I-YIYI

I was most bummed to realize last Monday that I had lost my cell phone, likely at the Morrissey show on Sunday, a modern-life tragedy. To modify his “Everyday is Like Sunday:

Trudging slowly over wet city streets
Back to the theater where your phone may have been stolen
This is the Sound town
That they forgot to close down
Armageddon - come Armageddon!
Come, Armageddon! Come!

Everyday is like Sunday
Everyday is silent and grey
Without my phone.

Oh, that’s not really true. I don’t spend that much time on my phone at all, but I did feel uncomfortably naked without it. My safety net more than anything, I suppose, in case another van wants to slam into my car on a wet rainy night. I will miss my Samsung Blackjack for the cute photos of my kids on there, and a few amusing text messages now lost to the black holes of other lost phones, single socks, and personal dignity. Most people who lose their phones fret over the lost phone numbers, but hey, if anyone wants to call me to repopulate my database, they can, BECAUSE I GOT A NEW iPHONE, MAN! Santa somewhat reluctantly arrived early to repair my general anxiety over not having a phone, and I am pretty excited. I am a Mac person, after all, and this cool lil thing all links up with MY WORLD seamlessly, unlike the Blackjack. So now I am officially over-i‘d, with an iPhone, an iPod touch, an iPod Nano, two MacBooks, and a fried MacMini and a fried iMac. Staring at all these screens reminds me that I need new glasses, but that will have to wait because gadgets are more fun than acquiring sharp reading vision.

So in a few hours, I have almost completely loaded up my new 32GB iPhone with songs from my iTunes bank. I will need to pare this down. I don’t really need 5000+ songs with me on another device, and I would like to get a few new apps. I can see where people can go mental getting new apps for their phones because they all sound like so much fun, although many of them turn out to be not quite so awesome in practical use. I am certainly no appspert, but I can tell you a few that I have and like.

Arcade Hoops and Bowl Lite: I am not much of a gamer and do not need to blow up dudes in a bloody and realistic manner on my phone while I am out and about. These two games are both by Skyworks, and are very basic classic arcade games that even a monkey with a delicate touch could use.

Coffee Buzz: Finds the nearest coffeehouse by you and lets you Twitter about it if you like. Just give me the latte, phone, hurry up.

iTranslate: For me, mostly good for comic relief, just to see the sentence “You are a hideous malformed beast of a human” translated into German.

SIRIUS XM Online: Oh, this is very very nice. As a subscriber, I really appreciate being able to have this as I travel. I used to actually bring along my boombox and the radio and the antenna in my luggage and now I don’t have to – I can listen to Underground Garage and SIRIUS XMU and all the rest from my leetle phone.

Pandora: A nice change of pace from the above if I just want to listen to some fresh songs without the DJs for awhile.

Sit Or Squat: Yes, this finds the nearest available public toilet and provides ratings. If you are a parent, you know why I have this.

NY Times: Not as flashy as CNN, but not anywhere near as annoying and better-written. Shocking, huh.

I am looking forward to using the iPhone camera to do some new creative work, using Voice Memos to record spontaneous ideas or conversations from MissSeven, and I am most looking forward to not losing it EVER. And it is appropriately i-ish to be able to go into Garage Band, bring up your own recording (soon to be available on iTunes for your holiday giving pleasure), ask it to make you a ringtone, and there we ARE.




Heh. Fun. RIP, Blackjack.