Google Voice for texting

Does anyone else use Google Voice instead of paying the $10 or whatever it is per month for texting? I've just started using it and think it is freakin' brilliant! It assigns me a phone # that I can give to my friends and the text gets sent to my e-mail and I don't get charged $.10 per message...freaking amazing!

The only downside is that they can't send me a picture message...they could send it through email if they have a smartphone, but my wife and mother-in-law who often send me random pics of stuff don't have smartphones so that is kind of a bummer, but it def. beats paying per text message.

I read a blog someone posted about it and what they loved was that they can give the # assigned by google to all of their business people and whoever else asks for it...and then if they're on vacation or have it set to go to voicemail at a certain time they won't be bothered by the phone calls.

The only thing I don't like is that it seems so bloody slow whenever someone calls that #. I don't know if it is the phone or the service, but I tried to asnwer it right away when my dad called that # the other day to test it out and by the time I was able to answer it it had went to voicemail.