Free Is It Just Me? by Miranda Hart Page B

them as well.
    What, like a telegram? Where does it print out?
    The telephone has a screen on it.
    A bit like a calculator? I wrote ‘Boobless’ to Beady on mine in Chemistry class yesterday (SO funny).
    These messages aren’t just limited to ‘Boobless’, ‘ShellOil’ and ‘Esso’. You can write anything. They’re called ‘texts’.
    Texts? Why don’t you just call them, if it’s a phone?
    Because sometimes you can’t be bothered to call. If you’re running a bit late you can send a quick note saying: ‘Will be there in 5.’
    What’s the point in doing a ‘text’ to say that? You’re going to be ‘there in 5’ anyway.
    It’s polite. It’s what we do. Sometimes we text a full conversation . . .
    You press buttons for words to come up on a phone instead of just calling someone when it’s a phone anyway? One word – WHY?
    BECAUSE . . . Well . . . because . . . ummm . . . no, hang on . . . because sometimes conversations are more amusing in text form. And it’s good for quickly making plans.
    But that could just be a VERY QUICK PHONE CALL. BECAUSE IT’S A PHONE!
    Look, FORGET TEXTS! Get this – you can even send photos to someone else’s phone screen, if you want.
    Don’t be stupid. How can you send a photo through a PHONE? Are you also driving cars in the sky? How does it all even work?
    Ummm . . . well . . . there’s a satellite in the sky that . . . uh . . . bounces rays of information on a . . . a superhighway.
    So there ARE highways in the sky? Can you drive cars on them?
    They’re not literal highways. There’s sort of . . . an invisible energy and there are . . . waves of air . . . oh, I DON’T KNOW!
    I knew you were talking rubbish. Photos on phones. Absurd.
    It’s not rubbish. It’s just an advance on digital cameras.
    What are they?
    AAAAAHHHH! OK. They’re cameras, and you can see the photo as soon as you take it.
    Impossible! Even in Boots in Waterlooville the quickest development time is three days.
    Please shut your face.
    RUDE.
    This is just getting more complicated than I’d hoped. Bear with. So the photo immediately comes up on the screen on the camera and you take a photo and if you don’t like it, you can just get rid of it and take another one.
    OK, so you’re looking at a view, and you take a photo. Do you then have to look at the photo of what you are ALREADY LOOKING AT, and decide if you like the photo?
    Yes. Then take another photo if we don’t like it.
    Then presumably look at it to see if you like that one?
    Yeah. See, if it’s a fun photo, whether your friends look good, if you’re showing your best side –
    How vain. You’re standing around looking at the photos on your camera instead of actually looking at the view. You IDIOT! Why don’t you stop looking at photos of what you’re experiencing, and just get on with . . . EXPERIENCING it?
    We
are
experiencing it!
    You’re not: you’re looking at photos of the thing you should be looking at.
You all sound mad. One of the best things is getting photos developed and remembering what we took. Like that time we got the photos back a week after the Isle of Wight school trip and found that photo we’d forgotten about of Bella putting a hotdog in Miss Everett’s anorak hood.
    Oh, I give up. Just wait and see. You’ll enjoy it, you really will.
    No, don’t you dare give up. You still haven’t explained this ‘email’ thing to me yet.
    * collective deep breath * Oh, MDRC, I’m exhausted. Are you keeping up? But I suppose we’d better do this.
    An email is an ‘electronic mail’. You know when you type a letter on a computer?
    I don’t have a computer. Why would I have a computer? What am I – a City banker?
    Calm down. Right, you know when you type a letter on your electronic typewriter?
    I can’t believe that thing. You press the delete button and Tipp-Ex is automatically in the machine, and it rubs the letter out. It’s total genius.
    Yes, amazing. Anyway, imagine