Life in Technicolor

This time I am going to go on for a bit about technology again. My personal technology. I gave in and switched to the iPhone finally. My brother upgraded to the iPhone 4 so he passed his 3GS down to me. I felt kinda silly about it. I was such a Palm fangirl. I was fond of my old Palm pilot and considered getting a Treo for some time. Then I got the iPod touch, so I had the fun of iPhone apps, without paying for the expensive iPhone plan. And I had my Blackberry for a phone since I couldn't have a camera phone at work.

When the Palm Pre came out, I wanted it, but it was only on Sprint. So I made do with my Blackberry for another year, until the Pre showed up on AT&T. I had to get it, even though it meant adding a second line. But I had fun with it. It was small and cute, I liked how if felt in my pocket, and still had a slide out keyboard for texting.

There were a lot of really cool things about the Pre. It did multitasking better than the iPhone; you could keep several apps open at once and slide easily back and forth between them. I liked the way it pulls all your contacts' information together from Facebook and integrated them with your phone's contacts. So when one of your Facebook friends called, you'd see their current profile picture and if they changed their number or anything else, it updated to the Pre automatically. It used Google Calendar so you'd enter your events via Google, and they would sync automatically over the air. You never had to plug the phone into the computer. It took nice pictures and video. I got a little footage at the Keane concert. I also love the Touchstone charging dock. You just sit the phone on it, no plugging it in. Very cool.

Downsides, the number of apps available is underwhelming. I lost enthusiasm for checking the Palm app store. Most disappointing of all, Pocket Money hasn't been released in a WebOS version. Still. (I used Pocket Money on my old Palm Zire. I've been using it on my iPod Touch since I got it. And now with the iPhone, I can sync my data from one device to the other.) Other downsides, the slide out keyboard is a little tight for my big fat fingers. The size of the screen made web surfing, zooming in and clicking on links a bit tricky. And though I got used to it, the swipe gestures needed to move between apps and pages were not my favorite way of navigating. I'd forget how many times to swipe to return to a previous web page or switch apps. Also, it was slooooow. Slow booting up, and sometimes would not power down, no matter how many times I attempted to turn it off.

Okay, so it was an experiment. Resistance is futile and all that. I am now an iPhone user. I still have to carry my Blackberry on work days. But on my off time, I can make use of some of the cool MINI apps like MINILink, MINI Road Assist and MINIConnected. I think being able to stream internet radio over my car stereo through my iPhone will make the whole switch worthwhile. That and the fact that I don't have to carry my iPod Touch with me all the time. I'll still use it at work for entertainment. But now I can keep track of expenses and purchases using Pocket Money on my iPhone and then sync it to my iPod later. No double entry necessary. And switching data plans didn't cost any more from Palm to iPhone.

So that's that. Though that doesn't end the angst over technology. I saw the cutest little HP netbook at Best Buy (when I was there buying the big 160GB iPod classic for my car so I can have all my music with me at all times). It has a pink plaid design. I wondered if perhaps I should get it for writing. But then, wait, that's what I got this iPad for right? And how much writing have I actually done on it? Not much. A few blogs. A poem at that poetry workshop with Brian Turner. But the blogs have been erratic and poor quality. I have started entries and posted them before they were finished, just as placeholders so I could at least have an entry for that day, even if I didn't finish them until days later.

I'd like to pause here to note that there are three guys at the table next to me in this Starbucks, 3 generations it seems, one elderly gentleman, a guy my age, and one younger guy. I wonder what their relationship is. They asked me about my iPad/keyboard set up. But they keep making jokes using these cultural references to see which ones the others would get, or which would turn out to be too old/too recent for them. So far they have broached politics, music, comic books, art (a Toulouse Letrec joke), football and musical theatre. Seriously corny jokes to go with each one. But I have to say I've been enjoying listening in. Now the older two have left and the younger is on his own. He's drawing a picture of Mystique from X-men.

Okay, what was I saying? Right, the netbook. I like this set up with the iPad and the keyboard, but it doesn't do so well on the lap, you really need a table to sit it on. Hence, most of my use has been in various Starbucks around town. Anyway, I am, as I predicted, using the iPad more for other things, using apps, playing games (Farmville, big surprise), email, movies, reading, etc. So it's more a distraction from my writing than I already had.

