On The Road

"The only people that interest me are the mad ones, the ones that are mad to live, mad to talk, desirous of everything at the same time, the ones that never yawn or say a commonplace thing ... but burn, burn, burn like roman candles across the night."

-- Jack Kerouac

Today I bought my Amtrak ticket to San Francisco. On April 1, I board the train with one carry-on bag and leave my comfortable Seattle life behind. Ahead of me, there is a little room in San Francisco, some friends and a lot of I-don't-know. That's pretty cool.

But to be perfectly honest, I'm sadder than I thought I'd be at this point. I have a clearer sense of what I'm losing than what I'll gain. I can already tell that I'm going to get tired of saying goodbye to good people pretty darn fast. But I know I'll be back someday, and all the really good folks will stay in touch and (hopefully!) come visit me.

So, folks, it's my last weekend in Seattle! Let's have some kicks. :-)

Phone Home(work)

I'm done ranting about the iPhone, but if it's not the right phone for the world traveler, what is? It turns out that this question has a surprisingly complicated answer.

Rather than do my own homework, I decided to crib from someone else's. My friend BT is a tech fetishist. When Matrix-style neural jacks are commercially available, I'm pretty sure BT will be the first in line. I explained my requirements to him. My fantasy phone would ...

• Be able to make and receive calls all over the world;
  
• Provide access to my email, text messaging and the web wirelessly, anywhere;
• Not cost an arm and a leg for roaming/international voice/data/text messaging;
  
• Connect to Wi-Fi networks when they're available

... to which BT snarked, "You're looking for a phone that does everything everywhere. Stop looking; it doesn't exist."

BT agrees that the iPhone is not a good solution for world travelers. He suggested I get a BlackBerry, preferrably the Bold. Sign up for the AT&T World Traveler plan. Also, ask for Blackberry's special world-wide unlimitted international email thingie, which (unlike a general international data plan) doesn't charge you per kilobyte. You could get your email in Antartica if you wanted to (and BT has).

Also, he suggested I buy a cheap unlocked quad-band GSM handset on eBay and buy local SIM cards wherever I am. When these words came out of BT's mouth, I stared blankly. "You know this stuff, right?", BT asked in disbelief. I didn't. In short, it means to buy a second phone that isn't tied into any particular netword (AT&T, Sprint, Verizon, etc.). The SIM card is the magic piece that gets you on a network. With a local SIM card, you can get on a local network and make calls more cheaply.

"Quad-band" means it'll work on whatever frequency band happens to be used by the local network. "GSM" is the name of the network protocol these phone use. In North America, the dominant protocol, CDMA, is different from that used by than the rest of the world (except Japan, which might as well be Mars for the bizarro cellular technology they use there). If you get a quad-band GSM phone, you should be able to connect to most cell networks anywhere with the right SIM chip. A search on eBay turns up many such handsets for sale for around $50. Not bad.

I'm told that buying SIM chips abroad is a breeze. Many come with a prepaid number of minues. When they run out, you can hand the chip over to a vendor and ask for, say, 10 euros of extra minues. They'll give you back the chip and some magic number to dial, and then Presto! you have more minutes. Shazaam.

I'm now the proud owner of a Blackberry Bold. We're still getting acquainted. I have yet to pick up el cheapo unlocked handset, but there's no rush.

Since this conversation, BT tipped me off to Google Voice, a voice mail/call forwarding solution that's coming soon from the Goog that should make all this stuff even easier and cheaper. Or so BT says. I'll take his word for it.

Much Ado About Housing

For months I had been making slow, steady progress toward my nomadic departure, but now things are coming together quickly. Very, very quickly.

In an earlier post, I discussed a few different options for Being Free: sell my stuff; buy a condo and do house swaps; put my stuff in storage; or sublet my current apartment. A friend of mine jumped on the opportunity to sublet my apartment. Earlier this week, she found the most charming roommate anyone could hope for through craigslist. And the latest development: with the help of another friend, I now have a sublet lined up in my first destination: San Francisco.

Over the past few days, this enterprise has gone from hell-if-I-know to zOMG-I-leave-in-2-weeks. Life moves pretty fast.

More to come...

An American Dream?

When I meet folks and tell them that I'm unwed and childless, I sometimes get that buck-up-li'l-camper-success-will-find-you sympathy. Those folks get my lemon face. But I get a much different reaction when I tell people that I plan to travel and work remotely.

Most people, when they hear my plans, say something like, "WOW! I'd LOVE to do that.". Humans are such fascinating creatures! So many conflicting interests! I guess I shouldn't be surprised.

Bombarded by contrary messages from culture and counter-culture, are we a schizophrenic people who have trouble telling where our own happiness lies? I used to think I knew.

