Sunday, April 17, 2011

Distraction or Useful Tool?

I now have a smart phone.  I am the owner of a Blackberry Curve 9300.  Mine is black, not any of the fun colors shown there on the web page.  A friend of mine, who I think has a droid phone, congratulated me on going with 2005 technology.  The Blackberry phones don't have all the apps that you can get with a droid or an Iphone, but so far, I really like it.

Where I get worried though is that this will become a distraction for me, rather than a useful tool.  My hope when I bought this phone was to make it a useful tool in my life.  Five days in, I think it is a useful tool, though I've bordered on obsession with it.  I'm using it for my e-mail, and I've also gotten some apps that are useful for daily things.  Here's what I've picked up so far:

-A golf range finder GPS app - this was the first one I got.
-Blackberry traffic - this is a map application that provides directions.
-Weatherbug - this has been very helpful for getting the forecast, checking the radar, etc.
-Sports mobile - now I don't have to go to ESPN to get the scores
-A scientific calculator - because I'm an engineer
-IBrevieary - this is a Catholic Resource with prayers and such.  I'm hoping to make more time to pray during day, and hopefully this will help me.
-Olive Tree Bible Software with a New American Bible - This is the only app I've paid for.  I had to buy the Bible, but I thought it would be good to have with me as I try to make time to pray during the day.
-FatSecret Calorie Counter - I really want to lose 15 lbs or so, even 20 wouldn't hurt.  A friend used this and lost 50 lbs.  I started today and can still eat about 30 calories before bed.

That's all I've got for apps.  I'm trying really hard to avoid getting time wasters, like games and such.  Like I said above, the goal is useful tool, not distraction.  Hopefully this will prove to be a very useful tool.  If anybody has any suggestions of other apps that might be good to have on my phone, please let me know.

2 comments:

Deacon Sean said...

I'd feel more guilty about giving you trouble for the 2005 technology if you weren't now using some of the apps that I recommended. Good luck with all your goals for prayer and weight loss.

Julie said...

I'd vote for useful tool:)