I put my palm pilot and keyboard to good use today and went over to Border’s to write for a bit. Got nearly 2,000 words done, too! Not bad for a morning’s work.
I don’t really like lugging my computer around, but find that writing on something that folds up to fit in my purse is really, really nice!
I have the added bonus of not being connected to the ‘net on it, so I am not tempted to do any web surfing or stuff like that.
I was wondering if the people around would be too much of a distraction from actually writing, but it turned out not to be so. In fact, the people watching was considerably less of a temptation to let my mind go off task than using a computer connected to the ‘net is! I did chat briefly with some people who were fascinated by the Palm and the little keyboard, but it wasn’t enough to throw me off my groove.
I’m using Quickoffice on my Palm, which syncs okay with my word processor. Formatting isn’t ideal, but I’m writing a novel and in a novel formatting isn’t fancier than anything you’re likely to be able to do on a typewriter, anyway. I really wish I’d had something like this as a teenager. It would have kept me out of the basement when my hands cramped up too much from writing longhand out in the woods. There was a rock and a log that would have made the perfect desk! A laptop isn’t really someone you’re okay with taking out into the woods with you, but this? Perfect.