Last weekend I headed up to Maine to visit with friends and hit the slopes. I had been looking forward to getting in touch with nature, but was a little nervous because I knew I was bound to have no service on my iPhone. I dreaded the inevitable separation anxiety, but figured it was probably for the best. I'm sure by my prior dependence-heavy posts you will agree I needed a little time away from the ol' girl.
Still, I was pleasantly surprised to find that I had service for most of the 8-hour (yes, god help me) car ride, and pretty much over the moon when a bored search of the app store bore the most incredible fruit. Just when I thought the iPhone couldn't possibly get any better, it gave me Kindle, or at least a pretty acceptable approximation of it. If you recall, I was practically drooling over the Kindle in a prior post, but lamenting the high price tag.
The Amazon app allowed me the same access to digital books that the covetable Kindle does, and though the screen is probably brighter, definitely smaller and sometimes a bit reflective, there I was, clicking to purchase David Sedaris' When You Are Engulfed in Flames. And thanks to Amazon's Whispersync technology (no idea what that is, but it sounds completely cool) I was reading it about two seconds later.
The text appears large enough that I do not squint at the screen, and turning pages with the swipe of a finger is pretty darn easy. It also remembers the page where I left off so I can pick it right up again, no problem. As I mentioned, it is a little brighter than my ideal, but I can certainly make it work, especially when it allows me to have any book I want at my fingertips at a moment's notice.
So once again, yay iPhone, and also yay free wifi once we got to our condo. Though my phone service was a little spotty, leaving me to check my messages up on the lifts, I was never once without Facebook, Gmail or Twitter updates. Sorry nature!
