A ten year old who can text KNOWS how to read!

[LewisLegion]

Guh!

So I got a new cellphone with a new number. Almost immediately I start getting texts to 'Terry' (So not my name) from various people. I text back to several saying they have the wrong number and most say 'oops, sorry' and don't text back.

Not this one number. Six or seven times a day for three days, I get constant texts to 'Terry' asking how I am, chatting on about random things...and I keep texting back 'you have the wrong number. This phone does not belong to Terry.'

About the second day I got tired of it and simply didn't respond. The third day it was so bad (texts every five minutes for like two hours, demanding to know why I wasn't texting back or calling like I'd been asked too) and I finally snapped and sent off what basically amounted to 'look, you have the WRONG NUMBER. I've told you this a thousand times already. This number does NOT BELONG to Terry any more. Frak off and leave me alone!'

Not five minutes later I get a final text that reads 'Excuse me, who do you think you are? You just very much upset a 10 year old little boy who thought he was texting his uncle. There was no reason to be so rude to a little kid!'

I texted back 'I think I'm the person this kid has been annoying for the last three days. if a ten year old can text, he can READ the fifty texts I sent back to him telling him he had the wrong number, that I was not his uncle. Now STOP TEXTING ME!'

Didn't get a single text after that...finally!

[Beki710]

Who allows a 10 year old free reign with a mobile?! Think your response was a lot calmer than I would have been!

[LewisLegion]

Seriously. Honestly, if I had known it was a kid, I probably would have responded the same, just wouldn't have cussed. But c'mon, how was I supposed to know it was a kid? It's not like I have magic 'see through the phone' powers.

[Peppergirl]

I was at a cookout/party a couple of weeks ago and one of the kids had her own iPhone.

She's 8.



Apparently she's had a cell phone since she was 5. The mother's excuse was that the child needed it in order to contact the mother when she was visiting at the child's fathers house.

I guess he lived in a barn or something.

[Eisa]

^I can see having some sort of cell phone for emergencies, but an iPhone? Really?


Also, wow. Yeah, you went off on him, but I would have snapped, too. You only told him a bajillion times WRONG NUMBER. How thick IS this kid?

[Amina516]

My 11 year old asked for a cell phone. His father and I laughed hysterically. Yeah, not happening.

I would have probably responded the same as the OP.

[Seshat]

If I had a child, I might consider getting them a simple phone, locked down to a few numbers. Family, family friends, trusted parents of their friends. And yes, with a plan that had strictly limited minutes and once they were spent, it locked to emergency only. (or if I could get it, emergency/parents/grandparents)

[hinakiba777]

Where I live land lines are 123, half the cell phones are 124, and the other half are 145.*

As you can see they are all pretty damn close. So wrong numbers are the norm, especially on the cell phones. If you are with provider A you tend to dial that number even if your friend is with provider B. So I get a lot of phone calls from the staff and clients of a company that sells lobsters. As one of their staff has the cell phone number 145-777 and my number is 124-7777. Depending on the time a day, and how long it is between the calls I'm either very understanding, or I cuss enough to make a sailor blush.

What I am trying to say is, I would have done the same in your situation.

Actually my dad had a problem similar to yours when he got his first cell phone. So he started responding that horrible things had happened to the person they were looking for. Like she was arrested for narcotics, on trial for a horrible crime, etc. So at least you didn't do that.



*not the actually numbers I just used these to show how similar the combinations are.

[Lurking Sockpuppet]

My 11 and 10 yr old know they will not have their own phone until they can get a job, sign a contract and pay for it on their own. I would say 75% of the kids around here have cell phones.

[pitmonkey]

We got our kids phones when they turned 16. By that time they had a life of their own and it was a way to keep in contact with them. They knew that the minutes were limited so they didn't go over.

[Victory Sabre]

My 11-year-old nephew just got a cell phone recently. He has unlimited texts, but only 500 min phone time a month. He's a smart responsible kid, and can be trusted with it. Also, it costs my sister less than before she added a phone for him.

It's a basic phone, btw.

[Solumina]

As soon as my brother got his learners permit we both got cell phones (as my parents weren't the only ones teaching him how to drive so they wanted him to have one in case there was an emergency and the person he was driving with didn't have one) but they were really basic and we had 200 shared minutes (parent's included) and no texts. I understand times have changed and that cellphones have become a much more integral part of communication but I still don't understand really young kids having super fancy (and expensive) phones.

[Blue Ginger]

About 10 years ago, I knew of a 4 year old with a phone. He would call mummy while at childcare if he wanted a toy someone else had. Mummy would then call the centre to demand her child got the toy. Would love to know how he turned out. He is probably one of the SC's on here.

I got my first mobile at 17. I rarely used it. Still rarely use it. I'm known for leaving it in my bag when I am at home. Even now £10 pre-paid credit lasts me about 3 weeks. I don't even have a phone that connects to the internet, let alone a touch screen.

[firecat88]

I got my first cellphone my second year of college. The only time I actually used it, at first, was to call my parents after class to see who was picking me up. When I got a Blackberry, I used it for that and to play a few bajillion games of Brick Breaker.

I now have an iPhone, with a limited monthly text and data plan. It's shiny, but free WiFi spots (if I use a good, free WiFi signal, it doesn't count against my data plan) are few and far between around here. Thus, unless I'm at a place where I know the WiFi is good, the phone still gets used mostly for making calls to people to either see who's picking me up after class or what the latest update in the planning is for my sister's wedding. And for playing Sudoku.

[Kogarashi]

I swear some of the wrong numbers I've gotten in the past were due to someone not dialing the area code when calling. My phone could identify the originating state for the number calling me, though in this age of cell phones, that doesn't necessarily mean the phone itself wasn't in the same state as me. But I suspect that some of those people punched in the number without using the area code, and their phone went, "Oh, there's a local number with that prefix! Dial!" and connected to me, rather than automatically using their phone's area code. It would explain some of the confusion I've gotten on the other end from numbers from Florida or California.

Hubby's and my phones are still pretty basic. No data plan for us, despite the fact that my phone is technically a smartphone. It's a low-end one, though, no touch screen (more like my sister's Blackberry with the slide-out keyboard), so it works fine without a data plan. Our kids aren't getting phones until they're driving, and that'll be for emergency contact purposes. Either we'll get them something like a tracphone, or depending on our contract, add on the simplest phones we can to our family plan and not get the data options. The reason for our own phone simplicity is that Hubby is a bit of a Luddite at heart, and I just don't text enough to justify the monthly cost. If I need to send a family member a text message, I have an instant messenger program on my computer that'll do it for me.

Were I in the OP's situation, I probably would've responded similarly, if without the swearing (because I just don't swear). I certainly would've given the kid's mom a stern lecture, though, since Precious Junior doesn't need to be sheltered from his own ability to read and comprehend the many repeated polite notifications that Terry is no longer at that number.