Don't leave a voicemail, seriously.

My mother has a smartphone.

I really don't think I need to say more, but I will.

She has a smartphone w/ android and the kid at Verizon set up a gmail account for her (which is standard practice when you have an android phone). This is after about five years of me trying to get her off of Outlook, which I feel is about as outdated and useless as cassette tapes.

She immediately forgets both her username and pw. I ask her where the paperwork is because they must have written both down as they know that their geriatric users have the memories of yeast. She threw it out.

She's going out of town tomorrow very much against her will so I thought I would teach her how to dl podcasts onto her phone since she's given up using her iPod (this is one of those curiosities of life that is inexplicable and I don't even attempt to understand). As I taught her how to get podcasts she says "Now, how do I get the gmail thing?"

Cue: five hours of bullshit.

I set up a new gmail account for her and that caused gmail to flag my account and lock it since I had two separate gmail accounts open. Excuse me, what? Fuck off and die, mofo!

Then she tries to log into her gmail on her phone and because of the smart feature she figures out her original username...which is her name plus the pw to her atm card.

Me: Um, that's not acceptable.
Her: No one knows what that is.
Me: Dude, I'm hardly that worried about this, but ever heard of identity theft?
Her: Oh whatever, no one will ever know.
Me: Why did you think this was a good idea?
Her: I can't remember choosing the name. I don't know.
Me: ...

For those of you who do not have geriatric parents, please tune in. This is mild. The best is when they call you and ask who you are because they don't remember what number they dialed.

The funniest part of this is, of course, that my mom is a geriatrician. She takes care of all the other old people. [insert laugh track]