iWant

About a month ago, my cell phone contract came up for renewal and I briefly considered ditching Verizon and getting a brand spanking new iPhone. I soon reasoned that my possession of two fully-functional iPods --regular and nano sized-- and the substantial initial costs of iPhone ownership were two solid reasons to stick with my service. Verizon after all basically gave me $150 in credit, allowing me to get a "Chocolate" phone for free. It's no substitute for an all-in-one phone/iPod/minicomputer/Terminator, but compared with dropping $500 on an iPhone, this was economically a no-brainer.

Just a week after that thrifty decision, my father wrote an email to me and my brothers:

Happy fourth to all of you wherever your are. Just a heads up if you
happen to write to me on my uah email - it is read by my three
assistants - so watch what you say.

My iPhone number is xxx-xxx-xxxx if you want to call during business
hours. I'm trying to get my old Lehigh phone onto a Verizon account with
Mom so I can talk to you more easily.

Despite seething with jealousy, my globe-trotting brother saw the real reason for the message and replied:

You just wanted to let us know that

a) you have an iPhone
b) you have three assistants

And let me say that I, for one, will try very, very hard not to abuse
the fact that three proper, polite, southern ladies read your email.

Now all this time I had still been standing by my decision to not blow half a grand on a friggin phone. I had congratulated myself on my financial restraint and pondered with considerable glee how many beers I could buy with the money I'd saved. All this was thrown out the window yesterday. It was yesterday that my sterling laptop, a vision in slightly dented titanium given to me by that same globe-trotting brother (who now is undoubtedly reading much faster, hoping to find just what it was that went wrong with his belovéd baby), gave its first signs of age. I was sitting in school, enjoying the Intarwebs while my students toiled, when the laptop ceased to receive power from its cord. The cord itself had been tempermental in the past. Only a certain angle seemed to provide the necessary power and light the little green light that told me everything was OK. Now suddenly no amount of twisting and turning would keep the power flowing.

There were two possibilities: one, the cord is faulty and needs to be replaced for $80; two, the internal power module is crapping out, requiring extensive repairs of unknown expense. I quickly paid a visit to the website of the 5th Ave Apple Store and made a Genius Bar reservation for that afternoon. Reservation complete, I quickly put the 'puter to sleep and took up my book for the remainder of the school day. I arrived at the store a few minutes before my reservation and took to looking around. The store was in its usual state of over-occupancy. A seminar on Final Cut Pro was in full swing. Kids were playing games on iMacs. Every computer and iPod had one or more customers peering at it or utilizing the store's free wireless internet. I browsed the games. Nothing too interesting, although I may be persuaded to get Call of Duty one of these days because I do so much love shooting things. My name finally appeared on the Genius Bar queue at #12. Still a bit of a wait. I wandered over to the iPhone section.

And here my troubles began. One iPhone model in the corner was miraculously unattended. I picked it up and started fiddling around. Damn. Damn damn damn damn damn. My technolust was immediately aroused. I watched some videos, listened to some music, surfed the internet and tried typing on the screen. That last task was not as difficult as you might expect, as long as you were typing normal English words. Proper names and and combinations of letters and numbers (such as getting directions from 22nd St and 6th Ave to 77th St and 5th Ave) were difficult because the machine didn't know what you were trying to say. But when typing notes or text messages with normal sentences, it was remarkably accurate. The iPhone may do away with txt spk because it's much easier to crappily type full words and have it recognize them than it is to try and type abbreviations accurately on a small keyboard.

The map feature was the best. I could buzz around Manhattan and see whatever I wanted, either from a satellite or streetmap. With this thing I'd never have to ask "Where's the nearest [anything]?" ever again. Traffic was updated in real time. It would be indispensible when catching a cab.

I was loathe to put it down and head to the Genius Bar, where I eventually discovered that it was just the cord that needed replacing (breathe easy, bro) and not some dire internal issue. However, immediately after I purchased another power cord, I found myself back playing with the iPhones --moving through pictures with a flick of a finger, zooming in on webpages with an inverse pinching motion-- like everyone else in the store, enthralled by the little wündergizmo.

In short, I now regret my hasty though frugal decision to start a new contract with Verizon. So I must wait two years before I can get an iPhone. Of course, by then they'll be implanted in your brain so that you can listen to music during boring meetings and your phone conversations will be indistinguishable from the raving homeless guys who talk to themselves on the street.