iComplaints

Activities

Avery, Nain, and I went to lunch with Grandma Kate today.  I was hoping, as I'm sure all parents do, that Avery would be on her best behavior and show off all her new skills.  No such luck.  She was in full-on 2.25yo whiny/"I do it!"/"No!"/"Mine!" mode.  Then she threw a minor car seat tantrum when we left.  As I said, it was minor and there wasn't a struggle to get her into the seat as much as there was crying once we drove away.  She got over it once we reached the grocery store.  Right now she's napping nicely. 

After she wakes up, we might head over to a local nursery that has a lot of animals and things to see.  Or maybe we'll hit the park again. 

Tomorrow we're heading up to Cheyenne to visit with Uncle Collin, Aunt Denise, and Cousin Dylan.  Hopefully the weather is nice so we can hit the park up there.

iPhone complaints

I love my iPhone, but like all Apple products, it's missing some very obvious functionality.  Apple is weird that way.  I shall list my biggest complaints:

• No auto-off feature.  With my Blackberry, as with a lot of phones, I could set up my phone to shut off at 11 pm and then wake up at 6 am, thereby saving battery life when I didn't use my phone at night.  You'd think since most smartphones are battery hogs, this would be key functionality, but if the iPhone has this functionality, I haven't found it. 
• No arrow keys on the keyboard.  With my Blackberry, and with the Android, there is a roller ball that you can use to get the cursor in a precise location to edit typing.  With the iPhone, you have to use your finger to tap where you want the cursor to show up.  This gets the general location, but it's really hard to get it to land exactly in the middle of a word that you need to edit.  Typically I have to select the whole word and then retype it.  Why they don't have little arrow keys on the keyboard to allow you to move the cursor over a few letters is puzzling to me. 
• The volume of the phone ring is on the same control as the volume for applications, etc.  I want my phone ring to be at a constant level unless I specifically lower the volume.  With the iPhone, the volume button controls the volume for the phone ring, the iPod, the applications, etc.  So if I want to listen to music very softly and turn down the volume, unless I remember to turn up the volume when I'm done, the phone ring will be so low I cannot hear it.  This is why I miss most calls on my iPhone.  As a phone, it really sucks.  As an information device, it rules.  Fortunately, I consider the phone functionality to be the least important features, but it's still amazing this wasn't caught in testing. 
• Locking controls.  This is really a nice to have feature, and I don't actually fault Apple for not putting it in on the first few iterations of the phone.  However, it's been out long enough now that they must know it is an awesome tool for distraction with toddlers.  I generally let Avery play with it at will and hope she doesn't delete anything I care about.  I can replace most applications if she deletes them and the pictures and videos get backed up when I sync with my computer.  It would be awesome if Apple developed a control screen that would allow parents to configure a simple "toddler" mode that would allow me to indicate which applications would be enabled in that mode and would disable the ability to delete and/or move around applications. 
• Auto email population.  Each time I have to log into a website using my email address, I get mad.  How come they don't have a shortcut button that allows me to press it and have it fill in a configured email address?  I am not asking it to remember all my various logins, but most logins now are an email address.  I spend more time pecking out my stupid email address when I could just push a button and have it auto populate.  Along those same lines, what's up with not putting the @ symbol on the main screen? 
• Custom dictionary.  My Blackberry had a custom dictionary.  I loved it because I could put in my custom word like "bc" and have it auto correct to "because."  I also put in shortcuts for names and addresses.  Apple doesn't have this.  I hear people rave about the auto correct functionality, but I am not impressed with it.