Vacations Vs Cell Phones

Of the three days of vacation I've had this year, work related calls have interrupted me four times. Yesterday I was serenaded by my singing cell phone at 4:50 AM due to an electrical storm setting off the fire alarms where I work, which is an hour away from my house. The City PD didn't use the correct first contact number and called me, instead.

Inspite of repeated reminders nobody seems to remember that I'm on vacation. Does this happen to you?

Last time I went on vacation, I had a chat with a fellow traveller who was absolutely shocked to learn that I was leaving my cell phone at home for 10+ days. Believe me it felt GREAT. I didn't give a damn about what happened at work either - they can call my replacement, they can call the alternative contacts, it is THEIR g$# da%@ problem and that is why I detailed everything out before I left.

I regard a cellphone as a necessary evil (ironic considering my day job involves communications), and I ditch it at every possible opportunity. There is something wonderful about being able to sit down knowing you will not be bothered. Life went on before cell phones, life will go on after them.

If I did opt to carry a cellphone for emergency use, it would be fully charged and then switched off both to keep the lithium ion cells from discharging, and to prevent incoming calls. Or, I get even more sneaky - change out the SIM card for a prepaid card. One of the nice things about working communications is that you not only build bridges to communicate - you also know how to burn them.

thanks for reminding me, why i dont have one /ubbthreads/images/graemlins/smile.gif
i take the Home phone of the hook when i want "peace". so it wouldnt bother me in the least, to have "accidentally positivly on purpose" have the battery die, have it fall in the lake , or have it be stolen with my american express travelers checks /ubbthreads/images/graemlins/smile.gif
UNLESS
i was being paid a BIG HUGE salery, and they paid huge overtime, and its a paid vacation, or something along those lines, where the disruptions are relative to the perks.

I have also resisted getting a cell phone for the same reason. I get bothered enough as it is, and with a cell phone, I would never have a moments peace. Out of 4900 students at my college, I can say that I am one of only about 10 that don't own and carry a cell phone with them constantly.

Someday, I will be forced to buy a cell I am sure, either by work or the phasing out of landlines. But until then I am enjoying the fact that I am hard to get a hold of, and still have time to myself.

VidPro, good luck with your resistance to the cell movement as well.

I have also resisted getting a cell phone for the same reason. I get bothered enough as it is, and with a cell phone, I would never have a moments peace. Out of 4900 students at my college, I can say that I am one of only about 10 that don't own and carry a cell phone with them constantly.

Someday, I will be forced to buy a cell I am sure, either by work or the phasing out of landlines. But until then I am enjoying the fact that I am hard to get a hold of, and still have time to myself

VidPro, good luck with your resistance to the cell movement as well.

IMO folks who take their cell phones on vacation are just asking to be called by exactly who your on vacation from. If they just can't survive without your input while your on vacation it's time to renegotiate your salary package upwards by at least three times your current salary unless you already own the company and in that case you brought it on yourself.

I'm very fussy about who gets my cell phone number and have had to repeatedly tell the people at work that they can have my home landline number but I do not give out my cell number.

I have my own 1 man business, so I have to be in contact. The phone's on 24x7x365.

Before I started my own business, I worked at the same place as my wife. She had inherited my old job, so I was her un-official back-up. One of us always had to be available. That really sucked sometimes. Her boss had the guts to say that we should not go on vacation together. We decided she was not really kidding.

Some day I'll have a vacation without laptop, cell phone and wireless modem. Maybe.

Daniel

Vacation? Being pretty much self employed for several years, a 3 day weekend is pushing it!

I will be selective in ANSWERING it however....

I used to have a boss who'd conveniently forget when I was out for doctor's appointments, vacation days, etc. This individual would frequently call me while I was in the doctor's office, and the excuse was always "I forgot." On one occasion I finally said "would you like to say hello to the doctor?!"
/ubbthreads/images/graemlins/mad.gif

Not wanting to be bothered when I'm out is exactly the reason I don't own/carry a cell phone. In fact, I found phone calls so disruptive (and also holding the phone aggravates my carpal tunnel syndrome) that I've ceased taking personal calls period. Now I just take the calls that are 100% necessary for my business and guess what? I suddenly seem to have a lot more time. I've often heard people complain that their days just seem to evaporate. Many of those same people spend literally hours each day on the phone, often having their time wasted by people who call them when they have nothing better to do, and much of the rest watching TV. Ditch the unnecessary phone calls and find how much more time you have each day. I got tired of being an unpaid counseler/technical advisor/psychiatrist to people which is why I decided to ditch the personal calls entirely. There was also the fact that calls seemed to come at the worst possible times. I'm often involved in tasks requiring a lot of concentration. Anything which interrupts me forces me in many cases to discard literally hours of work. The phone is about the worst culprit for such interruptions.