So I'm in Best Buy, where I am spending entirely too much time lately, and I see this netbook. I check it out on line, read some reviews, etc. It's so affordable. And I remember Todd saying to me, when I was catching up with him in emails, just get a netbook and get writing. I thought, well with that I could write more often maybe. Then, I went back to Best Buy again this weekend. There was the netbook, but there was also an HP 14.5" laptop with the i3 processor and Windows 7 Home Premium, which would fit so nicely in my Kipling laptop bag that I had purchased months ago in anticipation of getting a new laptop, and doesn't fit my current old 15.4" laptop. It was reduced from $749 to $599. Good deal. But twice what I'd be spending on the netbook. What to do? I stood there, paralyzed with indecision. Maybe I can get both. Cause sometimes I may want to take a full laptop with me while traveling and sometimes I might want something small enough to drop into my purse.

Okay, this is crazy. Two more computers! I really don't need them. My iMac does most of the heavy lifting. And now that I have my new flatscreen, I can actually still see the TV while I'm at the computer. I have my old laptop, which I've mostly used for the MS Money program, and for scanning in those old photos. For some reason, my iMac won't play nice with the scanner portion of my printer/scanner/copier.

Cooler heads prevailed this time. I left without either new computer, resolved to do more writing on my iPad. This old thing. It's a whole 3 months old. How soon we become dissatisfied. Logically I understand how I'm psychologically manipulated by the marketing departments of the world. And yet I'm somehow powerless to resist. Though sometimes I manage. Like this time.

And so I guess this passes for writing. Writing about writing. And writing about not writing. It's so meta. But at least I made myself leave the house. I was up and dressed, and I even did my taxes. Then I came out into the hall, and Dad was playing with Miracle, getting ready to go to the gym, and I joined them on the hallway floor. Then Dad left and I started thinking, you know I really don't have to go anywhere today. I can get cash on my way to the MINI event tomorrow. I can stay home. I can even write at home knowing no one would be around to bother me for at least an hour. But the inertia I was feeling about leaving the house would surely carry over into my plan to do some writing. So I sucked it up and here I am. Now I think I'm done. A good day's work? Maybe.


- Posted using BlogPress from my iPad

Location:Starbucks

Clocks

Here I sit surrounded by redundancy. Take devices that tell time for instance. Here at my desk at work, I can see the time on my computer screen and my desk phone. I also have a wristwatch, a mobile phone and an iPod, each of which also shows the time. There’s a clock on the wall behind me too, but that has long been either stopped, or incorrect.

For the most part, these devices differ from each other by a minute or three. I go by the clock on my desk phone for when it’s time to leave for the bus since it runs anywhere from 2 to 4 minutes ahead of the other clocks. Though once I step outside, my watch becomes the guide to what time I think the busses should actually be leaving their parking lot. Who knows which clock they are looking at.

Some of these clocks are set automatically. From a network, atomically? I’m not sure. Some standard time that is somehow transmitted to us anyway. But no matter how many clocks are around us, we’ve no reason to keep them all, there will still be ones we use more than others.

I was reading an article in The Atlantic about how watches are steadily becoming obsolete. That young children no longer recognize pointing to one’s wrist as the universal gesture of asking for the time. That watches will soon be relegated to the realm of the sundial, and that as it is they are used largely as jewelry.

I, for one, am quite attached to my watch, literally. I have several, and I do tend to match them to my outfits, but I do actually use them to tell time too. When I sit at my desk during lunch, reading on my Kindle, I check my watch to see how much time I have left on my break. I could lean over a few inches and see the reading on the deskphone. Or I could pick up my iPod or mobile phone and press any button. But glancing at my wrist is still the most natural response. My watch is there, buckled on my arm, so I don’t even have to remember where I set it down. Or if it’s turned on.

And I feel naked without it. If I leave the house without a watch on my wrist, I still have other ways to see the time. Usually at least two within arm’s reach. When I get in my car, there’s a third. But still I feel lost. Why is that?

The thing is, a watch, fashion aside, has one purpose. It tells the time. The other options make phone calls, play music, contain applications to create and store information, etc. Which device I reach for usually has to do with the fact that I want to do several things at once.

If I want to play a computer game, I can use my iPod, my iPad, my Playstation 3, my desktop computer using games online or downloaded to my machine.

If I want to travel at the same time, the desktop is ruled out. If I want to listen at the same time, there goes the Playstation. (Actually, I think the Playstation has the ability to play MP3s, or download music or something, but I have no idea how. It has too many other functions.) If I want to tweet, facebook or blog while playing my game, I can only do that on my iPod or iPad, except that actually my TV has apps for that now.

