new toy

Gadgets are an appropriate topic for the ShoppingGals, right? (I posted about this on my regular blog, but since it's shopping related, and since my regular blog isn't public, I thought I'd post here too.)

Retired my RAZR and picked up the new BlackBerry Pearl from T-Mobile last week, and so far so good! It's always hard getting used to a new phone, especially when you switch brands. I was a hard-core Nokia girl until I got the RAZR, and was very reluctant to make that change, but it was pretty seemless. This switch is a little more difficult. My main 2 complaints are with the text messaging, of course, since I text message like a maniac. First of all, there's no "quick and easy" way to start a new text message. It's actually quite cumbersome, not instinctive at all. You'd think that this kind of phone would have a push-of-a-button function that would take you to a blank new text. I mean, this phone is made for messaging! I found one shortcut but it still takes a couple of keystrokes before you get there. The other problem is with sending a text message to multiple recipients. Again, it takes several keystrokes to do it. Very time consuming.

Also, the menus are really counter-intuitive. Why aren't the Help topics listed alphabetically? But these are all things that I can live with. I'm already getting used to everything, so going back may be out of the question already, hahaha. The Qwerty keyboard is great, and the SureType feature is pretty cool. I can browse the web, link my email accounts to it, do Instant Messaging, etc. The screen is huge, the battery life is 10x better than the RAZR, and it's not all bulky and wide like other BlackBerry's (it's actually pretty much the same size as the RAZR when closed). T-Mobile has a 14-day return policy, so I still have 8 more days to decide for sure if I *love* it! My guess is that I'll keep it....

patent leather

I returned the red-ish/orange-ish Tano handbag. It just wasn't the right bag for me. Instead, I exchanged it for a Charles David dark red patent leather clutch/writstlet. I cannot seem to find a picture of it anywhere, put it is SUPER-CUTE and is larger than a regular clutch/wristlet. It's long and has a lot of space inside, including a few pockets inside.

The other factor that made me decide to return the Tano handbag was that I bought this lovely black patent leather Francesco Biasia handbag:




















It was a tough decision to return the Tano, but I think I made the right one! =)