Along the lines of having more time to myself I'm also spending less time on CPF and other forums I frequent. I've found that the online stuff can become too addictive and eat up hours of time each day.

I take mine I think there is 4 people that know my cell number none of them work with me two of them (wife and son)
would be with me the other two know its not for general use. I carry one just in case something important comes up.
Nothing work related is important while I am off so they do not have my number. I will post it here for you guys in case you need me. BR549 /ubbthreads/images/graemlins/crackup.gif /ubbthreads/images/graemlins/crackup.gif /ubbthreads/images/graemlins/crackup.gif
Topper /ubbthreads/images/graemlins/poke2.gif

I'm sure glad my wife had her phone with her when I managed to hit a rock with the rental car a few weeks ago. We were able to get a few miles closer to our hotel before the last of the transmission fluid drained and we could go no more. Still haven't heard a thing from Hertz. For a couple days I really enjoyed driving that '05 Malibu Maxx.

Geoff

We take cell phones (turned off) when backpacking for pretty much the same reason people take avalanche beacons. In the event of an emergency the phone may not work so we don't depend on it, but if it did work the emergency could potentially become far less severe.

nobody calls my cellphone but my wife and my mom /ubbthreads/images/graemlins/smile.gif So it's no problem to carry it. I just throw it in my pocket, it never rings unless it's something important or unless my wife and I are trying to coordinate meeting somewhere with the kids or something. it is convenient to use for outgoing calls, to make dinner reservations on the road and such.

It is so very good to have when nobody calls you on it. So I blame not the cellphone, but those of you that actually give the number to more people than actually need it. My wife I want to reach me, my work, they can just wait till I get back to my desk /ubbthreads/images/graemlins/smile.gif

Very few people have my cell number. I can also set up call forwarding to and from home if I want (all part of packages so the cost is low for both). This way I have a reasonable expectation that the call might actually be worth answering, but I can be in touch most all of the time.

I know how to turn it off and not just silence the ringer. When I am someplace I don't want to or cannot be interrupted, I just turn it off and let the system deal with it.

I love Caller ID. Even if the cell phone is on, I can see if it is worth taking the call. Or not.

I really love Voicemail. I figure that if they really have something important to say, it is worth leaving a message. If they don't, I figure it must be low priority.

With a few options and an extra piece of equipment or two, I can be in contact most places. By using the way things are set up I can control the level of interruptions and even control the amount of control people would like to think they have.

Even with all that and the way I use the phone I still find that only one out of maybe twenty calls are worth taking. Therefore, my two favorite phrases, even for stuff at home, have become "It can wait" and "Go ahead. You can deal with it."

I keep a cellular telephone turned on and with me anytime I leave the house. I don't receive too many calls on it; usually it's just my housemate who needs something (like a pack of stamps or a thing of milk) that neither of us remembered to write before I left.

So the short story is: I don't mind having my cellular telephony with me and turned on at all.

The last person who raided the corporate database to extract my phone number (a breach of privacy) to fake an emergency call to me about a trivial issue got reamed a new one on the spot. That's how hard it is to get hold of my number. And I am grateful for that.... next time I'll give them a fake number or my fax number. Let the modem get it! God bless the technical support chick who shared the same opinion with me so many years ago... (we were colleagues so we shared the same common enemy /ubbthreads/images/graemlins/tongue.gif)

What I REALLY want is a voice firewall with configurable ruleset. Preferably a ruleset modelled on Cisco Callmanager style call routing - the things you can do with that system are unbelievable. But I would be happy to be able to simply define basic rules that would enable given numbers to be routed to me, dropped silently, allowed to ring without activating the ringer, fake busy tone, fake disconnect, routed to your favorite 1-900 "adult women" chat service (to really **** them off) or diverted to my V.90 modem (yeah I'm evil /ubbthreads/images/graemlins/wink.gif). What if they have an unlisted number that doesn't show up on caller ID? Well, a ruleset should be able to accomodate a generic rule for "private numbers" - and I'd set it to drop silent. /ubbthreads/images/graemlins/smile.gif

so what about that?
is there Cell phone SPAM? do people with long term use of cells end up getting telemarketer calls? and does it go onto your minutes?

Some work requires it, but then employers abuse it. If you have an idea it's a calm time you can always turn it off and say the battery ran out! ;-) However, that one can't be used too often (if anyone asks why you didn't hear a battery warning beep, you can say it was packed in a bag).

What about Blackberries (the increasingly popular wireless email devices)? I haven't heard anyone mention these. They add a whole new level of intrusion that will only increase over time with 'progress' and the batteries last a Long time.