Sometimes it’s good to go “off-the-grid” and find a place where you are completely unreachable. A land with no computers, no social media, and no cell phones. Everyone needs to make time in life to unplug.
However, when you are producing a crazy TV show with crew scrambling through shot lists, costumes getting thrown together, and locations being confirmed and reconfirmed, going “off-the-grid” is a bad thing. We rely heavily on our phones in the field, and if they aren’t working we are left with nothing but a wink and a prayer hoping things go smoothly. Sometimes it works, but generally, it doesn’t. We need our phones all over Texas, not just in the cities and on the highways.
For a decade, I was a loyal customer to my old cell phone company. However, there was a little problem with their coverage. It was called The Texas Hill Country. Make that West Texas completely. They seemed to forget that it even existed. And this was one of the major carriers. Their coverage dropped off just past the I-35 corridor. I spend a lot of time out West, so this was a big, big problem. Then I found AT&T who let me test out their phones all over the state. See their coverage map below.
I could actually make calls in the Hill Country. What a revelation! I could stream music and podcasts on my cross-Texas road trips. I could share photos from the back country in places like Guadalupe Mountains National Park (pictured above). I could stay in touch with Daytrippers all over Texas while I was traveling all over Texas. After just one day trip, I made it final and broke up with my old carrier – never to return.
Sometimes it’s good to go “off-the-grid” but I’d like to be the one to choose when that happens rather than have stinky coverage decide it for me. See you on the road!
