Thanks to James and others that had suggestions.

The Answer: Was perfectly logical......nothing wrong with my phone.

I had recently downloaded the "Weather Bug" and the first white vertical line that I thought was an exclamation point...with the bottom half of it red was actually a 'Thermometer' and the number beside it was the present temperature in Westport, CT....... and later it was a RED TRIANGLE when there was a Weather Warning. (we had high wind warnings and a possible freeze warning for tonight) Once you have looked at the warning the triangle goes back to the thermometer.

It is all pretty simple...once you figure out what things are......I was considering sending my 9700 back because something was wrong. Why else would we have a red triangle with an exclamation pt?

Glad I did not do that.......they would have a good laugh at me.

Now you can have a laugh at on me. Oh well, I am still learning.
Thanks, Tom
BTW: I love my BB 9700....especially now that I know "It ain't broke". :-)

Yes, I got a quick start manual. I have also looked through the icons online by BB.
I do not see either what I had or what it seems to have morphed into.

I now have a little more information.
The "icon" I have on my screen is a equilateral RED TRIANGLE .....base down.... with what may be a white ( ! ) exclamation point in it. My wife's identical 9700 does not have it on her screen. We got them at the same time. Does that help? Does anyone know what it might be? I am thinking there must be something wrong.

i also suggest going to the "Messages" section of your phone. From there you can see all of the messages/notifications. When you are there check to make sure none of them are bold. If that doesn't work I would suggest doing a battery pull to see if that fixes it.

Well the Facebook notification wouldn't have a red L. Do you get the icon often? or is this the first time you are seeing it?

Yes, I do face book. Could it be the number of post or messages from friends I am linked to?
It is not in the quick start book. I will have to stop in the BB shop next time I am near one.
I have a lot to learn about these very neat little computer/phones.

@tombmagic do you have any apps installed on your device? It could be from one of them.

I have an 'icon'. I am not sure what it is.
It is just to the right of my unread message envelope and it looks like a lower case L. with a number right beside it. it looks like this. l65 the bottom half of the lower case L seems to be red.
Does anyone know what this means?
I am new to the BB community and want to get to know my BB 9700.
Thanks,
Tom

Did you get an instruction manual with your phone?