For Sale By Owner

I have a decade's worth of crap here, and it's all got to go. If you want something, make an offer. Check back here periodically; I may update this post with more stuff.

Item	Suggested Price
Drafting table	$20
Swivel Chair	$10
Wooden coffee table	$20
Snowboard K2 FatBob 158 (with free carrying case)	$60 o.b.o.
Snowboard boots w/ switch bindings (men’s 10.5)	$60 o.b.o.
MSR snow shoes	$15
Cannondale hybrid bicycle, men’s	$80
Tennis racquet, Prince	$10
Cordless phone with answering machine	FREE!
AIWA hp-X35 headphones	$5
Assorted computer cables	FREE! Come have a rummage
2-person tent (North Face, Kestral)	$100
Sleeping bag (Kelty, Ridgeway mummy bag)	$60
Self-inflating sleeping pad	$20
Yoga mat	$10
Jumbo bean bag chair	$10
Fax machine	$10
Humidifier	$1
Leg lamp	Priceless

This just in: Someone bought my leg lamp! Sorry, folks.

Why I Won't Buy an iPhone

I admit that watching all the urban hipsters playing with their iPhones has made me a bit jealous. And considering that I'm going mobile, I certainly need to find myself a 3G phone, but the iPhone just isn't it. Here are a few reasons why ...

There are all the usual reasons people roll out against the iPhone: lock-in with AT&T, lo-res still camera, closed software platform, Apple's control-freak 'tude wrt the App Store, etc., etc.. To which I say, "Tru dat." But the bigger issue for me is that it doesn't travel well.

I took my gripes to my local Apple store. My conversation went something like this:

Yours Truly: I'm considering an iPhone.
Apple Flunkie: Just do it. It's totally rad. (Ed. I'm paraphrasing here.)
YT: You haven't even asked me my requirements.
AF: OK, what are your requirements?
YT: I want a phone I can use while I travel overseas.
AF: Oh.
... awkward pause ...
AF: Um. Here's what you do. Look on eBay for a hacked iPhone....
YT: Uhh...
AF: ... Get a first-generation hacked iPhone. It'll be cheaper. Then you'll be able to use it with some other international plan that is cheaper than AT&T.
YT: You're an official Apple rep, right?
AF: <shifts nervously> Yes.
YT: And you're saying that if I want to travel with my iPhone, the only practical solution that won't bankrupt me with AT&T's extortionate international data rates .... is a solution that isn't officially supported by Apple, right?
AF: Yes.
YT: You realize what a sh*t answer that is, right?
AF: Yes.
YT: <exits stage left>

Since then, Apple has gone on record saying that hacking an iPhone is copyright infringement and a DMCA violation. Nice.

OK people. I need a 3G phone that travels well. What are my best options?

This Modern Age

I'm still banging the same ol' drum: preparing myself for long term travel and working from the road....

While sluffing off all the unnecessary detritus I've accumulated over the years, I am replacing it with newer, better detritus for working and communicating while on the road. The basic idea is to move as much as I can online so I can access it from anywhere, and then add a dash of portable James Bond-esque digital gadgets to fill in the gaps. Here are the weapons of choice for the modern digital road warrior.

The Basics
GMail for email, Picasa for photos, Google Docs for collaborative office applications.

Phone and Fax
Skype / VoIP for cheap phone calls from anywhere to anywhere. MyFax for sending and receiving faxes via email. An iPhone, just 'cause.

Data Storage
SOS for online data backups. A portable external USB hard drive will also come in handy for storing large media files. Look for a so-called passport drive that is small and shock-resistant.

Social Networking
Facebook for keeping up with my peeps, Blogger for sharing my thoughts with y'all, Bootsnall and CouchSurfing for connecting with fellow travellers and finding sublets abroad.

Hardware
Power adaptors and portable surge protectors ... just do it. A portable printer would be nice (a Google search turns up plenty), but I don't have one to recommend, and a good e-reader would eliminate much of the need. Unfortunately, I haven't been wowed by the current crop of e-readers. Maybe the 2nd gen of the Kindle will set my heart aflame.

Also, a GPS navigator makes getting around unfamiliar environs a whole lot easier. Plug it into your 'puter and download the maps for wherever you happen to be. I absolutely <3 mine. I can ask it where the nearst coffee shop is. How did I ever live without it?

This stuff makes working from the road so easy, it's almost too easy.

Update:
Remember, I signed up for Earth Class Mail as my mail forwarding solution? Well, I'm currently in Oregon reading mail that was delivered to me in Seattle. They scanned it, turned it into a pdf and emailed it to me. What a great service! I'm really excited to see my systems are up and running smoothly.