My Lost Phone – Addendum

So, about a month ago, as we were getting on a plane to go to California, I misplaced my phone. Someone called the contact number to tell us that he left it at the “Lost and Found” at BWI. So, cool. I went to the L&F desk, and was told that there are actually six different L&F places in BWI alone. One for the terminals, one for security, one for the ticketing, one for international ticketing, one for the parking lots, one for the buses that service the parking lots . . . you get the idea.

So, after a long time spent calling L&F’s and leaving my name, description of the phone, contact info, and all that, I determined that he just didn’t turn it in. Many of the people I contacted told me that sometimes thieves call the contact number just to make sure the phone is active, and the victim doesn’t know who they are.

So there I was, I had no phone going into Cali, and it was a weekend where I really needed a phone (whole family was out there for 730 Evaluation stuff . . . tough weekend). As soon as we touched ground, I went to the T-Mobile store to get a Nexus instead. That’s where I was told that the Nexus can only be bought online. If I wanted a new phone right then, I’d have to pay full price for the previous generation.

I put my account on hold, and headed out, trying to figure out what I could do temporarily. As it turns out, there was an AT&T right next to the T-Mobile . . . and the 3GS had just come in . . . and I was starting to do some iPhone Development . . .

So, long story short, I’ve had an iPhone for the last few weeks. Got no complaints on that score. It’s not the same as my old phone, but it has esoteric benefits of it’s own.

Anyway, I finally get a phone call from the TSA. Turns out that the TSA has their own Lost & Found, separate from all the other six. After sitting on the phone for a month, they were just about to throw it in the “sell on e-bay” pile, when they got the bright idea to turn it on.

I gotta hand it to Android. Any phone that can keep a charge for a month is pretty freaking impressive. When it powered up, and they saw the contact info, they let me know that it was ready whenever I wanted to go pick it up.

So, now I’ve got an extra, defunct, G1. It runs apps (if you manually install them), it works through WiFi. . . it just doesn’t make calls. . . So, if you had something cool and powerful, and useless like that, what would you do?