Blackberry world - it’s a beautiful thing
Say what you want about the life-disrupting nature of the Blackberry, I had another ” wow” moment this week with mine that trumps the grief the gadget has caused my life!
To be fair, the bb doesn’t cause ME as much grief as it does the family around me when it goes off in the middle of the night or during a face to face conversation. More often than I like to admit it’s carrying an urgent bulletin from a pollster informing of the latest change in the political landscape, or to let me know what the premier’s itinerary is going to be for the next few days. My better half has on more than one occasion threatened to throw it down the toilet or into a snow bank, and once put it in the refrigerator freezer to chill out.
But this week, I was having dinner in a restaurant wondering about the safety of two dear friends who are on the final leg of a once in a life time trip around the world. I knew they were somewhere in China but not sure where because they were doing 14 cities in 16 days. I feared they may be near or god forbid caught in the terror of the earthquake. As the garlic bread arrived, I pulled the blackberry out of it’s holster, track-wheeled down to the black book icon, clicked their e mail co-ordinates and in the ”subject” line simply asked ; “Are you OK?, ” please respond”. By the time coffee and desert arrived the familiar “ding ding” Buzzzzzz Buzzzzzz went off around my waist. I didn’t worry at that moment if my dinner partner was offended. When I clicked open the e mail I saw the words I was waiting for “Yes, we are OKAY,” “we were in the earthquake zone a week ago, thank God.” “We felt the earth move though from here,” ”Back home next month, see you soon.” I shook my head and said to my dinner partner “These things are unbelievable”, What a world we live in.”