Another piece of new technology I am experimenting with this year is the Kindle keyboard edition that my middle daughter bought me for Christmas.  I don’t remember mentioning it to her, but somehow she came up with the very item I had been debating with myself about for nearly a year.

Understand me when I say, I prefer paper books.  I’m not a snob about it, they don’t have to be hard backs.  In fact, in some cases, I prefer paperbacks.  But, in spite of the fact that I am a techie, I don’t like reading extensively on a computer screen and I really hate trying to read anything longer than a text message on a phone screen.  I figured the e Readers would be more or less the same.

Still, I had been tempted by the idea of being able to store several large books in a small light weight device ever since dragging a loaded backpack all over Murray’s campus.  When I first began to think along those lines, while lugging The Complete Works of Shakespeare to and from class three days a week, the Kindle was selling for about $300.  But, I’d already bought the ten pound hardback and I just couldn’t justify that much money at the time, so I kind of forgot about it for the next few years. ( Read more )

One of the goals I’ve set for myself this year is to learn more about photography.  I own a Nikon D60 SLR camera that I mostly use like a point and shoot.  For several years now I have also owned a phone with a camera.  Camera phones these days can be as good as regular point and shoot type equipment.  I was used to my Blackberry and pretty much satisfied with it when I needed to take a quick snap.  However, the quality my brother, Jim,  gets with his iPhone is generally good enough to publish in the newspaper.

My cherry tree is in full bloom

If you know Jim, you know that he is over the top enthusiastic about iPhones.  When I was shopping for a smart phone, he tried his best to persuade me to get one.  I resisted because I prefer a physical keyboard.  However, touch screens have come a long way and physical keyboards are becoming a rarity.  The past month or so I have been looking at phones again because my contract is coming up for renewal soon and I haven’t found very many that don’t rely on a touch screen.   I have resigned myself to the idea that I will have to stay with my old phone until it dies or get used to not having a real keyboard.

The Dogwood is just beginning to come out.

Recently, Jim got the new iPhone 4s and he suggested that I use his old one for a while, just to see if I could adjust.  Every time I have to learn to use a new piece of equipment or some kind of radically revised software, I remind myself it’s good for my brain, all the experts say so.  However, I am afraid maybe the wear and tear on my stress level cancels out the brain exercise.  Anyhow, after more than a week of struggling, I have the iPhone mostly set up to suit me.  It’s not perfect, but it’s usable.

The Daffodils have been replaced by Tulips

Now it’s time to play with the camera.  Jim has at least a dozen camera apps.  He can take photos in HDR, as black & white, or as Polaroids.  Once they are taken, he can edit them with almost as many feature choices as on his desktop computer.  I have what came with the camera and one free Photoshop app called PS Express.  Until today, I hadn’t really used the camera function very much.  After watching Jim this past weekend, using his iPhone as much as his high end SLR or video camera, I decided it was time to start working toward, at least, a minimum of efficiency.   This afternoon, I took the phone out to the front yard and to see what I could develop.  The flower photos in this post are my results.  I’m still not as sold as Jim is, but maybe I can learn to be happy with it eventually.