Coming into this Century

I've recently acquired a couple of electonics that bring me into this century. Recently, Ray won an iPod. It's the second one for him. The first was 2 years ago and it was an iPod Nano, which fe's been enjoying a great deal. I've had a little MP3 player for a few years now, mostly for running. Over the summer, I decided that I wanted an iPod Shuffle for running. It's smaller and I liked some of the features. Ray and I were discussing this in the car on our vacation in July, then came home and discovered paperwork that had come in the mail saying Ray had won a Shuffle! It took a little while, but I now have a new Shuffle.

We've also discussed e-books for a long time. For a while, it was purely theoretical. The readers available were pitiful and extremely expensive! There was a time when I was against the idea of reading on a "computer". The experience couldn't be the same. There is something about holding a book in your hands and turning the pages. But time went on...we have a tiny house and lots of books! Our living room alone holds seven 6 foot bookshelves, which are almost entirely double stacked. A few years ago, Ray and I started talking about e-books as an alternative to paperbacks. We re-read our books (some of them many, many times), so we hate to get rid of any, but the idea of storing the bulk of them electronically is a step that could radically change our living space. But still, the readers were incredibly expensive. A few years ago I looked at them and they were still over a thousand dollars each for a nice one.

We've recently started looking at them again. I've decided against the Kindle for two reasons: I don't like that Amazon can reach into my collection and erase a book (which they have done, and fairly recently) and the service is not available in Canada. I can buy one and get the e-books online from the US site, but then I also have to pay duties. It just sits in my craw!

After a little digging and some consideration, I've decided to get the Sony PRS-600, which is the newest Sony e-book reader. This morning we went out and bought it. I have yet to use it, but the ability to write notes, look up words, and access books in such a great little format pleases me. I'll let you know how it goes.

So, I have entered the electronics market of this century. Only almost 10 years later!