Shiny new things - planned and unplanned

I was doing pretty good budgeting my allowance so I replaced my Galaxy Watch with a Galaxy Watch Active 2. Then I dropped my phone on a rough cement driveway.I wasn't even worried initially because I knew it hit the case edge. It must have hit a stone as it landed the second time. Budget blown

Let's talk about the planned spend first🙂 While I like my Galaxy Watch I find it heavy and sometimes it doesn't charge quickly. When the Active 2 came out and it had pretty well everything the Watch has I decided to give it a try. It's super light, I feel like I'm barely wearing it and I can use the inexpensive fun replacement bands. speaking of bands, I really like the band buckle design. Other things I like:

• light weight
• good speaker volume and clarity for phone calls
• Samsung Pay
• S Health is different and better for me
• virtual bezel for navigation
• the power bank bonus is awesome

Things I don't like is really just one thing. Without the metal bezel, the face is really exposed. So far I've been good at not hitting it on things. Even though the battery life is meh it tops up quickly while I'm having a shower or eating breakfast so that's ok.

Then there's the sad story of my phone😟 I had put it in a side pocket of my purse and when I bent down to let Bennie out of his house it slid out, bounced on the driveway then landed face down. I limped it along (actually it wasn't too bad) but finally decided on Sunday to get a replacement. What did I end up with? A Note 10. Same price as an S10 with more memory. Direct order from Samsung and get 2 day delivery. I did go into BestBuy to see if it felt too big but it was fine. With so little bezel it's amazing how large the screen can be.

Before it could arrive my screen really failed. It is a lesson on what I actually use my phone for ... photos for social media/blogging, tap to pay, banking, loyalty cards, password prompts, grocery lists (both making and ordering), booking things, making notes, calendar and the list goes on. It's also surprising what I can do with the screen not working. I get a lot of my notifications on my wrist and I can text from my Surface using the Your Phone app. On the good side I could plug it into my monitor and use it along with my BT keyboard. Dex works fine, the damage is all on the screen/digitizer.

New phone tomorrow...spending the evening setting up.