The old cellphone may also be used as an emergency phone.
By federal law, all cellphone towers must be able to transmit 911 calls even if there is not a valid cellphone contract on the phone. As long as the battery is good, of course.
I think the woman’s shelter is a good idea. I tend to be cynical, though. Has anyone actually done any statistics that these phones are actually used in the manner in which they were intended?
Find an old outhouse, one that doesn’t get serviced often (maybe one of those portable things at a festival). Drop the phone down the hole, take a photo of it, then run outside and catch your breath.
Or … run outside find the nearest cop and tell him you dropped your cell phone in the toilet, can he help you out? Take photos of the rescue.
Or … drill a big hole through the phone and wear it around your neck on a necklace made of shells. After you have 4 or 5 phones on your necklace, refer to yourself as Big Chief Cellphone.
Hey, I’m proud of that piranha idea. And when you’re done with the cell phone you can keep the fish around in case you have need of emergency body disposal.
If you don’t want to touch chicken liver (and really, who would?) I would third (fourth?) the give-it-to-charity suggestion. I’m a 911 dispatcher and we take numerous calls from women who are equipped with donated phones. Not all of them are emergencies, of course, and some people do abuse it, but it’s still a good program.
Sorry, Charlie. I’m not in a very charitable mood these days. I figure the value of an old beater like my old phone to be 20 dollars. Therefore, in lieu* of donating my phone, I will donate 20 dollars to a local charity. I promise. I’ll take a picture of that too.
NO MORE NICE GUY IDEAS!!! We need shards of plastic and circuit board!
*It’s so fun to fuck up lieu’s vanity searches.
The thing is, your phone may only be worth $20 but $20 won’t buy a phone, even one without a contract that can only be used to contact the police in the case of an emergency.
The phone can be destroyed senselessly or it could save a person’s life. That’s a no-brainer from where I sit.
Bruce— yep my local petstore has em. For the use after I am thinking telemarketers.
Anyway, if you are a golfer tee up and see how far you can drive that bad boy. Next idea— go to your local wal mart or k mart or gun store and by some black powder drill a hole stuff it full… figure out a fuse and blow that sucker to kingdom come.
Go to your local batting cages. Either run it through the pitching machine into a wall or hit with a bat.
Or just go psycho with a hammer. Not as pleasing for us to view but will do wonders for your psyche.
" Accidentally" drop it as you are walking in front of a car. Unsuspecting motorist runs over it. You run behind said motorist waving your arms about in the air. As soon as motorist gets out of the car, start crying. “look what you did to my phone” I am expecting a very important call. Cry, let the tears roll. Bonus points if it’s a shy teenage boy who thinks he is going to be in very big trouble.
One request dont do it to a unsuspecting teenaged boy. I had that happen to me but it was one of my moms friends playing a joke. They hid a bag of feathers in their driveway. I hit it they made me think I had hit their pet goose. Drama ensued not a cool thing to do.
What would be even better is if you could rig the phone so that it was ringing when you put it in the jar and was still ringing when it was found.
My suggestion would be to go to a construction site and try to slip it under a moving steam roller.
Another would be to open it up enough to put in as many firecrackers in it as possible (all strung together of course), then light the fuse and watch what happens.
I think something along the lines of a “Rube Goldburg” contraption would be an absolute hoot. Start out by calling the phone which activates the “machine” and eventual destruction of your phone. The longer and more complex the operation of the machine, the more opportunity for pictures with your new cell.
The final movement would be something like a bowling ball dropped from about 20 feet onto your old phone.
I await pictures with great anticipation.
along with the note that says ‘it’s for you’, add the URL for straightdope forum search, and ask them to search on some odd word that only this thread would contain. maybe they’ll post.