The iPhone vs. The iPad vs. The Unexpected Contender

If it keeps up, man will atrophy all his limbs but the push-button finger. –Frank Lloyd Wright

From the moment the first iPhone was unveiled, I've wanted one. Touch screen. MP3 player and phone all in one. Could there be anything more awesome?

I couldn't imagine it, but there is. The iPad. Angry Birds. Music. E-Mail. The whole of the internet in one tiny tablet. Plus the screen is bigger.

Call me fickle, but when the iPad came along I forgot all about the iPhone. Now I only have eyes for the iPad.

I have a phone. A smart phone, even. Mind you, I can't get a steady enough connection to log into my Google account so I can link to my e-mail and get cool apps like the barcode scanner thingie, and if the ambient temperature is to hot or too cold the back and home buttons don't work. I guess that makes my smart phone a little bit dumb. But, it has a full slide-out keyboard, which is awesome, and I have unlimited data {which is good because it surfs the internet like it's on dial-up or something} and texting, I never go over my 200 allotted talk minutes and my plan is cheap. So it doesn't matter so much that I'm carrying around a $200 calculator/alarm clock.

However, there arose a debate in my head between the iOSes recently and I've been weighing the pros and cons of each against each other.

Mr. Bug hates his phone. A lot. And we're on two different carriers so we were discussing the pros and cons of switching to a different carrier with a family plan. We were also doing a little wishful phone shopping. I immediately thought of the iPhone. And then I thought of how much the data plan would cost.

The very next day I found out that iPhones are now available through my current carrier. Granted, you have to buy the phone up front, but with data plans starting at $30, it is tempting. Very tempting. I'm pretty sure that the phone pays for itself in under a year, based on the savings in data plans. And once you have an iPhone, why would you want anything else?

With that, I got all excited about the iPhone again. Until I found out that the new iPhone 4S costs $650.00. I mean for that, I could get an iPad. The screen is bigger. And just thinking of the number of heavy, heavy books I won't have to carry back and forth to church on Sundays tips the scales hugely in favor of the iPad. Because I already have a phone. A smart phone, even.

The sensible thing to do, though, would be to get a new oven.

It would seem that our household appliances have reached the age of requiring frequent repairs or replacing. When we had to get a new dishwasher in April, I lamented the fact that we had to spend our meager tax refund on something so practical. But once the dishwasher, with its TARDIS-like* qualities, was installed and the dishes were shiny and sparkling once more, I started to fantasize about other new kitchen appliances.

I thought the fridge would be the next one to go. There's something wrong with the defroster in the freezer. The drain for excess moisture gets iced over and it starts dripping into the fridge. We defrost it and it works properly for a bit and then it ices over again.

In a surprising turn of events, the oven quit working eight weeks ago {and the freezer hasn't needed defrosting in five months}. The gas burners on the stove top have never reliably lit. Sometimes, after a long series of ignition clicks, the flame will burst out beyond the bottom of the pan nearly far enough to singe off your eyebrows. Sometimes it won't light at all and I have to use a match. And once in a great while, it lights after one ignition click. But it was the oven that went out. Since the stove top still works we're not starving or anything. And I know how to use a crock pot. But I kind of miss rolls with Sunday dinner. I'm dying to make a gingerbread cake to eat with the fresh, ripe peaches that are available in abundance right now. And there are only so many kinds of soups you can make before they all start to taste the same.

The cost of a repair on the oven would fall just short of the cost of a whole new one. So I suppose a resolution to the iOS debate will have to be postponed indefinitely because we're shopping for a new oven today. And I'm pretty sure the fridge is next in the line for replacing.

I'm also pretty sure that if I were ever to acquire a $650 phone and/or tablet, I would never, ever take them out of the pretty clear plastic boxes they come in for fear of dropping them and breaking the screens.

*TARDIS /ˈtɑrdɪs/: Time And Relative Dimension In Space. The TARDIS is a time machine and spacecraft in the British science fiction television program Doctor Who. A TARDIS is a product of the advanced technology of the Time Lords, an extraterrestrial civilization to which The Doctor belongs. A properly maintained and piloted TARDIS can transport its occupants to any point in time and any place in the universe. The interior of a TARDIS is much larger than its exterior, which can blend in with its surroundings using the ship's "chameleon circuit." The Doctor pilots an unreliable, obsolete TT Type 40, Mark 3 TARDIS. Its chameleon circuit is faulty, leaving it stuck in the shape of a 1960s-style London police box after a visit to London in 1963.

Doctor Who has become so much a part of popular culture that not only has the shape of the police box become more immediately associated with the TARDIS than with its real-world inspiration, the term "TARDIS-like" has been used to describe anything that seems to be bigger on the inside than on the outside.