Happy Birthday BA: Thirteen Years Old

It was a very busy week, hence my extreme quiet.

Thursday dawned, the 63rd anniversary of VE Day and the BA's 13th birthday. Of course there is great debate about this as she was born in the UK so all our Australian friends received news of her birth early on the morning of the 9th of May, also an important date as it's the birthday of the Bestie's beloved Mum. As a result we have a celebration on the 8th but we inform her she has not achieved her new 'age' until the next day :-)

Because of the mega birthday party back in April, her real birthday was a bit of a quiet affair highlighted rather by accident ( I forgot the date when I made the arrangement) by the delightful visit of Chris and Sinead of 'Ravings of a Wandering American Expatriate...' (formerly Chris in Oxford!).

It was quite surreal meeting a 'bloggy mate' in person but every bit as entertaining, informative and amusing as his blog with the additional pleasure of being able to talk to Sinead as well! They graciously helped us sing Happy Birthday and even bravely ate a piece of the alarmingly decorated and shaped birthday cake. Yes, I believe those are marshmellows.

Having been given a Gym Membership as an early birthday present around Easter, she didn't scoop too much on the day but did receive some money from friends and family. She has decided to use this, plus her pocket money savings, to buy a (da-da-DAH) mobile phone!

Yes, the time has come. I can delay it no longer and let's face it, we are getting to a stage where it will be useful.
My beautiful blonde-haired, blue-eyed fairy will soon be catching buses to the city and meeting friends at the Food Court. *sniff*

Mind you, I am really proud that she has taken the initiative to provide for the phone herself. Now when I say 'herself' I am of course using the term loosely. She intends to pay for the credit with her own pocket money. Which of course comes from us. :-) Ah well. At least she's prioritising her use of money, that in itself is quite a skill.

We made our way into the shopping centre in the city to visit a variety of outlets and compare phones, plans and providers. At the first stop I asked the helpful young man to explain the differences between 'plans' and 'prepaid' and to advise us as to which would be more appropriate for our purpose. Half way through his detailed explanation I noticed that the BA had drifted off with her friend to look at the displays.

"Hoi you! You're supposed to be listening to all this and deciding which product would suit you best!" I remonstrated.
"Oh, Mum.....its a all a bit confusing," she sighed.
"Well, if you don't understand the choices perhaps you're not old enough to own a phone!" I snapped, somewhat unreasonably as I was currently struggling to unravel the tangle of call rates, flag falls, free minutes, credit expiry periods, caps and minimum payments. Good grief. I don't even remember what I option I use on my own phone! These companies know what they are doing to prevent you making any direct comparisons!!!!

She did make an effort however and eventually we found we were leaning towards pre-paid as an effective method of controlling expenditure and getting free minutes for calls to named 'friend's' numbers. The phone itself may prove challenging as I am unimpressed with the idea of cameras and bluetooth connectivity for an item which is required mostly to check whether she managed to catch the school bus on time. Unfortunately, even the cheapest of phones
($79.00 AUD) seem to come with all manner of hideous 'extras'. These worry me. For example, the young friends who had stayed over on Friday night and were shopping with us, horrified me by paying through the nose to have their shocking, fuzzy, 1MB phone shots printed out in an automated booth using their phone's connectivity. I think they think a bluetooth download is free!!!!!!

And this doesn't even touch on what the young people are doing with phone shots of each other on 'youtube'!

Anyway, we have all the information to peruse and will make a decision during the week. Suffice to say she is very excited!

My great big thirteen year old girl............

Happy Birthday sweetheart.