Phone Home!

I was using my little wordbags with my new pupil on Tuesday morning. He really enjoys this activity - I cannot believe it is nearly six years since I made these - they have proved so popular with lots of pupils.
He put down 'et'. "What's that?" I said [we'd already established that foreign words are not allowed]

"Miss, you know  E T - Phone Home! " After a discussion about capital letters, Initials and abbreviations, I allowed it. But confessed I have never seen the film. He was amazed, and concerned.

"I probably should watch it" I said "I am quite fond of bicycles"
"There isn't much about bicycles in it, Miss!"
he informed me.
"Then why do they put one on the film poster?" I asked.
He wasn't sure...
I said that  'phoning home' was fraught with difficulties anyway, as my phonehas been on the blink for some time now. Just trivial things, you know ...

• the touch screen not responding at all to my finger
• so people call and swipe as I might, I cannot answer them
• the camera doesn't respond promptly, so lots of photos are of the pavement
• text messages have been even more random than usual with full. Stops appearing in quite. The wrong places, turning my. Messages into utter. Gibberish. Like that!

But the worst thing was on Sunday at 6.15am, when the alarm went off. And would not  be silenced. Poor Steph, sharing a double bed with me at Liz's mutterly sleepily "Can't you turn that off, Mum?" I was holding it under the duvet [not wanting to wake the entire household. It would not go off. In the end, Steph managed to switch off the phone for me. [Thank you Steph, apologies again for disturbing your sleep]

Bob did some research and on Tuesday afternoon I went and purchased a new phone. At least I am earning regularly so I can afford it now!]

It is a Motorola Moto G6 Play, very similar to Bob's phone [Argos were doing the best deal]

My old SIM card has transferred quite happily and I can do all the things I want to do [mostly texts, calls and WhatsApp messages - plus the camera]

I shall remain with my GiffGaff pay-as-you-go deal. It is only £5 a month, and that's a good deal for me. 

Last time I got a new phone was May 2010 - and that was a very basic little model. Every phone since has been a hand-me-down from someone else in the family. It is quite exciting to have one I have picked out for myself.

It may take a while to work out all the different features - so if you are a friend I communicate with by phone, please bear with me if I get it wrong occasionally.

What is strange though, is that although it is years since people had telephones like this in their homes, you often see this icon. It's started me wondering which other icons are still in use, even though technology has moved on? Any suggestions