In days of old (the late 90s) whenever I had an idea or needed to remember something, I grabbed the nearest notepad, Post it, or other scrap of paper, jotted it down, and then stuffed it in my pants pocket. When I arrived home, I amused my wife as I emptied my pockets of my wallet, keys, and a paper salad of yellow and white notes. I didn’t carry a notepad, because, at the time, I was only familiar with the small spiral-bound pads my dad favored, and while the small ones slipped neatly into my pants pockets, the metal spine invariably hooked itself onto either the fabric or my thigh’s flesh. No thank you.
Sometime in, I dunno, 2000, my friend Matt—who loves technology so much, our friend Chris suspected he was operated by a man at a control panel miles away—introduced me to the Palm m100 PDA. That worked nicely for a time. Surely, many trees were saved. My needs were basic, and while Matt kept leaping to the next technology because he absolutely, positively had to know he had an app to direct airflights, I was perfectly happy with the note-taking function. I especially liked the folding keyboard accessory. If there was any doohickey that made me feel like I was living in the future predicted by Terry Gilliam’s Brazil, it was the keyboard. It looked like a Underwood typewriter mated with a calculator. I got many strange looks when I used the keyboard, but I didn’t care. It was the most efficient portable writing device I ever owned. Better than a laptop, and cheaper besides.
Eventually, the m100 died, and once more inspired by Matt I picked up a Palm Tungsten E—a sharp little device. All chrome plastic and—compared to the m100—as organically shaped and sensuous as a Jean Arp piece. I got a few years use out of the Tungsten E. Like the m100, it served as my calendar, notebook, and to do list. I used it as a reader as well, and finished Paradise Lost, The Island of Dr. Moreau, and a few other books on it (all found at Matt’s site manybooks.net—pretty handy during the winter months when the train was crowded.
A couple of Christmases ago Mike bought me an iPod for Christmas (she already had one, being the true techhead in our relationship). I was thrilled with the music playing, Internet, gaming, and video apps, but it slowly became evident that as a word processor and reader, it’s abysmal. Maybe that’s too strong a word. But the reader I downloaded kept crashing, and the notepad and onscreen keyboard are so compressed as to be unusable. Give me back my portable keyboard, say I!
Anyway, that’s why I’m back to stuffing my pockets with bits of paper. Nah, I’m not bringing them home to build a nest for my cats—I’m just bustling with ideas.
