Mission accomplished!

Off to the Library again, phone in hand.

Got connected to the internet very smoothly. Clearly starting to get the hang of things.

Got into my email account. Got into the email from Microsoft and clicked on it. And then, wonder of wonders, my very first app (free, naturally) actually did download and I was able to view my one and only PDF document, as it happens a recent annual report from the National Trust. So I will now be able to check up on their finances as I munch in the restaurant at Polesden Lacey, whether or not they are fully hot spotted, which I trust and expect that they are.

The google interface did not appear to have an option to remember my email password, so let's hope that it has not, being slightly worried about security aspects of all this integration. There is also the thought that having gone through all this rigmarole, I will now be tempted to spend money by downloading apps which are not free. Perhaps it is just as well that there is no wifi at home.

But pleased by the assurance from the pleasant people at Carphone Warehouse that there is no charge from my phone services provider - Talkmobile - for using the Library wifi, or anybody else's wifi for that matter. I had suspected that they might be levying their own version of VAT on such activities. Not completely convinced yet because the pleasant people at Carphone Warehouse, while pleasant, have not done terribly well on giving me advice. I dare say I am both too old to warrant quality attention and too phone dumb to ask the right questions.

I forgot to mention yesterday that I can now see contacts from the phone on the PC and I succeeded in downloading an Excel readable (CSV)  file of them. So having today succeeded in downloading an app, I declare the new phone set up mission to be accomplished.

I celebrated by taking a snap of a new build British Telecom public phone box. Presumably the once proud estate of such things is now much shrunk in the face of the onslaught of the mobile phones, but interesting to see that they are still putting up some new ones. I did not get as far as investigating whether it actually worked, but it did look smart enough. And sensibly placed right outside our Job Centre, the customers for which might not all be fully paid up members of the connected world.

Which gives rise to the thought that it might not be such a bad way to keep track of people. No self respecting hoodie is going to be without a phone and he is unlikely to want to keep changing the thing with all the pack drill that that involves, so here we have a ready made tracking device. One which is going to cause far less bother than the ankle mounted gadgets one might otherwise use. And then there are the national register people: no need to invent yet another universal reference number for people. Just insist that they have an active mobile phone. No citizenship - and certainly no NHS and  no benefits - for persons without phones.