iPhone Junk Drawer

View From The Fridge
Photo by Leighann Lord

Surprise, surprise, there’s a new IOS software update for my iPhone. While these updates don’t happen every day, they are frequent enough to make you think, “Damn, didn’t I just do this?” This latest update required 2.5 gigs of free space on the phone and I wasn’t gonna make it. I’ve been maxing out the memory on my 16gig 4S since I got it. I’m constantly managing my photos, making executive decisions on what to keep, delete, or move to my computer. It’s agony. God forbid I don’t have instant access to one of the dozens of pictures I have of my dog. It’s a digital Sophie’s Choice.

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So I knuckled down and did some icleaning. In addition to photos, I got rid of all of my unnecessary, seemed-like-a-good-idea-at-the-time apps. But try as I might I still can’t bring myself to delete Rock, Paper, Scissors, Lizard, Spock even though it’s only function is to show it off to other fans of The Big Bang Theory. If you’re unfamiliar, it goes like this:

Scissors cuts paper

Paper covers rock

Rock crushes lizard

Lizard poisons Spock

Spock smashes scissors

Scissors decapitates lizard

Lizard eats paper

Paper disproves Spock

Spock vaporizes rock

Rock crushes scissors

If you’re judging me stop it. I don’t play Angry Birds or Words with Friends (or as my Mother would call it: Angry Friends and Words with Birds). Truth be told I don’t even play Rock, Paper, Scissors, Lizard, Spock … all that much ... anymore. It’s just there to bolster my geek street cred. You never know when a nerd-off is going to happen and a girl has to be prepared.

So, I deleted stuff, fired up my iTunes, and was all set to update the IOS when I noticed a big, fat yellow indicator bar labeled “Other” that was hogging up over three gigs of space on my iPhone. What the hell? Is this why I’m ditching dog photos?

Jalinda at Apple Care informed me that “Other” is a catchall for various things that the iPhone & iTunes don’t know how to file. Apparently, the only way to reclaim some of that space is to do a backup and restore. Just then I had a flashback to my BlackBerry days when a backup and restore was a days’ long process with marathon sessions on the phone with tech support. My longest call: Five hours. 

I began to whimper.

          Jalinda assured me that all would be well. And it would have been if I hadn’t chosen to restore my iPhone from my iCloud backup. Note to all: unless your wifi is powered by Dilithium crystals don’t choose to restore from iCloud. It was estimated to take first two, then seven then 10 hours. I called Apple Care again. And this time, with DJ’s help, we restarted the process and chose to do the backup from iTunes. It took just under an hour.   

I’m happy to report that my iPhone junk drawer has slimmed down to a svelte and sexy 1.5 gigs. You know what that means: more happy apps and puppy pics! Say cheese!

Thanks for reading The Urban Erma. You can subscribe to the blogcast (yes, I made up this word) FREE on iTunes. And, in case you were wondering, in addition to blogging I am also an amazing stand-up comedian. I do "Thinking Cap Comedy." Basically, if comedy were music, I'd be Jazz. Want to see a show? Check out my schedule at @ VeryFunnyLady.com.