spade

HA! I seriously thought I was the last person on earth not to have a cell phone. Don't get me wrong, I often think life would be easier if I had one. I just think that most of people I know who have cell phones do not realize how rude they are. God forbid they miss a call - it could have been important! I have a friend who will ask me to lunch because he "really needs to talk to me", etc. He'll literally be on the phone 90% of the meal. I always feel like saying "Hey that was great, next time I'll bring a f***ing book!"

I also feel that some people on cell phones do not realize that the people around them can hear them or see them. I see people fighting, screaming, and/or crying into phones while walking down the street at least once a week. I have heard so many intimate details of strangers' lives, not because I want to, but because the person sitting behind me on the train is yapping at full volume in my ear!