Hi, Sherman. We had a Sprint plan for 8 years while my husband was an
over the road truckdriver and we burned up THOUSANDS of minutes. When
he came off the road he wanted to eliminate that bill and didn't want
to get into another contract. When our 3rd child was due in August we
decided he needed a phone for a month and I did tons of research. We
ended up with Virgin Mobile. I'm sure it will work fine in Houston/La
Porte. I gave a friend the referral bonus in Corpus. I think it runs
on Sprint lines but I can't remember for sure. Anyway, for us it sucks
because I'm adding time every couple of days! I am trying to talk my
husband into another plan! He works nights now. We are spending
$100+ a month in minutes. Virgin Mobile has 3 different "plans" and
you can figure out what works best for you. Right now I have it set at
them taking 35 cents a minute per day and everything is 10 cents per
minute. If you use it infrequently you can set it to 25 cents per
minute for the first 10 minutes and then 10 cents the rest of the day.
Only on the days you use it. They also have a "talk all the time" deal
which I haven't checked into much. You have to "top up" I think every
90 days but you don't lose your minutes as long as you add some every
90 days to stay activated. They also have some "auto top-up" things
but I haven't checked into it much since I'm adding time all the time!

If I can talk my husband into a contract I'd gladly give you our
phone. Virgin Mobile actually encourages recycling your phones. It's
REALLY easy to go online and set up your own phone number on a recycled
phone. My only complaint with them has been for the first 2 months we
got TONS of wrong numbers....they re-issue phone numbers too fast! We
didn't b other checking voicemail because it was always a wrong number
and wasted minutes.

You can check out Virgin Mobile's deals at
http://www.virginmobileusa.com . You could also try to pick up a phone
on freecycle. Are you familiar with freecycle in your area? You can
email me for information if you're not.

amy