Dead earbuds

During my recent trip to London, I took my earbuds with me so that I could listen to some music while on the train. On the arriving journey, I listened to three songs without any problem, but then I briefly had to put the earbuds away. When I got the earbuds out again, the music coming through them was distorted. No matter how many times I adjusted my earbuds' plug in my phone's headphone jack, the sound did not improve. I ultimately gave up and completed the rest of my journey to and from London without any music.

I was concerned, however, that the problem was with my phone. My phone's headphone jack is slightly buggy in that if a plug is not inside it at a certain angle, it will only play in mono (or rarely, not at all). I was worried that the jack had failed completely; however, when I later tried my earbuds in my brother's and Dad's phones, and tried my brother's earbuds in mine, the problem was confirmed to be with my earbuds. The L-shaped connection area on them had been damaged and was the cause of the audio distortion.

Since then, a new pair of earbuds has been ordered to replace my old set. I sometimes use my phone as a music player and not having earbuds is annoying, especially if I'm on a train and don't want to disturb other people with what I'm listening to.

My earbuds weren't my only phone accessory that were affected that day. In the evening, when I was out by the lake at the Barbican Centre, my phone pouch blew out of my hands and into the water surrounding one of the fountains. I was able to retrieve the pouch but it was soaked; I put it in one of my pockets away from my phone in the hope that it would dry out. Fortunately, it did and the pouch is fine; it has no water damage.