The Fall and whether I should freak out and a new mobile phone

Today, I noticed a couple of branches turning yellow on the huge linden tree in front of my living room. Fall has always been my favorite season but, this year nothing seems to excite me anymore. 

I do not know whether I should start freaking out or not, but, I am coughing a little bit and my temperature is slightly elevated. I am taking an antibiotic for my implant so, even a slightly elevated temperature is alarming. 

I have no other symptoms such as loss of smell, achy joints and etc. I am hoping, it is just a simple cold.

I made some Tom Kha Gai today. Sounded like a good cold and cough remedy. I also made fresh ginger/lemon tea using the real ginger and lemons. I may have another one after dinner.

My 4 year old phone is about to kick the bucket. I have been resisting to replace it for some time. The battery needs to be charged like four times every day and I cannot use all the apps I need to use. I had to get rid of many apps because, it is just a 32Gb phone. Due to the weak TL, phone prices have sky-rocketed over here and I am the kind of person who does not like shelling out a bundle of money for a COOL phone. 

I have been an Ericsson fan for years and then when they sold their phone business to SONY, I became a SONY fan. Well, nobody imports SONY anymore because of it's high prices and even if they did, I do not think I would be willing to pay a lot of money. They used to be very reasonable in the past.

I have been making do with my phone for quiet a while now and I even thought about getting it's battery replaced. However, that doesn't help with the capacity issue.

My lovely, smart SIS came to the rescue! She found out that a website we frequently order online, is buying your old phone back and crediting your account for that buyback amount. Her husband had an old IPhone 7 which he was not using anymore. It's camera is not working. Their bank provides them with new phones every two years and lets them keep the old phones. She looked it up online and told me that they were paying a good deal of money for the IP 7. 

So, I started looking for phones and have decided to buy a Xiaomi Mi Note 10 Lite. It is a 128 GB; more than enough capacity and it has an enormous battery. Read good reviews about it and I know I will always miss the SONY phones I have had the pleasure of using so far, but, hey; it is just a gadget. 

I wanted to buy a Motorola when I was back in the US last year but, they are also non-existent in this market so, repair would not be possible if something happened. Plus,  the  government upped the taxes on the phones brought into the country by travelers just to please the importers while I was still in the US. You can only bring one phone every two years and you have to pay a huge tax. Have I mentioned that I really hate the government? I do.

So,

Xiaomi                                3609 TL (USD 493)

IP 7                                   - 1900 TL (USD 259)

Money out of pocket           1709 TL (USD 233) Perfect!

So, I signed up for the campaign and SIS will send the I phone to the buying party who will credit my account within 15 days and I will be buying my new phone. 

Many friends may laugh at me because I certainly can easily afford a shiny, expensive, cool phone. They may think, I am being cheap. However, I think, this is only frugal. The phone I use, the apartment I live in, the car I drive do not define who I am. Do they?