Phone maladies and having "one of those faces."

I got a few calls from my mobile phone provider recently, offering me an early upgrade. Each time I told them I'd have a think about it and call them back. About a week ago I finally called them back, only to be told that it wasn't them that had called me, it was some third party company(s) and had I taken them up on the offer they would have signed me up to an additional contract which would have taken me about a month to sort out! My advice is, if you get a call from anyone offering you anything, even if it is from a company that you already deal with, don't agree to anything, but instead call them back. OK, it means you foot the cost of the call, (if that's a real pain, ask for the name of the person you speak to and get them to call you back,) but it means you definitely know who you're dealing with.
I was told that my provider don't usually offer early upgrades either, so I decided to go into the local store in town to have a look at handsets and ask about upgrade charges for the ones I was interested in. I'm usually pretty up on handsets but this last year there has been nothing out that's particularly interested me. There was however, the next model up from my current phone.
I like my current phone. It does everything I want it to and it's small to boot. The only thing that slightly bugs me about it is that although you can have an MP3 as your ringtone, or several if you set groups of callers up - heck you could pretty much have a different MP3 for each person in your contact list, and you can also have an MP3 as your morning alarm, for some reason you can't set one as your text message tone. What? Why? All you get is a list of preset ones, that on the whole are pretty crappy.
I asked the guy if he could check if you can set an MP3 as a text tone on the new model and also another, similar model by the same manufacturer. Nope.
"Seriously?"
"Yeah. I don't get it either, most phones you can do that on now, but I checked both of those and it doesn't allow you to do it."
So we had a discussion about possible alternatives and the guy was very helpful. He told me that the next model up from mine had a shitty battery life too - a friend of his took it out and had to charge it before she got home. I eventually decided on a Sony Ericsson walkman phone for a number of reasons:

• I know Sony phones are pretty decent. The only problems I've heard with them is that the joystick in the middle sometimes breaks. This one doesn't have a joystick.
• It's a walkman phone. Now, I have a 30GB video Ipod, so I can't really see me using it as a walkman, (I used to use my old phone as one before I got my Ipod,) but at least I know it'll handle MP3's OK and the sound quality should be good.
• It comes with a 1GB pro duo memory stick, which I can also use in my PSP. :)
• It's a slide phone, which I like. I'm not keen on the handsets where the keypads are always exposed and my last two phones have been slides. Also, despite first impressions, it's actually about the same size as my current phone.
• It has a 2 megapixel camera. My current phone is the same, but the screen on the Sony is apparently better. The next model up from my current phone had a 3MP camera, which was a big draw for me. I mean 3MP? That's the same as digital cameras used to be not that long ago! I like having cameras as part of my phone. A few years back who'd have imagined it, but now we have mobile phones with respectable quality digital cameras and MP3 players built in! I don't do much photography, but it's something I'd like to do more of and learn more about, but I definitelty like the idea that if I ever want to snap something, I've always got a camera on me.

