I left my phone in the cab when I flew to Arizona last year. And you know, there aren't any pay phones in the airport anymore. I had to go into an airport store (a Verizon store, ironically) to call my limo service to tell them what I looked like so they could find me outside. Traveling with no phone really sucks. Good luck buddy.

I think I could give up any of the other screens, but not my phone. I hope your hotel is sending you yours.

Next time be careful what you wish for.

I've not gotten a smart phone. I did get a fliptop cell phone, for emergencies. I never turn it on unless I need it.
It was only 10 years ago that I got internet that was not dial-up! I find it interesting that a device so 'important' was left behind.
Hope the rest of the trip is fun and exciting!

While surely not a pleasant or ideal situation to find yourself in, I think your military training combined with your general reasoned approach to life as a whole will help to keep your brain from getting totally discombobulated. Good to see you can still take a mildly humorous approach to things given the annoying nature of what happened.

I suppose you could get a ''burner'' phone? Or...you can just buy a book and take photos and remember a time when you had NO PHONE AT ALL! (Wish I could've seen your face when you realized your phone was NOT in your pocket!)

It can only be a good thing. Make the best of it.

Isn't it amazing how these infernal machines can get so embedded in our lives?

I was a long hold out. I got my first cell phone in 2010. It was a little flip phone. I quickly got good at using the number keypad to write text messages. It was a Byzantine system, but I made it work.

Then I got one of those sliders that have a full alphabet keyboard. Man, I thought I was picking in the tall cotton!

Then I got my first smart phone, a little droid. That opened up the world of online dating. Which is how I got onto agnostic.com. At first I was just looking for a woman, but I became intrigued by the conversation. Now it's ALL about the conversation. (I did find some interesting dates on other sites.)

I sometimes wonder how long it would take me to get unhooked from screens. I've become very accustomed to getting up to date news, mostly relating to politics and the big issues of our time: climate change, war, economics, immigration, public health. And I use google all the time, for looking up definitions, histories, etc.

I'll be interested to hear if your mental outlook improves after a lengthy break from the madding screens. Good luck!

We are all human, we all make mistakes such as your's.

One of my hobby horses is to have a unique password for each service that I use, and always de-select the "remember me" option. That forces me to remember passwords. The trick that I use is (name of the service)+(memorable words that is the same for all passwords).

Your phone will feel very lonely for a week!