This Is My Life...Drive

I am writing this blog entry on my new toy: my PalmOne LifeDrive PDA. Yes. I have completely foresaken my initial plan (er, dream?) of buying a Palm TX as replacement for my Palm Tungsten T2 of one year and three months.

As the month of May ushered in, everybody and their mothers in my company started getting orgasmically happy...thanks to the profit-sharing (aka mid-year bonus) that normally totals 2.5 to three times an employee's monthly salary (with the bitch of a substantial tax, mind you) almost coming into our payroll accounts. As a result, some of the employees--me included--already started purchasing expensive (some even exorbitant) items...which were, of course, already affordable to them, thanks to the profit sharing moolah.

Now, just so everything is in crystal clear perspective, I'll set the records straight: the minute the PalmOne LifeDrive came out in the market, I was smitten. I told myself that someday, I will own a brand-spanking new unit...that is, once it has already gotten SIGNIFICANTLY cheaper than the THIRTY FOUR FRICKIN' THOUSAND PESOSESOSES price tag. I mean, what's not to love about the LD??! It's got four GIGABYTES of storage, baby! That means not having to buy or lag with me any more SD or MMC expansion cards, or having to worry about burning files that I need to transport from one PC to another into a "transition" CD-RW (because the LD acts like a USB Flash drive), or forcing myself to remember to synchronize with my laptop lest all my Palm data get erased (because it has a non-volatile memory that's not battery-dependent). And besides, it's just way TOO gorgeous--what with a silver-colored über manly chassis and hard buttons all over. I just HAD to have it. But that craving, perhaps, would have to take a backseat to another, say TX...until it becomes more affordable for my budget.

So, about three or four days before the big bucks came in, I gathered all my old Tungsten's peripherals because I was bidding it farewell and I'm letting someone else bid on it...on eBay. In full anticipation of a brand-spanking new PDA, I came a-strutting to MobileOne in Glorietta, the official dealer of Palm and Apple products. My rollercoaster excitement over getting a new LD notwithstanding, I made a wiser resolution. I did--you've gotta believe me when I say this, aight?--intend to buy the TX...for practical reasons. The TX costs only about P18600. And to be completely rational about the decision, I convinced myself that I didnt need the four frickin' gigabytes of hard drive in the LifeDrive. After all, SD and MMC cards are now made more affordable, thanks to CD-R King.

Upon arriving at MobileOne, however, I came across a flyer about their current promos. Turns out, I can buy either a TX or a LifeDrive using a deferred payment scheme...and on 0% interest for 12 months! That got me stumped for a decision. I automatically pulled out--how ironic was this--my old and trusty T2 and tinkered with the digits of the calculator. For about 400 pesos more per month, I will be able to afford a LifeDrive...and I get a free wireless keyboard and leather case to go with it (read: the TX doesn't come with anything for free). I was REALLY stumped so I told the sales clerk that I would need to sleep on it. It went home and literally slept ON it, i.e. by falling asleep on the flyer that I brought home, with the attached computation sheets.

The next day was a blur. Oh, that was prolly because it was a routinary training that my team had to do for the company, and prolly because my mind was really still hung up on the lack of a decision. Up until two minutes before I fished my HSBC credit card from my wallet and handed it to Maricel the sales clerk, I did not have a decision. But when my plastic buddy left my wallet, I have made a decision: fuck it, I'm buying the LD. And I salivated in a Pavlovian fashion as I await the completion of the transaction (and as Sam and Stephen, the technicians, readied the unit and plastered the scratch-proof protection film).

Five minutes later, the salivating stopped midway from my mouth and the white linoleum floor after I discovered what happened. Maricel, in her boombox-volumed voice shouted out, "Sir, declined!" My jaws dropped...as the rest of the other waiting customers' eyebrows raised into kingdom come. As if my tongue had a mind of its own, I blurted out, "What the fuck?? How did that happen?" And to add to the consternation, Maricel nonchalantly said, "Sir, baka kasi hindi kayo nagbabayad ng bill ninyo." I shot her a menacing look, pulled out my whip and castigated her until only her hair roots were unscathed and not bleeding. OK. That was just my thought balloon talking. Again, as if my tongue had a mind totally independent of my own sane and rational brain, I blurted out, "but I just paid TWENTY FOUR thousand pesos three days ago!" (which was what I really did to that month's bill...because I never believed in paying just the minimum payment, as that would just make my latter payments mushroom into a balloon payment). That sort'a worked, because the eyebrow raising kind of vaporized as fast as how it spread earlier like wildfire.

Turns out, inspite of my current and prompt payments, I was way over my credit limit of...well, let's just say A LOT. That was attributed to the fact that--which I conveniently forgot--I was also paying on installments a refrigerator, an airconditioner, a dvd player, ANOTHER [portable] dvd player, and an mp3 player. And since I never came across installment options or staggered payment schemes like this when I was in the US, I did not completely understand how the system worked. So, the idiot me just found out the hard way that that was how it works in the Philippines. Geesh.

And since I'm already hyped up about bringing home my new baby, I resorted to the unimaginable--or at least in my previously-known-as-sane life's context: I fished out my other credit cards and had Maricel divide the payable among them...and with the remainder (yes, there was still a hefty remainder after having carefully apportioned it already among the other plastics!) I had to pull out from my BPI ATM account. HAH! So do you now believe me when I tell you "what Ben wants, Ben gets..."??? ;-)

Almost thirty minutes later, harassed and staring blankly into my then-already-empty faux leather wallet, I stepped out of MobileOne, with my office bag and LifeDrive paper bag in tow...and with an ear-to-ear grin, with matching skipping and giddy-yapping my way to the vehicle terminal going home to the condo. And that night, I slept with a hard...steel material by my bedside.

That, ladies and gentlemen, is the story of my Life. Please don't take him (I say "him" because it's way too pogi to be a "she") away from me...or I'd die (well, that's only because without a PDA/organizer, I'm better off dead anyway, because I can hardly remember a birthday, a contact information, or an appointment. Loser eh?).

Now, if you'd excuse me, me and my LifeDrive are going for a stroll in Wi-Fi park.