Smart Phone vs Carpal Tunnel?

Say Huh?
Maybe I use my phone too much. Maybe my wife was right. Dammit. There I said it, and where potentially millions of people could see it. There's at least a half dozen or so who probably already have. Its just so damn handy though, I can't help myself. It fulfills, well most of, my needs. I mean where else can you get your news, weather, technology and Facebook updates in one place? Hell, throw in some porn, a little blogging, the number for the local hardware store, what time the sushi bar in town closes, taking pictures and videos that can be online in seconds, and of course the ability to make phone calls once in awhile. If you're tech savvy enough, and not afraid to break something, you might even follow my lead and run Google's Ice Cream Sandwich,
months before its ready for your device, thus satisfying the need to try something new, as well as giving you something to bitch about (don't do this unless you're absolutely sure you want to void your warranty.) The only problem with your phone being so cool, besides being yelled at, sometimes losing photos, posting the wrong photos to your FaceBook or Google+  profile, having to actually answer the phone, or worse, being without signal, is that this really cool phone might hurt you. That's what might have made my wife right.

Aren't Claws Great?

Is It Carpal Tunnel?Sometimes we all enjoy something a little too much, and end up paying for it later. Remember your Super Nintendo? After a couple straight days of Mortal Kombat, Super Metroid or Legend of Zelda: Link To the Past, your hands started to hurt and resemble claws, didn't they? Take a look now, those claws are back, wrapped around your little touchscreen joy device. Mine are and they ache. I've tried holding it differently and at different angles, using different fingers to type, using the bulky, lousy hardware keyboard (thanks HTC), and even (almost successfully) used the built in voice recognition software and text-to-speech (TTS) functions, all in attempts to make my hands quit hurting. But they don't. Chances are I just need a break, but its so damned addictive, and sometimes necessary. Its probably not carpal tunnel, either. It's probably a repetitive motion injury or at best some strained muscles. I mean my hands quit hurting shortly after I defeated Koopa.

That's Not Enough
I know you're probably thinking I'm the worst tech writer ever, especially when I don't tell you how to fix it. Well that's because I'm not really a writer, especially a tech writer, because I come up with my own shit. And while it won't make your hands feel better, there is something you can do about it - sue your phone's manufacturer or your phone company. Come to think of it, your phone company is the better choice, which I'll explain. First off, does anybody remember the lady that sued McDonald's for her coffee burning her when it spilled in her lap? I do, and remember it opening a floodgate of lawsuits which eventually ended with fat people taking away my SuperSize fries and my extra bacon, cheese and lard on a McRib. Was it the fault of McDonald's Corp. that she spilled the coffee? Was it the maker of the coffee? Was it their fault it was so hot? Quite simply, no. Coffee is supposed to be hot, and it was found to be properly packaged, labeled and served. Granted the warnings on the cups back then could have been bigger, but any coffee drinker knows that their favorite drink is hot. Maybe she should have sued Honda or whoever designed her car for not putting in enough cupholders.

And this is why I think my phone company is at fault for my hands hurting. They intentionally asked the manufacturer to make the phone small and compact, with rounded edges and corners, a display that goes almost to those edges except on the bottom to allow for an unused trackpad, a sleek metal battery cover and bevel and a slightly rubberized back for "grip." there's also some hard to reach buttons on the sides, a high powered battery (for which I won't list specs because it requires shutting the phone down), and a slide out keyboard, all of which add considerable, uncomfortable, hard to hold weight to this compact device. My phone company, with all their evil intents that I will later purvey to the world through this blog, intentionally made this phone fun to use as well, for all the reasons listed in this post and more. Now I'm guessing that there's probably a warning inside my 208 page user manual and supplemental materials that came with my phone, but apparently, as was the case with that poor lady's coffee, the warnings aren't big enough. They were probably slipped in next to the line that states: Voicestream is no longer. We are T-Mobile. Unless you live more than 100 yards off any minor highway, or outside of a metro area, your technological and personal habits will be added to our collective. You have no choice. We will change the terms of your use as we see fit. Resistance is futile. That line of course was in a third point Olde English font that couldn't be read if it were stretched across the side of a semi trailer. I'll probably go rip the box apart to look in that book now, because the pdf version I downloaded doesn't display fine print very well on here - wait that's a thumb print. Oh well, instead I'm off to catch another Pikachu` on my phone's SNES emulator, sip my coffee, and get ready for the holidays. I'll need lots of beer money.