The Longest Now

They say you can never know somebody perfectly, not even yourself.  It can make you feel helpless in the face of the gaping maw of the eternal Void.  There are days when the pointlessness of life hangs from your neck like a bronzed baby, and even a second helping of scallion pancakes seems unappetizing.  And yet redundant lightweight wireless devices secreted about your person, with touchscreens and zpf keyboards, interconnected via infrared and thumb-sized harddrives, can make these worries disappear for a few fleeting hours. 

Posting from a much beloved X40,

SJ

I missed the live panel with HIV-positive children yesterday, but everyone is stll discussing retroviruses (when did “virus” take on the generic plural?). David Baltimore just made a conversational appearance, along with purified viral stocks. This state is passing lovely, and somehow I am dancing between predicted rainclouds; sunny, fogless, and clear today, as twas in SF all weekend.

ucsd med school …

Here I am in Palo Alto, sitting nezt to Shimon and Bruce at the
Accelerating change conference. There are about 300 people at the
conference, and we just enjoyed a rare presentation by will wright
(talking about second life, among other things)

waiting to hear
his debate with jaron lanier later today. and, of course, posting from
the ipaq… still about 40wpm, but havent migrated to touchtyping yet.

accelerating change …

I have on the table before me a device designed with the utmost
brilliance.  I
haven’t seen such a quietly pleasing design in a gadget-package in
recent memory.  Some of you know that I was aiming to purchase
at
least a phone and a laptop this week, but I did not end up with the
Danger Sidekick I
was angling for…

The sidekick I understand – delightful design, with a number of
charming flaws, and a few unfortunate barriers to improvement; a good,
and reasonable inexpensive, 1-year purchase to replace my ailing
phone.  A few troubles arose: 1) they no longer offer the
‘old’
sidekick in-store, in favor of the ‘new’ one (which is admittedly
sturdier and a better heft, but $100 more and with a less perfect
keyboard), and 2) I fell in love, just in time, with something
else.

I discovered the first functional pda-phone I’ve ever seen.  And I
discovered it by chance, simply because its attachable thumb-keyboard
is so brilliant. 
As I was filling out the paperwork for my sidekick, I was chatting with
the rep about good mini-keyboards (or the lack thereof) and he showed
me the attachable keyboard for the iPaq 6315. 
It was light, the width of the pda, looked breakable, but had smooth,
responsive buttons that didn’t rattle or distress.  crazy. 
It was only then that I stopped to look at the awful pda-sized blob of
plascrete, no doubt like ever other such blob, and thought, ‘hmm, not
execrable.’  I cancelled my pending order… (more)

For the best, funniest, or most priceless presidential election
blogging.  And they put up the money for a G-ad
for it; I guess that’s #2 on my list of “what mindless ad-association
has done for me lately”.  egads.

WaPo presidential blogger awards… interesting. …

It’s worth checking out what various public figures and pundits have to say today : Bush, Dean (and blog), Kerry, Daschle, Frist… (thanks, burtonator)

“…I’m so disappointed, I’m thinking about moving to BOSTON…”

“…Dean/Obama in 2008…”

“…You dems need to push for Hilary in 2008. Also, keep Michael Moore out front as your spokesman. This is good for the party, trust me.”

HTTP 504 – Bush Reelected …

I just purchased my very own Scott eVest today, though I’ve worn one many times and have been touting their delights for years. It was a pleasant experience; the founder and his wife run the business together, and through a glitch in their phone system I got rolled over to personal cell-phones… so I ended up speaking to them directly. I can vouch for the fact that they are both lovely people.

I snagged the very last of the original 2.5 special edition vests; the new line is even more special, and I’m holding out for a discount on one of the solar-panel-enhanced models which recently came out… but I wanted one I could wear out without regret.

Technology Enabled Clothing, eVests, etc …