Melissa Kite Melissa Kite

Real life | 15 February 2018

I trashed the screen — accidentally on subliminally purpose, then pretended I couldn’t get another one

issue 17 February 2018

After much thought, I am toying with the idea of faking my own death.

I mean in a virtual sense, but as virtual reality is more important than physical reality nowadays, this is pretty heavy stuff.

Specifically, I want to cease to exist on Facebook, Twitter and all other social networking platforms, where I barely exist anyway because they frighten me so much, but where I have what is known as ‘a presence’. Do not scoff. I have reason to believe it may well be possible to do this.

A few weeks ago, I faked my own iPhone death. People said it couldn’t be done. But I managed it by trashing the screen, accidently on subliminally purpose, and telling everyone that my phone provider wouldn’t let me have another one until I was due an upgrade in three months’ time, which was true — thanks, EE — and that I was refusing to buy one sooner on principle.

I switched back to an old BlackBerry with buttons and no access to the internet — something to do with the fact that the BlackBerry corporation, in so far as it exists, is not really up and doing. I texted everyone to say this was the way it was, and they would just have to live with the fact that I couldn’t be sent links, or invitations to partake of free gabbling on WhatsApp.

Everyone accepted this pretty much, eventually, although inevitably there were a lot of folk who continued to call and text the iPhone and send me lots of links and invitations on WhatsApp to talk about the fact that I had trashed my iPhone.

I could see all this because after a few days of the screen being blank from the smashing, it came weirdly back to life.

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