Get off the computer!

Bailey, this past weekend:

Bailey, 2007:

I'm sensing a theme here....

The iPad vs. the Luddite

Not really - I'm not a Luddite. I am a gadget slut. I admit it. Love the electronic gadgetry.

But the economic downturn has really hit me hard, and I can't afford all the cool toys (or groceries) that I wish I could.

So I felt like an addict falling off the wagon when a friend showed up 10 days ago with her iPad - naturally, I'd heard of them, but I had never SEEN one, and she pushed a few buttons, and I knew I had to have one.

And so I bought one that night. And posted same to Facebook. Where everyone told me how much I would Loooooove it!

It arrived a week later (from China, of course!), and I started loading it with free apps, and playing around with it, and spent some more $ getting my home and work converted over to Wireless, because you can't really use an iPad unless you have Wi-Fi connectivity, and here's my dilemma:

Loving it? Not so much.

So far, its major usefulness for me is to stream instant movies from NetFlix at work. Which I can also do on my laptop, but my work laptop is NOT in an area where I can also work on jewelry creation, so it's nice to be able to stream movies over at my workbench.

Of course, I was already watching NetFlix DVDs there on my portable DVD player, so it's not like the iPad has changed the movie situation that much - but admittedly now I can watch some instant ones while waiting for the turn around on the hard copies, though NetFlix's choice of instant movies is highly limited, so this capability is really NOT a big deal.

There's a Kindle app. Nice, but I really splurged for Christmas and got myself a Kindle, so I already had one! Now I have 2.  $$$, buh-bye. 

There's a browser, and the iPad boots instantly, so that's nice, but I can browse on my laptop, and it is much easier to browse and type with a mouse and a real keypad, vs the iPad's keyboard and finger-swooshing.

Calendar. Yeah, there is one. But it is so much faster to write an appt in my Day-Runner than to open the iPad, turn it on, unlock the screen (WTF with THAT feature), open the app, and then navigate through all the screens just to enter your hair appointment on the correct day at the correct time. Hunh-uh.

Lists. I love me some To-Do lists. But creating them in the iPad is another labor and screen-intensive ordeal (seriously? my lists have to have tags?); and I can't see myself toting the iPad around the grocery store, and waking it up every time I need to check the grocery list.  So the Luddite in me would probably sit down in parking lot of the grocery store, and re-write my iPad grocery list onto a post-it note to shove in my pocket for a more user-friendly grocery-shopping experience. 1 step forward electronically, 2 steps back.

iPod. Have one, and I have a wonderful stereophonic iPod dock at the shop, so I already have all my tunes at my fingertips. I've moved all my tunes to the iPad, but can't see myself using the iPad to listen to music. If I were waiting at a doctor's office, I would have to have headphones - and at work and home I already have my music set up. Meh.

Games - not a big issue. If I have time to kill, I'll read on the Kindle app.

Part of the problem, IMO, is that I don't get out much. I'm at home, I'm at work. Have laptops both places. So maybe if I travelled more, or was hanging out @ Wi-Fi spots, I might find the iPad more useful.

My brother has been offering lots of advice, which I really appreciate. He's been incredibly patient, and is like a walking iPad Wiki. One of his suggestions was to put my jewelry photo portfolio onto the iPad, so I can show folks the high-res photos of my work anytime. And I am going to start transferring these (thousands of) photos tonight.

My brother also sent me a link to appadvice.com, to help me make more informed decisions before purchasing any non-free apps. But I was laughing hysterically after reading just one description of a recommended app - it was written in such tech-speak I literally could not comprehend what they were trying to say. So I basically need an app to translate this app's geek-speak to English!

The iTunes AppStore gives extremely limited info on the functionality/capability of the apps, and then, for most of the apps, there are customer-provided "reviews". But just as the grass is always greener on the other side, one person's peeve about an app is another user's favorite thing, so deciding which apps to choose just based on the info in the AppStore is electronic Russian Roulette.

I am not trying to be Debbie Downer about this. I desperately want to love my iPad. It is mine now, and we must do more than peacefully coexist!

So I'm curious to hear from you iPad lovers out there - what do YOU love about your iPad, and why? And what has turned out to be a waste of your time &/or money, app-wise?

What a day. What a nightmare.

My beloved laptop computer died yesterday. I can't say I wasn't warned - it had been acting sick for about 2 weeks, and became critical last Sunday. Its screen would start to pixelate, then funny stripes would appear, then the whole thing would just freeze up. I was in a state of denial, and also panic, because my life was stored in there!

I own an external drive, and had backed it up about 6 months ago, and while I still didn't want to believe I was going to lose the computer, I decided drastic measures were necessary. I learned if I performed enough CPR on it, I could ultimately achieve a working state on it, so I got it up and running, and started to back everything up. I also went online with Dell, and ordered a replacement laptop. (Ouch!)

I decided to leave the computer on all week, since starting it up seemed to be the issue. But on Thursday, critical programs were refusing to function (like my photoshop program), so I had to reboot - and couldn't. Tried again on Friday, and nothing. Dead, dead, dead.

Unbelievably enough, the new Dell computer had arrived on Thursday, despite Dell telling me it wouldn't even be shipped until 4/16. I guess my old one knew it was safe to give up!

So on Saturday, I began the painful process of getting my new computer in acceptable condition - you guys know what I mean - getting all my old files migrated over, and reloading all my favorite software (games, too!), and getting the wallpaper and screensaver set up, etc. I started at 7:30 PM, and finally quit at 6:45 AM - I knew I had dreaded doing this, but I really underestimated how long it would take. Lots of the software required a restart after each install, and I had to search on the web for some drivers and other stuff. Plus just migrating all the backed-up files took over 2 hours.

So I wasn't done at 6:45, but was exhausted - fell asleep around 8AM - realizing I was hungry because I had missed dinner AND breakfast, and woke up at 12, ready to finish. And now, at 6:30 PM, everything is done except for a few games, which can wait. And I still haven't eaten.

What a nightmare this set-up was. But I love my new computer - it is so bright and shiny and super fast! But I miss the old one, and I keep opening migrated files where only half the text came over - Weird.

I'll try to resuscitate my old computer one more time (not today) and see if I can wrangle up the incomplete Word files. I have way too many to open them all to check for content, but I'll check the most important ones.

I feel for anyone else facing this situation.

Something nice happened while all this was going on - I logged on to Etsy at one point, and discovered that one of my favorite necklaces had sold! Very nice customer, too - so I will be getting this packed up tonight for her!