Life with the iPhone after 30 days: More shortcuts and more freezes

I usually get up in the mornings and go to my office and turn on my desktop CPU to check the day's news, my email, etc. But before I even turn on my desktop on a given morning, the iPhone, which sits atop my office desk, will now tell me if I have new email that has come in overnight. (Note: I have to leave my iPhone outside of my room because the GSM signal interferes with my iPod/JBL music dock's speakers, making that noise--you know that noise). Being aware that I got email overnight is nice, sure, but it sort of takes the surprise getting a new email on my main computer.

Sure, on the other hand, it could be the universe telling me NOT to turn on my main CPU in the morning. The iPhone is a shortcut, it's a timesaver for sure. I could do my emailing and browsing on the iPhone. Turning on the CPU will invariably lead me to lollygaggle in the morning as I will ended up checking this site or that, clicking on an interesting article, or buying a song from iTunes. (Question: Will Apple ever allow iTunes purchases from the iPhone?) This all causes me to leave the house later for work that I had hoped. The iPhone's gentle ping to let me know that I have email is nice and would arguably save me from having to turn on my CPU in the mornings, but I think there's still something to be said about checking email on a bigger screen (not to mention a bigger keyboard).

Speaking of screens, I've noticed lately, that the iPhone's screen doesn't quite clean as easily as before. While it remains relatively unscratched (unlike the rest of the iPhone's casing) it is harder to get my grimy fingerprints off, even with the iPhone's iRag.

On another random note: While my iPhone friends and I still await for a major update, the security update released a couple of weeks ago added a feature that I was awaiting: Namely the ability to forward an email. This basic function was previously unavailable and, like most things in life, you don't realize how important it was to you until you don't have it.

Apart from that update, the bugs in the Camera Roll I noticed earlier are still there. Other random freezes leaded to the dreaded Black Screen of Death also remain, including a bug that freaked me out this morning while commuting on San Francisco's MUNI.

Namely, I was creating a long text message only when the train stopped (I get car sick from staring at the text screen for too long, sad, I know) but, invariably, the screen will automatically shut off for powersave. If it's more than a minute, I also have to enter my passcode. Anyway, in the middle of the message, after the screen had gone dark, I tried to finish off my message and nothing worked. No touching, no fiddling with the home key, no clicks with the top switch, nothing worked. The iPhone stared at me blankly, dead and unresponsive. Of course, there was a brief moment of panic. What if the iPhone itself was completely dead. I was expecting important calls, access to music, etc. Well, as with this month I had to do a hard, 8-second reset. Much to my relief (and after 10 seconds by my count) the Apple symbol reappeared and a reboot had commenced.

But, of course, the text message was gone. D-oh!