iBucky

As I no longer have a boyfriend — or much human contact of any kind outside of work — my new best friend whom I spend all my time with, is my iPhone [pictured left, in bed]. iPhone (which, per Apple, is used without an article, just as one would use a name - i.e. "There are many new apps for iPhone." or "iPhone and I are going to dinner tonight.") does take some getting used to. Mostly setting it up is complicated when you have to call a number to deactivate your old phone and activate iPhone and you don't have a landline, so you get cut off in the middle of the directions on what to do next. But we got it activated and now I've been happily loading it up with music and amusing free apps that serve no real purpose, like Magic 8 Ball. (As iPhone a questions, shake it, it answers.)

What I haven't done a lot of with iPhone yet, is talk on it. I realize how little I actually talk on the phone any more and I wonder if that's universally true. Do people talk on the phone less than ever before. I mean, at work I still talk on the phone. Talking to people is kind of the point on newspaper journalism. But in my personal life, everything is e-mail and text messages. My boyfriend used to call and we would speak a lot, but he's the only one. I called my brother for no apparent reason, just so I could use the phone. Ironically, the phone part of iPhone was what made me buy it. I'd heard all about the fancy applications and its use as a iPod, etc. But I hadn't heard much about it as a phone until I was watching the demos on the Apple Web site. I'd been secretly coveting iPhone for a while, but until some Christmas cash showed up couldn't really justify the purchase. But then when I saw the visual voicemail, I knew I had to have iPhone right then and there. So I ordered one.

Visual voicemail allows you to look at a list of who's left messages and you can choose which one you want to listen to by tapping it. You can also rewind, fast forward and pause the message.

The best part of the phone part of iPhone, however, is that I can actually get reception in my apartment. My old Samsung (God rest its soul) was very shady in this area and in fact, on the night before iPhone arrived, I had through it on the floor in anger after it dropped an important call and then I couldn't get a signal out. It also, randomly, would decide the SIM card was invalid and I would have to turn the phone off and then back on.

Finally, because all iPod stuff is standard, iPhone fits into all my preexisting iPod accoutrement, like the speakers I have in the living room. You can also hook iPhone up to your TV and play movies off of it. I don't have any movies in digital form, but I still get excited over the idea that I could watch the movies, if I did.

It's sad that this is all I have to get excited over these days, I know.