"I" Want It

For posterity’s sake, I feel like I must record the “I” mania that has swept the nation (maybe the world).

In just my brief lifetime, I have seen the rise of the personal computer. It’s hard to believe that my dad’s law office used to have a room that was entirely dedicated to housing its single mammoth-sized computer. The temperature had to be kept just so.

Later, I remember feeling state of the art, because our home had a computer. I typed on Bankstreet Writer (white letters on a fairly barren black screen), and saved my small compositions to 5 and1/4 inch floppy discs.

Today, I practically hold the world at my fingertips through my iphone. And so does everybody else. The iphone 4 came out this summer, and I stopped by the Apple Store that first day to see if could get one for my mom. It was her birthday. Silly me.

At 1:00 in the afternoon, the line was still around the corner and out of sight. Thankfully, the Apple people put up canopies to protect their customers from the Arizona sun. I still didn't stick around.

I understand the mania though. Apple’s “I” products are amazing. The variety of applications, which make your phone everything from a flashlight, to a level, to a piano, to a credit card machine, simply astonish me. As soon as I can convince myself that I'll use the ipad for work and not just play, I want one of those too.

Anyhow, the iphone 4 came out in June. It is now July. I've heard that over 3 million have already been sold. You would think demand would dry up. But the phones (aka the-mini-do-everything-you-ever-thought-of-machines) are still hard to come by. Nathan and Steph are on multiple waiting lists. This is despite the bad signal reviews.

I just wonder what technology will be able to do by the time Bridgette grows up.