Random numbers in your mobile

Is it just me?

I’ve numbers for folk i dont intend to speak to again.

Plus loads of names and nicknames.

I’d delete them but for some reason i can’t bring my self to do it…..

I mean who the F is hippy graham?

Ha, you don’t know who hippy graham is!?!? You don’t deserve his number!

Im my case, it’s more a case of not being arsed to spend the time working though them all to work of which are no longer relevant.

Just like photos on the phone – the memory is large enough that it just doesn’t affect me

Having read this I’ve just purged my contacts.

You made the cut Duncan, you’ll be pleased to hear.

Kind regards,

Graham (the Hippy)

Im my case, it’s more a case of not being arsed to spend the time working though them all to work of which are no longer relevant.

Just like photos on the phone – the memory is large enough that it just doesn’t affect me

Pretty much this ^^.

In the early days of mobiles, I remember having to write down all the names and numbers and then manually copy everything over so that was an opportunity to scrub unused contacts. Now it just syncs everything across without me needing to think about it so I never bother going through and checking.

There are a few names / nicknames on there I don’t even recognise.

I swear I only know about 30 people and I’d only ever call about six of them!

Even weirder is that for loads of my contacts the face of some bloke who I don’t recognise appears!

There’s a few dead people in mine, I’m not sure why I don’t remove them, but I don’t.

I have loads of customer numbers, some only needed once and get purged once in a while others stay but I’m not great at remembering names so they are often more descriptive. I think ‘Nice Scots Lady’ would be happy with hers, ‘Baldy Weirdo’ maybe less so

Is that weird bloke the placeholder picture of Johnny Appleseed?

In the early days of mobiles, I remember having to write down all the names and numbers and then manually copy everything over so that was an opportunity to scrub unused contacts.

I think from pretty early on mac’s were able to sync contacts with old candy bar phones, or you were able to copy contacts across using the memory card –  so I don’t think I ever had to manually copy numbers over.

Becuase of that I’ve still got a bunch of folk on my phone who’s surnames are incomplete because the phone I had when I first saved their number had a 14 digit character limit.

Now that they’ve been in my contacts for so long if I type their full name my Mac / phone the auto correct changes is to the incomplete version.

Just scrolling through my contacts now – I’ve got a ‘Jane Northumberland’ and had to think about who I know from Northumberland called Jane – its the Duchess of Northumberland  🙂

No… That one has hair apparently

I think ‘Nice Scots Lady’ would be happy with hers, ‘Baldy Weirdo’ maybe less so

I’ve got ‘Dave Pointless’ ‘Creepy Neil’ and ‘Grumph’

Curious thread.

People who I’m never going to call again, I mostly never added in the first place.  Pretty much from day one I had contacts stored as actual names, so I’d have Graham Smith rather than Hippy Graham.

I occasionally look at other people’s utter shit tip of a phonebook and boggle.  Like, seven discrete entries for one person, rather than having one contact with multiple numbers for home, work etc.  We haven’t been saving contacts to a SIM card in like 20 years, what are you doing?

In the early days of mobiles, I remember having to write down all the names and numbers and then manually copy everything over

You know, I had my first mobile in 1999 and I’ve never had to do this.  Even going between disparate feature phones there’s always been a way of transferring (often using Outlook as a middle man).

That said, I’m weird with numbers.  At a gathering of old friends recently, I went round the table and recited everyone’s home phone numbers from memory (sometimes including before and after they’d moved house).  I’m shit with names and worse with faces, but numbers and voices stick in my brain.

People who I’m never going to call again, I mostly never added in the first place.

My work world is pretty dynamic – always working with new people in new places – so theres people I’ll be in contact with a lot, but maybe only for a few days. At the end of that period theres no reason to believe I won’t work with then again so theres not really any reason to delete them in any hurry – until the point where I can’t remember who they are and then I’m not sure if theyre someone worth keeping.

I think from pretty early on mac’s were able to sync contacts with old candy bar phones, or you were able to copy contacts across using the memory card –  so I don’t think I ever had to manually copy numbers over.

Like, seven discrete entries for one person, rather than having one contact with multiple numbers for home, work etc.

My first phone (1998, as a poor student) was so basic that if you wanted to send a text, you still had to manually type the number in, it wouldn’t allow you to select a name from the address book. As a result, I knew my parents’, gf , housemates and a couple of other numbers off by heart. And it certainly wasn’t guaranteed that everyone would have a mobile at that time.

But it absolutely wouldn’t do multiple numbers for one name nor would it do more than about 12 or 14 characters. I had a lot of shortened names and a lot of:
BillW
BillW Mo
Dad
Dad Mo
etc for where I’d had to store mobile numbers separately. That took years to clean up!

Plenty of random unrecognisable ones, some known but random numbers (including Hora, how the heck I have his number is a mystery!), but what’s most sad is the number of people in my contacts that are now dead 😕

I called one on the random numbers in my phone and got through to a guy called Ernie.

There’s an absolute load of nonsense in my contacts but the only numbers I actively look for are my home landline and my wife’s mobile because I can never remember them.

My wife once looked through and asked why I had so much crap on there and that she couldn’t put up with it….. But why? It would take more time and effort to go through and purge it than any negative impact having a load of crap contacts actually has!

No… That one has hair apparently

Is he the hair apparent?

Yep I generally don’t delete contacts. Mix of people who I’ve worked with in the past, always useful to keep their details, plus restaurants for places I used to live. And also people who are dead and I can’t bring myself to delete their number.

However proper names none of that nickname nonsense and I only have 289 contacts.

“David Helicopters”

I think I really should be able to remember who that is.

Ive also  got

“Lisa Balloons”

and

“Jelly”

Can I have Lisa’s number?

Is he the hair apparent?

Delete your account.

🤣🤣

I’m guilty of this. Still save contacts to my SIM card, still have a 14 character limit, still have truncated surnames or ‘mob’ after the first name.

I keep them, so I know never to answer them 😀

I have all sorts from various phones over the years. I have one contact called “boring ****, don’t answer”, its a bloke I used to work with who had a habit of calling in the car on his way home from work to discuss something that happened during the day and he would be near impossible to get off the phone. I guess at some point I updated the contact so I didn’t forget and get stuck talking to him for half the evening 🙂

49 contacts in my phone. Probably used about half of them in the last year.

1500 contacts – I do not know that meaning people!

Did this at school and it’s always stuck with me.

https://poets.org/poem/long-distance-ii

#humblebrag

Still save contacts to my SIM card

Why?  Good god, do you still write using a quill and inkwell?  That was mental twenty years ago.

“David Helicopters”

I think I really should be able to remember who that is.

Ive also  got

“Lisa Balloons”

and

“Jelly”

You’re a kids entertainer and party organiser, who likes arriving in style but suffers from amnesia.  You’re welcome.

You’re a kids entertainer and party organiser, who likes arriving in style but suffers from amnesia.  You’re welcome.

Ahh – that must be Mr Jelly

I mean who the F is hippy graham?

Iirc, a vegan who enjoyed Trailquests

Not just you.

Just checked mine. I have no idea…

This has prompted me to have a rummage through my contacts list and cull a few. It’s down to 115 from somewhere around 130-odd. None were really random, but most go back years and most are no longer available or needed.