New Toy!

I have a new Sidekick.. After much delay and considering assorted options, I decided to get the new Sidekick LX. The decision to do it this weekend was reinforced by my SK3's increasing unreliability: I hadn't been able to get it to connect to the Internet all weekend.

One of my motivations in getting the LX model, instead of a used SK3, was to make myself feel less stupid about having broken my SK3. If I paid $100 or whatever for an SK3, I'd be in the same position I'd be in if I just hadn't broken my SK3 in the first place. Except $100 poorer. Now I'm $350 poorer, but I have a shiny new SK LX.

It is indeed, very shiny.

It's not as pleasant to hold as my SK3: the back is flat with a little ridge at one end, instead of slightly convex. The SK3 just felt nice to hold. This design is sleeker and a touch lighter but not as comfortable. The keys are a little stiffer, but the layout's not as bad as the SK Slide. It's also not a slide: the screen swivels out just like the older SKs. I asked Krysti, the saleswoman at the kiosk I always go to, "Am I going to hate the keyboard?"

Krysti said, "No, the keyboard on the LX is good. You'd hate the keyboard on the Slide." This is why I always go to Krysti.

I couldn't, bizarrely, buy the SK LX from Krysti, which annoyed me. It turns out the kiosk I always go to isn't actually owned by T-Mobile. It's owned by a third party vendor that T-Mobile licensed to sell their products. But T-Mobile only lets them sell phones with a new contract because they're having production shortages, and I wasn't eligible for a new contract because I have a year left on the old one. Fortunately, there's a kiosk in the same mall that is owned by T-Mobile, so Krysti sent me to them to get it.

The saleswoman there, Jimmie, was very helpful, too. I don't know what T-Mobile does to deserve such nice staffers. I told her, "I want to buy a Sidekick LX."

"All right. Are you already a T-Mobile customer or are you getting a new account?"

"I'm already a customer, I'm not eligible for an upgrade, I'm going to pay full price for it and I'm OK with that," I told her with a smile.

As it turned out, I was eligible for a partial upgrade. Which meant that instead of a $170 discount for a brand new 2-year contract, I could get a $70 discount by signing a 2-year contract effective now -- in essence adding a year to my existing contract. "Sure, why not? I've been with T-Mobile for six years now, I don't think I'll be cancelling in the next two years, either."

Thus, I walked out with my newest toy.

So far, I don't hate the keyboard but I'm not used to it yet.

The screen, on the other hand ...

The screen is beautiful.

I told telnar, "I got it for the resolution. It's got a better resolution than what I use on my desktop."

"I can believe that. My desktop monitor is 22" diagonally, and 1600x1280 or something, and my iPhone is, what, 3" diagonally and it's something like 480x320 -- "

"No, I don't mean 'it's got a better resolution per inch'. I mean it's got a better resolution overall. I don't run my desktop monitor at its maximum resolution; I run it at 1160x800 or whatever. The SK LX has a resolution of 1280x1024."

It's gorgeous. Both my new SK and my old one automatically resized images to fit horizontally on the screen. But on the new LX, I can actually see all the details on the tiny images. I can read comics on the LX, like bad_rabbit. No, really. I have to take my glasses off to do it and it's probably bad for my eyes, but I can.

I don't know if it's enough to make up for the inferior feel in my hands and of the keyboard, but I may get used to those and they'll be fine. My excuse* for buying it locally instead of getting one used off ebay or something was that I get a two-week trial period from the store, so I can return it if I don't get used to it.

In the meantime: ooooo, shiny ....

* My real reason is that it was easier and more satisfying to go to the store and pick it up than to set up an ebay account, figure out how to pay for it, and wait for it to arrive.

Mowed Down

Saturday, as I was out walking and chatting with koogrr on the phone, I waved to my neighbor who was out on her riding mower. The average lawn in this neighborhood is less than a quarter of an acre, but 90% of us have riding lawn mowers anyway. In truth, a low-end riding mower is only about twice as much as a decent walk-behind mower, and a low easier to use. Lut and I have one ourselves. Sadly, it doesn't make us much more likely to mow the lawn. Spring is here, the grass is growing, and we hadn't mowed the lawn yet. Lut had set the battery on the mower to charge Saturday morning and -- in theory -- he would mow the lawn this weekend. Usually he gets the parts of the lawn that the riding mower can cover, and I get the rest. It's about the same amount of time for both, although it's a lot more effort to do the (much smaller) areas that the riding mower can't get to.

Usually we actually get around to mowing the lawn once for every two or three weekends that we plan to mow it on. In the summertime, the lawn should be mowed once a week. In practice, it's more like once a month. Are you familiar with the expression "gone to seed" to describe something badly neglected? That's what my lawn was doing.

My neighbor put her mower into park and beckoned me over. "You know," she said, "if you ever want me to mow your lawn for you, I will. I don't mind."

I gaped at her. "Any time you want to mow my lawn," I assured her, "you are more than welcome to do so."

She asked for gas money to do it, which was understandable at today's gas prices. She guessed $10. I gave her $20, because it was easily worth that much to me not to have to worry about it.

About an hour later, when I was back inside, we heard her mowing the lawn. I explained to Lut about her offer. Then the doorbell rang.

"Um ... did you have a pipe running across your front yard?" my neighbor asked.

Oops.

The sump pump puts out a ton of water, so to get it away from the house we've got seventy five feet or so of two-inch diameter plastic hose running from the house to the storm sewer ditch at behind the backyard. This works nicely to keep my lawn from turning into an overwatered swamp. Lut's always mowed right over it with our lawn tractor, which he keeps at a fairly high setting, so I didn't think of it.

Apparently, my neighbor's lawn mower rides somewhat lower, and had chewed up the hose rather impressively. She was terribly apologetic about it. I wasn't the least upset: I hadn't warned her, and the pipe is practically invisible even when the grass is short. When she mowed it, the grass was a foot and half tall. She never had a chance. So not her fault. Also, the hose is cheap stuff.

Anyway, now I do have to remember to get a new 2" hose. I bagged the remnants in the garage, but possibly should look to see if there's a salvageable length -- we'd made the hose long enough by connecting a couple of shorter hoses, and I'm not sure where it got chewed up.

In the meantime: hey, my lawn is mowed! Cool.

Now, if I could just convince her to bag my leaves ...