The Palm's still living up to its hype. I'm actually using it (gasp) for what it's intended for -- itemizing task lists, putting all my contacts in a central place, using it as a repository for needed business information, and things like that. That I'm also systematically loading the John Carter, Warlord of Mars books on it as well as a darned good fake Tricorder screen doesn't change that fact.

And it's small. It's actually 'tuckable,' rather than luggable. The Newton's greatest strength and greatest failing were its size. It's the perfect size for annotating notes -- it's about the size of a steno pad, if three times as thick. The Newton's the size of a very small calculator, and its case doesn't make it any thicker than my old TI-80 back in high school.

The other really well done bit on the Palm is Palm Desktop for Mac. (And, I presume, the Windows version too.) See, scribbling all this information into the Palm is cumbersome, and cumbersome means you'll stop using it entirely. By having a darned good contact manager and appointments calendar on the desktop computer that HotSyncs to the Palm at the touch of one button, I can use the comfortable interface to add all my information in, but have it wherever I go.

So, it's a good investment for a Manager type. Eileen, the Systems Administrator, reports it's making her tasks go a lot better as well. She also reports that it can hold a good number of trivia games. Other office members are making noise about getting theirs, so that'll have to be a priority, I think.

It's a cool and rainy day, but not cold and not stormy. The bad weather is coming, apparently. Just in time for an insurance fracas.

You see, I've been with AIG for a long time. They're hard to get some information out of, but they were always inexpensive, and they let me pay twice a year (which I prefer). Midway through this last six months, I got around to telling them I was now living in New Hampshire, and I no longer commuted to work.

Big mistake. My bill jumped $200 or so. For the six months. Meaning a $400 jump in total cost.

This seemed strange to me, so I called them. And yes, they confirmed it. No, I hadn't been a bad driver. This was just the way it worked, was all.

So I jumped on the Internet and got six or seven quotes. I'm going with Traveller's Insurance (under the red umbrella), for $150 less a year than my old insurance rate, or $550 less than my new one. I have to pay monthly (less than fifty bucks), but I can deal. At these prices, you better believe I can deal.

Insurance companies make no sense at all to me.