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Dick Tracy got it backwards

Do you have a watch? I know I don't.

From about the age of eight or so, I always wore a watch. At first it was a simple "17 jewel" mechanical wind-up watch that my parents bought me as a Christmas gift while I was still at primary school but I've had quite a few wristy-timepieces over the years.

I recall buying one of the new-fangled LED watches while living in Sydney in the 1970s, it was awfully pricey but a wonder of modern (for the time) miniaturisation and sophistication.

the batteries only lasted about two weeks because everyone wanted to see it light up and display the time with its tiny seven-segment LED display.

Then, a couple of years later, I spent a whole week's salary on a fancy LCD watch -- and this one came with an alarm and an hourly beep. I soon learned that to wear this watch to the movies would earn the wrath of others as it chirped away on every o'clock.

My next watch was an LCD unit that was also supposed to be waterproof to 100 feet.

Unfortunately, although it may have been designed to cope with the significant water pressure encountered at such depths, it went all foggy and stopped working when I wore it while having a shower.

By the 1980s I'd tired of "digital" and bought myself a nice LCD analog watch. It was still a digital inside but used a round LCD screen that displayed analog hands instead of numerals. I liked it and it worked well -- for as long as it lasted.

I then gave up wearing watches and relied instead on my own body-clock to keep track of the time. It's amazing just how accurately you can tell the time when you've weened yourself off wearing a watch. I was rarely more than 5-6 minutes out when estimating the time.

I soon discovered however, that when engaging in international air travel, a wristwatch is essential. Jetlag kills the accuracy of your internal body clock so last time I flew to the USA I picked up a cheap watch while I was there. I still have it somewhere but I only wore it for the duration of that journey.

So now I'm back to using my body clock -- oh, and my mobile phone.

I find it rather interesting that (at least for me), my mobile phone has become the equivalent of the good old-fashioned fob-watch.

Thanks to my ever-present mobile, I have no need for an annoying wrist-wrap that simply tells the time. I'm still accurate to 5-6 minutes using my body-clock and when I need to make double-sure, my phone comes to the rescue.

I've noticed recently that whereas some 20-30 years ago *everybody* wore a watch, there are now a surprising number of folk like myself, who simply don't bother.

So, I'd be very interested to find out if I'm unusual in ditching my watch in favour of honing my time-estimating skills and relying on my phone.

Are you a watch wearer?

Has the Dick-Tracy wristwatch telephone actually become the telephone that doubles as a watch?

Or, if you're really a wrist-watch enthusiast, could this be the phone for you?

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