I guess it is the network.

These days, cellphone technology evolves so quickly that a girl's gotta update her phone on a very regular basis if she wants to keep up with what's hot. And considering my entire life pretty much revolves around this wallet-sized piece of technology, I'm picky.

After doing a tiny bit of research and keeping my eye out for the phones I've been seeing my friends getting, and since I have Verizon and not AT&T (sorry iPhoners), I decided on a Palm Treo.

My New-Every-Two deal was up so I headed into the store to get my new pride and joy, thinking I was going to get a hefty deal on it. No such luck. I ended up having to talk to this guy, Guierrmo (who, I'll admit, is kind of a hottie.... but he needs to pick a new name for suresies), for like an hour and a half to try to work out something better (even a tech-savvy chick like myself doesn't feel like shelling out a whole $600 for something I'm going to drop within a month), since I guess its one of their most expensive models.

Not to toot my own horn too extravagantly, but I can be quite the charmer when I want to be, and I definitely wanted to be. It was clear that this Guierrmo guy had taken a liking to me, with all the unabashed flirting and staring he was doing, and I knew all I had to do was be cute and bat my eyelashes a little to get my way.

I ended up with a greatly discounted service plan and an extra $150 off the phone, plus the usual discount for the new 2-year contract. But that wasn't all. When I got home and started trying to figure out how to use my new gadget, I received a text message.

"Hi, this is Guierrmo with Verizon Wireless.
Feel free to text or call me if you have
any questions about your new phone."

Apparently he'd sneakily written down my cell number while entering it into the computer to update my contract. It was a pretty normal-seeming message, and I had to wonder if maybe I was overreacting... maybe this is a new standard of customer service? As they say... "It's the Network." I wrote back. I had to. Maybe I was a little bit of a smart-ass, but he didn't seem to mind.

"Wow.... pretty personalized customer
service you guys offer huh?"

To which he replied:

"Yeah, it's the network. ;-)"

So that settled it. He was definitely flirting. Customer service doesn't involve wink emoticons, if you ask me.

A few days went by and I did have a question about my phone that I couldn't find anywhere in the instruction manual, so I texted him and asked him why it kept turning the word "anything" into "thanksgiving" when I was sending text messages.

Bad idea. Then came an onslaught (we're talking.... 5 days worth) of texts and phone calls (just voicemails... you didn't think I'd answer, did you?) asking me to hang out, and telling me how awesome and hot he thinks I am, and how he hopes I'm having a great holiday and how I'm his Christmas wish. Wow. Has he ever heard of playing hard to get? I could teach him a thing or two. The Art of Seduction (the book and the philosophy) is all about not being very available... he should read it.

Hate to say it, boys and girls, but my arm's pretty twistable....

We're going out tonight.