Ralph’s Place

I am upset

This morning, I had all but decided to buy an iPod Touch. The oportunity is there to get one at a good price and although I already have a Nano, the video, wifi and general “coolness” of the Touch are enough to draw me in and make me want one.

All was well, I was excited! Unfortunately, this was not to last.

Initially I spent some time thinking about whether to go for the 8GB or 16GB version. Obviously I wanted the bigger one so the goal was to find a reason to justify the extra cost. This search was the beginning of the end, as it prompted thoughts along the lines of “what will I actually use this for?”.

Video? Yes. On train journeys, tube journeys, bus journeys whatever. Put simply, I don’t watch any TV anymore because I don’t have time. There are however some shows that I miss, and if I could get these onto a Touch, I could watch them during my travel time. Spot on!

Wi-Fi? Yes, sort of. I wouldn’t go all out and buy the £3.99 a month Cloud package (I spend no time in either coffee shops or GNER trains and thus wouldn’t use it), but I would get use out of it at work, at home, at friend’s houses etc. Not having to boot up my computer (although it is a Mac, and takes less than a minute) to check my email would be a bonus, and when away from home I wouldn’t need to borrow a computer to do so either - as long as there’s a wireless network I can use anyway.

Music? Well, no. I have a Nano, and the thing I like about it is it’s size! It’s light, fits in any pocket and still stores more than enough music for a portable player. Why would I buy another iPod if I have this?

But the Touch is cool! The widescreen multi-touch interface is great for navigating the menu structure, viewing/zooming in on photos, watching videos and browsing the web. It looks great, is a pleasure to use and is genuinely a revolutionary device. But do I want one? Not really, I have an iPod I’m happy with. I do want the other features though, and I definitely want the device. Then I realised…

I want an iPhone.

If you combine the Video, Wi-Fi and “coolness” with the extra functions of a phone, then throw in a calendar app, that’s what I want. A device I can use to communicate with people, manage my life through a calendar sync’d with outlook (my phone), as well as watch videos and browse the web via Wi-Fi (the Touch). The iPhone is a truly revolutionary device, one I want to get on board with.

But there are drawbacks. It’s expensive! £269 for the phone is already a lot, but then you’re left with a choice of 3 recidulously overpriced tarriffs from O2! £35 a month for 200 mins and 200 texts? No thanks! Ok so you get unlimited data and Cloud Wi-Fi for that, but still? You can get 200 mins and 400 texts for £15 with O2 simplicity. £3.99 a month gets you the Cloud Wi-Fi on the touch, and the iPhone isn’t 3G so any data transfer will happen over GPRS or EDGE (which is really poor in the UK) and be of limited value for the speed you get. Let’s face it, I’d need more than 200 minutes anyway, I get through most of my 750 I get now (for the same price)! So I’d need the £45 or £55 per month deal, but that’s way more than I can spend on a phone. You don’t even get free O2 to O2 calls like on just about every other new tarriff. Where’s the sense in that?

Even if I could justify the cost though, the iPhone still falls short of expectation. Despite the fact it’s essentially a hand held computer with a phone function, you can’t install 3rd party applications on it because Apple have locked it down tight. I wouldn’t hack the device to do this, and I have no reason to either. But I’m sure that a week after I get one I’ll find an app written for hacked phones that I must have, and I’ll be annoyed and frustrated that I can’t have it, just because Apple say I can’t.

Also, as I said before, it’s not 3G. Edge networks in the UK are poor at best, even if you can find one, and GPRS is slooooow. I’m not buying an iPhone to have to wait minutes and minutes to do things that should take a matter of seconds, that’ll be unbareable!

So, Apple, I’m upset. I want to be able to join in the party and buy one of these awesome devices you’ve built, but I can’t. If I get a Touch, I’ll be disappointed that it’s not an iPhone or that it’s replaced my Nano, which I love. Yet, if I get an iPhone I’ll be both disappointed and poor. The tarriffs are insanely overpriced and completely out of character with others available on O2, and the device itself, while ground breaking and revolutionary, is lacking in just the wrong places… and I know it’ll leave me wanting more.

I can only hope that in the new year things improve. 3G support, the freedom to install new applications, and of course sensibly priced call plans. Is that too much to ask?

Yep, last week I finally took the plunge and invested in a Nikon D40 DSLR You might’ve spotted some photos up from last week, and there’ll hopefully be more from this weekend!

Alas, the quality difference doesn’t show online (I’m looking at ways to improve on that), but trust me, it’s an improvement on my now aging Canon A75! It’s a lot more fun to use too, in auto “point and shoot” mode it pretty much handles everything for me (which is definitely a good thing!). It seemed to overexpose everything at the weekend, but apparently there are some settings I can play with to fix that! I’m looking foward to learning what all the complicated stuff does, it might even improve my photography

Now, if only I could afford the lense I want to go with it :S

Spotted this in the news this morning on the BBC Primary children ’suffer stress’.

I wish I could say it gets better *sigh*

Unbelievable as it may sound, I’ve been to the peak district 2 weekends in a row, and am planning to go again this weekend.

Ok, now that you’ve got back on your chair… It’s been an awesome couple of weeks! Stanage twice, and finally the trip to Burbage I’d been waiting for last Sunday. I’d completely forgotten how much I liked gritstone! It’s short, there’s friction and of course there’s more than enough crack routes to get your hands jammed into Amazing!

The climbing has been excellent. Jumped straight onto Central Trinity as the first route back, a VS I’d seconded before and knew to be quite doable. Forgot about all the jamming involved though, I got some abuse for that hehe. Via Media (VS 4c) also went that day, a great little crack route with a tricky start but then easing near the end with gear just about everywhere.

The trip to Burbage meant an induction for Caroline on Mutiny Crack. Possibly the best HS on grit with an excellent sequence of overhead jamming moves to pull through the initial roof (see photos). I hadn’t led it before and loved every minute! Of course my goal for the day had to be Knights Move (HVS 5a) and after a bit of lunch that was ticked with no issues. A soft touch at the grade, but still only my second HVS (Tody’s Wall being my first), and my first in over 2 years! Things feel like they might be falling into place at long, long last lol.

Injuries are never far away from a climbing post. I’ve been having physio on my elbow for a couple of weeks now and it’s actually starting to feel a bit better. It was sore for the first weekend, but last week it felt much better, with the only reminder of the pain coming on the crux of The 3-D Wall (E2 6a), and even that wasn’t too bad. (Also pleased to get the 6a tick, nice lead Ed!) More physio this week anyway and I’m hoping it’s actually getting better!

There’s more peak goodness this weekend anyway, with more routes on the tick list begging to be tried… I wonder which will go next…

“Busy” has been a common theme of late, not just for me, but for everyone it seems! I don’t know if it’s just the time of year, or whether the world’s actually getting busier, but time is no longer as plentiful as I remember it once being… many moons ago.

So, what’s been going on? It’s been nearly 2 months since I last posted here, which is a long time even by my standards. In all honesty I’ve probably had time here and there to write something, but no energy to think of something to write lol. Some headlines though:

I’m playing badminton again! Started playing on Tuesday nights at a club in Victoria. No commitment to join or play matches, which is a bonus… although having said that it’d be nice once I get into it a bit more to maybe get involved with a club playing in a league if I have time (there’s that word again)

Work is… well, work. It’s not as bad as it’s been in the past, but the pressure’s still on and the long days are still hanging around. Everyone’s tired and the deadline is coming up in a couple of weeks. Should be interesting *ahem*

Nottingham is the new London! Didn’t you know?

Tea is good! No sorry, tea is amazing!

I like cake! It’s true!

More to come soon anyway, stay tuned