So I'd made my choice. Now we had to talk tarrifs. He suggested I change mine because my current tarrif was price matched to a competitor's and I couldn't get the phone for free unless I changed. There's always a catch. In this case however, it seems to have worked out pretty well because for an extra £5 a month, I get 500 any time, any network minutes and unlimited texts. Unlimited texts actually means up to 3000 a month, but that's still way more than I would use. At the moment, I pay £30 a month and my bill is usually between roughly £32 to £37 a month when the calls and texts are added on. This way, I can't really see me going over £35. It meant changing my number, but I figured, hell with it, it's not like I've never changed my number in the past, I'll send out an email and a text and people will update their contacts lists/books and get used to using the new number in about a year or so. Now because I was changing my number, this was effectively a new contract rather than a standard upgrade, (it still amazes me that I've been with this provider for two years and I'd still get a better deal if I just walked in off the street, but hey...) so there were forms to fill in and I needed to provide them with two forms of ID - one for signature, which my credit card sufficed for, and a second for proof of address, like a drivers licence or bill. I didn't have anything with me so I said I pop back the next day with it & the assistant kindly offered to charge the phone overnight for me so it would be ready when I came in. Now that's decent customer service.
So I went back in today and I walked, like I usually do when I go into town as it's only about 30 minutes walk and saves me first finding somewhere to park and then paying for the priviledge. The weather was shite and I got pretty wet on the way in, but I was excited at getting my new phone and spending an hour or two playing with it, moving my contacts and photos across and that sort of thing. This is one area where I am a bit of a typical bloke - I get excited by new gadgets. Particularly phones and games consoles, but I used to want to work in the computer games industry, so that's my justification for that one. For the most part, I'm not really a typical bloke in a lot of ways, I don't like drinking until I'm sick and getting in fights, (OK, perhaps that's a little unfair, but although I like a drink I'm a self confessed lightwieght and I'm OK with it,) I don't like football at all and I don't mind going shopping.
Anyway I got to the store, and I'd taken two bills, one from the phone company themselves, and my passport - just to be sure. The assistant duly informed me that they couldn't accept the bills as proof of address, despite both of them having my name and address emblazoned across the front and one of them having been sent by the company itself! After a minute or two or verbal wrangling, my mood rapidly deteriorating, I asked to speak to the manager. I don't usually like doing that, having worked in positions where people asked to speak to my manager, only to be told the exact thing by them. The manager came over and instantly made a huge mistake: He called me 'chap', as in, "Well, the problem we've got chap, is..."
He stopped short of concluding his sentence upon glancing up at my rather less than pleased countenance. I've had a fair few people tell me that I can look rather intimidating at times - even my current girlfriend thought I was something of a 'hard case' when she first met me and I occasionally have people cross the street to avoid me. I'm not that type of guy at all, as anyone that knows me, including my girlfriend now she knows me better, would tell you. In fact I'm a big softie, but if I'm annoyed, people can usually see it and this guy saw it now.
He wasn't to know that this was one of my buttons, but I really, REALLY dislike being talked to by shop staff as if I was one of their friends. I think it's just unprofessional. I once went into a branch of popular high street electrical retailers to ask about MP3 players, just before I bought my Ipod. The young man that served me chatted to me as if we were talking about the subject in the pub, over a pint. He eventually got the message from looking at my expression too, after telling me that a particular model was, "the dog's bollocks." I have no problem with swearing at all - I have a mouth like a dock worker most of the time myself, (if you knew where I grew up, you'd know how apt that was,) and most days the air between my colleague and myself in the office we share is blue with the language, but when I go into a shop, I expect to be treated the same as every other customer, which is to say, professionally and with some respect. Needless to say, I bought my Ipod elsewhere.
I'm prepared to accept that it's because I'm getting older that I feel this way, but I do place a high value on politeness and respect. You'd never hear me swear in front of my Grandmother, for example. There's a time and place and it's about what's appropriate for the situation. Besides which, I must still look young enough that these teens-to-twenties twats feel I'm enough of 'one of them,' for them to be able to get away with it.
I've become aware over the last ten or so years, that I have 'one of those faces', but the strange thing is it seems to be a different, 'one of those faces,' to different people.
Some people think I'm intimidating, (which I have to confess, I occasionally use to my advantage,) and like I mentioned I still have people actually cross the street to avoid me. That face seems to be when I'm most relaxed, strangely. When I'm just feeling OK, content, but maybe thiking about something, my face relaxes and apparently turns into some kind of snarling scowl. I know this isn't exactly the case, but this is when people seem to think I look scary. I remember a guy I used to work with asked one of the managers to ask me something because he was too nervous to ask me himself. He actually referred to me as, "that scary guy," to which the manager replied, "Him? You couldn't meet a less scary guy!"
Sometimes that same face comes across as merely pissed off - this usually happens with people that know me already. the amount of times I've just been sitting, quite content and happily thinking about something when someone I know has asked me what's the matter. Sometimes this has even ended in an argument because the person hasn't believed I've been OK and for some reason feel I'm reluctant to talk to them about whatever is supposedly bothering me and we both end up getting exasperated with the other.
For some reason, I get asked for directions a lot. I mean, I lot more than I think should be normal. I think sometimes this might be due to the fact that I walk pretty fast, so people look at me and think, "Oh, there's a guy who knows where he's going, let's ask him." which is true - I know where I'M going, but maybe not where they want to go. The wierd thing is that I get asked in towns and places I've never been to before, again, more than I think is probably normal. So I obviously have a face that looks like I belong wherever I am and maybe that's not such a bad thing.