My golly, I’m in lust again.

One of my favorite gadgets and among my top travel must-haves is Amazon’s Kindle. Back in 2010, I bought the Kindle Keyboard as my first “Ooh, I’m a working girl now!” gift for myself. It took much deliberation until I decided that, yes, it’s worth the investment, and finally gave the go-signal for the purchase. True enough, I never regretted trading in my paperbacks for an e-reader.

I remember that moment of breathless wonder when I first opened that cardboard box and unearthed my newfound treasure. There was an image on the screen and it looked to me like a graphic protective sticker. You can imagine my surprise when I discovered that it actually was the screen itself. That was just how amazing the technology was. It’s nothing like an iPad–though I’ve had many friends press the screen, expecting it to be touch-controlled.

I’ve never really had the urge to purchase an iPad, for the very reason that I’ve got an iPhone for all those games and apps, a MacBook Pro for heavy surfing, program use and word processing, and my ever-trusty Kindle for my reading–which I do A LOT of. I’m not even inclined to trade in my iPhone for the latest model that Apple’s releasing soon (not that I could trade it in if I wanted to, since I have a contract).

What I AM tempted to buy is the new Kindle Paperwhite.

GAAAAAH. @_@

How GORGEOUS is that? I’m totally drooling over that lovely screen resolution. And the built-in light–OH MY GOD. That’s a HUGE improvement in reading convenience!

This is it–gadget lust has struck once again!

I watched the advertorial video, heart pumping at each word of the speaker about the enhanced features. I made my computations: at $119 for the non-3G model, it’s still cheaper than the price I bought my Keyboard for, AND the dollar-peso exchange rate IS lower now. That insidious thought, “why don’t I buy it as a Christmas gift for myself?”, crept in…especially since I have relatives who’ll be coming for the wedding in January.

Then, I scrolled down to the model comparisons. BAM. There’s the catch. My current device has 4GB storage, while the Paperwhite only has 2GB. They cut it down by half–and that makes a whole lot of difference to me. Sure, there’s the cloud storage, but you’ll still have to download the archived books via WiFi.

So with that, my inner beast is quieted…for now, at least. I’m happy with my existing Kindle, though it may not be touch controlled or front-lit (though I wouldn’t complain if someone would give the Paperwhite to me as a gift, LOL). Maybe when it conks out…well, I hope it won’t. Not for a couple more years, if Amazon got it right. I’ll just put away that $119++ (“plus plus” because you still have all those accessories, of course) and tag it for my Scotland fund.

I just discovered that my birthday–along with my brother’s, as we’re exactly eight years apart–next year falls on Easter Sunday. It’ll be my twenty-fifth! (Yes, my quarter-life crisis struck early, and, oh, I just gave away my age!) That just calls for one heck of a trip, don’t you think?

Hmm, time to start planning again! 🙂