Some of you might have noticed that I've been away the last couple of days.
(that's right, yes? Someone must have noticed??) Some quack had decided I needed a handful of screws in my spine -- I couldn't reach, otherwise I'd have screwed them in myself.

Aaaanyyhooo -- I took my 770 with me. Now people, this is Belgium and a small town hospital, so forget about WiFi hotspots on the grounds; the best reaction I got was: "Duh?", so Internet access was not the reason why I took the 770 (although, read on).

I had purchased a second 1 gig card (still no luck on finding 2GB RS-MMCs in this neck on the woods) and converted a couple of DVDs to 770 Format with Konttori's mucho excellente Media Converter tool (for the curious: Kill Bill 1 and 2 and Battle of the Bulge; the latter split into two parts as it is an almost 4 hours long movie). I added a few CD tracks and a selection from the magnificent Baen ebook repository (Jim Baen recently passed away, but his good work of offering electronic books without even a hint of DRM madness continues).

The bottom line is that this was my best hospital experience to date. I realize that that doesn't necessarily mean much, what with hospitals being what they are, but the Nokia 770 is an amazingly good thing to have with you in bed .

I have previously mentioned my other go-everywhere tool, the Sony Ericsson P910i smartphone, which also plays movies, shows books and plays a mean tune, but the P910's 320x208 screen cringes into submission next to the 770's 800x480 powerhouse (and BTW, the "pearly lights" backlight so many complained about actually makes movies look even better and allowed me to turn the backlight way down for reading). It's screen is also physically smaller than the 770's; this looks trivial, but it makes a huge difference if a Tiger tank is charging right into your face (I admit, I never got to watch the Kill Bills because of too much Happy Juice keeping me in Fairyland. And for some reason Henry Fonda and Charles Bronson always seem to win the toss).

And although, as I previously mentioned, WiFi access is considered science fiction (notice the clever link to Baen Books there? Good eh?) in Belgian hospitals, the 770 actually picked up three neighbouring APs. Unfortunately, none of their owners were social -- or mad -- enough to open their link to the world, so I couldn't do anything with them. But I might have, in which case nobody would have missed me at all.

Is there really nobody who noticed? <snif>

PS: I still can't pair my P910 with my 770, so GPRS was out as well (and in any case Mobistar, my GSM provider, has a really crappy GPRS setup that might for all intents and purposes just be called WAP, or even WALC: What a Load of Crap). So, still nobody noticed I was gone, eh? You bastards! I could have died on that operating table and you just don't care!! I hate you all!!!!!

...
(changes meds to much more powerful drugs)
...

Ahem, here're the links:

Baen Books: http://www.baen.com/

[hypnotic insert: All Buy Baen Books! They are the best! All Buy Baen Books! Go Buy Baen Books Now!]

All about Media Converter: http://www.internettablettalk.com/wi...kia_770_format

And what the heck, the P910i: http://www.mobile-review.com/review/...-p910-en.shtml

Pictures of me after surgery: http://no_way_jose.com