THE GADGET GURU
4 May 2003
When we last left our intrepid journalist, she was on the verge of a nervous breakdown
over how much she still had left to do and how little time she had to do it in.
Thus, if I didn't already have a ticket in hand, I probably would not have gone to Boise
today. Dumbest thing for someone with my schedule to try to do! But I had purchased the
ticket before I knew I was going to be drowning.
I got even more behinder last night. Sort of. Instead of transcribing, I went and
interviewed the director of the teen theatre, about which I am doing a feature story for
Tuesday. We had a great interview, but it was just one more tape that was going to have
to be transcribed.
I got up at 2:30 a.m. to work on the psychiatrist's rush report--all 20 pages of it. It
was longer than I anticipated, so I never did get to Dr. G's work, or even think about
the interview tape.
But then I had a brainstorm. I checked and discovered that the earphones for the
transcription unit will plug into the dictation machine that I had used for the
interview. So I packed that, thinking I would just transcribe it here at Olivia's
house.
But then I got the bright idea that I would test out the new folding keyboard that I
bought for the Palm Pilot to take to Australia. I'd give it a test of how well it works
on the road.
IT WORKS GREAT!!!!!
I got to the airport 2 hrs early and bought some coffee. While I was wondering how I was
going to kill time, I decided to test out the palm pilot. I managed to get about 10-15
minutes worth of typing done (and a friend who happened to be catching the plane before
mine took my picture while doing it).
Once we were airborn en route to Portland, the first leg of the trip, I got out all of my
little gadgets--unfolded the keyboard, plugged in the Palm pilot, took out the dictation
machine, attached the ear phones and voila--I was in business. (It should also be
pointed out that this would not be possible if I still weighed what I weighed a year ago.
This project necessitates my being able to lay the tray table flat in front of me!)
By the time we got to Portland, I had finished one whole side of the tape and I was very
jazzed.
In the Portland airport (where I had a 2 hour lay-over) I found an office place for
travelers, which I had all to myself, so I got all of my stuff organized again and just
sat there till I'd finished the entire interview. I still have the other interviews to
do and the feataure to write, but I am finally ahead of the game and am very pleased.
But what of Boise? Olivia met me at the airport. My first impression is that you can
live a whole year, weather-wise, in a day here. She said I'd missed the snow on the
mountain tops and the hail but it was sunny as the plane landed and raining by the time
we got to the car. It has gone from bright sun (warm, actually) to pouring rain and back
again. At one point I looked off into the distance and it was pouring to my left and
clear blue sky to my right. It was like being in Hawaii.
