Kindle Me Pink

Technology is a fearsome and wonderful thing. I find I alternate between hating the chains it places on us and drinking it in with big gulps. I guess right now I'm gulping. This blog, of course, has become my fun online journal. After a lengthy and inexplicable hiatus I also signed up for billpay at our bank because as fun as handwriting checks is, managing half a dozen accounts the old-fashioned way is getting, well, old. Of course there is my phone, which functions as a camera, camcorder, GPS, mp3 player, photo album, web browser, along with phone and text messages, all in a sporty red package.
Meanwhile, I had been obsessing for some time over a new product at Amazon called the Kindle. Literally within hours of scoffing at the idea of e-books (true bibliophiles require the aesthetic pleasure of paper and page-turning, dog-eared pages and notes in margins, plus who wants to spend more time staring at a glaring screen?) I found this thing. Intending to read up on it in order to boost my ammunition for cynicism, I soon found it has an amazing list of features that caused me to drool in anticipation of owning one.
Now this may seem like a swell idea to put on one's Christmas list, but after several weeks of obsessing I came to the conclusion that Bill would never purchase this item for me since it is not something he would see the beauty of, plus my book group is starting back up. Like showing up at the first day of school with the best Trapper Keeper, I anticipated sitting with the group, saying with each suggested title, "Oh, I can have a free preview chapter in 15 seconds, let's look shall we?", or "I can find the author of that one/browse the bestseller list/read reviews or discover what other books people who bought that book chose". So yesterday when I rushed home to snatch the lovely Amazon box off the porch I trampled firmly on feelings of indulgence and guilt and began to Kindle.
On top of all that, what started as Bill and I browsing MySpace and Facebook to see how risky those sites seemed for our teens and how secure their pages were, we were sucked in by curiosity "I wonder if anyone we know is out here. Here's a handy Search for your Friends feature." Turns out there are old married folks like us out there :-) Now somewhere along the way I will find more ways for technology to add efficiency to our lives, but for now I'm kinda having fun.