Alien Barbecue

Those of you who subscribe to my Twitter feed already know this from last night, but my e-mail is STILL down, and Dreamhost (their name no longer appropriate) is taking their very sweet time responding to my support ticket. My IMAP server won’t recognize my username or password, whether I try to access it by Mail, by Thunderbird, or by either of my mobile devices. I can, however, access my mail via the web browser, but it’s uber slow and downright frustrating to use.

[Insert swear words and threats of eternal damnation to the e-mail server here.]

My Gmail account still seems to be working, though I hate having to revert to using it. Still, if any of you have emergencies, you have my other contact information and you know the drill.

Just an FYI.

I never mentioned that I left town for a few days, that I got sick with a ghastly cold promptly on the way back home, and that as a result of all this I’ve been trying to get ahead or to catch up in work, but that’s what I’ve been doing; and because I knew I’d be so busy doing all this I got myself an iPod Touch, as I mentioned the last time I posted, mostly so I could keep up with critical e-mail.

I never knew how such a purchase could change so much. Only a day after I received the iPod Touch, I was setting up my e-mail accounts on it, downloading an e-book reader for reading on the plane, and installing all kinds of apps to make my life easier away from my work computer. Before I knew it, HE was ogling the gadget and asking me all kinds of questions. Yes, the iPod Touch does this and that; no, it doesn’t do this or that, but I think the iPhone does. The iPhone? Well, it does all this plus make calls and take photos too. Pretty soon, HE was ordering an iPhone, and when we went to pick it up after Thanksgiving, I found myself getting one as well.

Oh, sure, we had all kinds of justification for getting early Christmas gifts for ourselves. HE was planning on getting a new phone anyway, and he’d been looking into getting a GPS. Me, my cell phone was dying, the iPod Touch depends too much on Wi-Fi, which I might not encounter in the rural areas of Maryland where HE and I were planning to go, and I was in the market for a pocket digital camera anyway. We thought we had to find all kinds of excuses to get the iPhones, to relieve us of the guilt we were sure to feel for spending so much for such little things, but we never dreamed how life-changing they’d be.

HE, the news and political junkie who was once a navigator, immediately downloaded all the free news and navigation apps that caught his eye, and when we descended upon Maryland, his iPhone paid for itself about a handful times. Never a day went by without him saying about one aspect or another, “This feature alone is worth what I paid for the phone!” HE is very much in love with his phone. Lend him an ear, and he will talk it off while disguised as an Apple salesman.

I, on the other hand, found my gadgets useful for catching up on reading while on the plane, and before I left town, in between work projects, I even managed to create a mobile version of my site—so quick and easy! Install a WordPress plug-in, and away we go.

And that is what I forgot to mention in all the hubbub of travel, sickness, and work:

So, if you have an iPhone, or any kind of mobile browser, go check my site out on it. The iPhone version even matches my full version site, and if you bookmark it (hit the plus sign on the bottom and select “Add to Home Screen”), it even adds a custom icon, a cutesy illustration of me. The site is still not exactly the way I’d like it to look, but I’m too busy with work right now to do any tweaking on it.

In the meantime, I just thought I’d post something and make a mention of it.

I am writing this from my iPod Touch. It’s a little clumsy typing, but it’s effective enough. I mean, here I am!

I showed H.E. this thing, and he is über impressed. I can do my e-mail on it and surf the web, among so many other things. Music and games, what it’s really designed for, are like the last things on my mind when it comes to this beautiful gadget. I wanted to make sure I didn’t miss out on critical e-mail. Plus it doubles as an e-reader!

I’m so in love.