If I want to read a book, and I haven’t got a hardcover or paperback at hand, I can download something new on my Kindle, or my iPad, or my iPod... Or my iMac. Does the Playstation do that too? Not sure, but I do know I can watch movies and live baseball, as well as play games on it. And on my iMac. And my laptop. I forgot about that one.

Do I want to do all these things at the same time? I pretty much grew up watching TV and doing something else at the same time; homework, laundry, cooking, eating, reading, grading papers, whatever. Nowadays I routinely check email, text or look something up online while in front of the TV. There’s never any need to feel lost or out of touch.

Right now I’m writing this, and listening to Podcasts (yep, on the iPod). I have a second iPod that I keep in the car at all times. So it’s basically part of my car stereo. Of course there is also radio and a CD player...my car is two months old and I’ve yet to play a CD in there. Does anyone do that any more? The upgraded stereos can get Satellite radio or even stream internet radio! Music from anywhere in the world, beamed down to you in your car, no matter where you are. That’s a long way from having to carefully place the needle on a vinyl record that may only play one song, or at the most half an album. Side 1 or Side 2, remember that?

I just glanced down at my iPod to select a new Podcast and I saw the picture on my screen (it’s a portable photo album too, so is my iPad, my phone, iPhoto, etc.). The new iPods all have cameras on them too as well as the phones. Hardly anything goes undocumented nowadays. But all that stuff that’s getting documented, how do you know what to focus on? Instead of trying to figure out what is going on in any given scene, you have to wonder, what isn’t going on?

I come back to my original thought, wondering why we have all this redundancy. Do I need to have all these devices? Each one has its strengths, its primary function. If I want to take good photographs, I’d rely on an actual camera rather than a device with a camera in it. If I want to read an electronic book (again, physical copy not available), I’d most likely stick with the Kindle. If I want to read my email, I wait until I get home to my iMac where I can see it in full screen html. If I want to listen to the radio, hey I’ll just turn on a radio. Like the one on my nightstand...that also charges and plays my iPod, and wakes me in the morning and oh yeah, tells time. Sigh.

Lost!

It's come and gone now. And has been talked about. And will be talked about. You could probably teach a course on it. Lost is over. And we will never see the likes of it again. Even J.J. Abrams' genius cannot repeat an achievement like this.

Everyone will have their theories about what it means. Which reality is real? Who lived? Who died? Who was left? and what happened to them? What was it all for? And there is plenty to mull over, piece together, details to notice, obsess over, and enjoy. It was, after all, a bloody great ride.

What can I say that hasn't been pointed out by critics, Lost-ies and other avid viewers? I don't know. It's all still sinking in. But I just wanted to mark the moment's passing, unnecessary though it may be. It's already certain that it cannot be forgotten.

Fix You

This weekend I took my car in to the shop to have some work done on her suspension. She's been needing her front control arm bushings replaced for about a year, and it's just now that I've had the money to get it done. Turned out other bits of her suspension had been wearing out too, the right side motor mount and torque mounts had to be replaced. I also needed new rear brake pads since my sensor light had been on for about 6 weeks. I still have a few minor things to take care of, like the automatic lock in the driver's side door, and strangely, the third brake light mounted on the back hatch has actually disappeared! No one can figure it out yet. It was just suddenly not there when I got home from work Thursday night.

As much as I love my car, it's always a cringe-worthy moment when you learn how much these repairs will cost. Fortunately I have a reputable shop with great mechanics who specialize in British cars. They take good care of MINIfir and are up front about which repairs are essential and which things can wait until I have some more money coming in. Unlike the dealership, they don't act like if I wait to get something done, my wheels will fly off or something.

Now that I've taken care of the big stuff, I feel much better, and I'm sure MINIfir does too. I've got a plan, once I've taken care of the other minor issues, to accelerate my payments and get my loan payed off as quickly as possible. Then MINIfir will be mine free and clear. True, she'll be 6 years old by then, and she'll still be needing regular repairs and maintenance as she ages, but I will feel so proud that I bought her, ordered from the dealer, and have cared for and fed her, and paid her off little by little, and finally will really be her owner.

I can't explain what it means. But she is the best and biggest, most expensive and most important thing I own. And I love her. So when she's broken I fix her. And she fixes me in return.