Tom’s Tuesday Tech Tip: Should a Certified Legal Nurse Consultant be Seen in Public with an iPhone Stylus?

The longer you’re in the world of technology, the more iterations of devices you see. Some are good, some are bad. I remember when I left (unwillingly) my paper DayTimers^®, was issued a PDA (Personal Data Assistant) and had to learn how to use a stylus to write that silly Palm^® language. The stylus was like a mechanical pencil without lead and was constantly getting lost. I still occasionally find one under a desk or in the back of my sock drawer. The only thing cool about my PDA was that the cover flipped up like a communicator on Star Trek^® (the original series). At the time, PDAs were a must-have for every Certified Legal Nurse Consultant’s business.

A note of explanation for those of my CLNC^® amigos who didn’t live through the times of technological darkness: PDAs were kind of like smart phones but without a phone. They kept calendars and contacts but if you wanted to talk to somebody you needed to have a cell phone too. If you were a really important CLNC^® consultant (and you know who you are), you carried around your PDA and cell phone plus at least one extra battery for that cell phone at all times so you wouldn’t get cut short in the middle of a VERY IMPORTANT COMMUNICATION.

Time moves forward and I remember the trauma of having my cell phone and PDA both taken away and replaced with a Blackberry. This was early on when a Blackberry looked like a blue brick with buttons. Still, I was soon in device heaven because it was not just a phone or a PDA but it did email too! Now, I could be just like every other corporate drone attorney standing around doorways at legal conferences punching out VERY IMPORTANT COMMUNICATIONS via email and using my cell-phone voice to speak (loudly) to my office.

I’ve got fat fingers. Make of that what you will. Despite that fact I was able to use my original Blackberry plus two later models with the barest minimum of spelling errors (thanks in no small part to its internal spell check software). When I was desperate, I was not beneath grabbing a #5 pencil from the nearest accountant and using the eraser end of the pencil to more accurately type email. I guess I sort of missed the stylus but wouldn’t admit it.

Time continues to move forward and today, like every other sentient being, I’m on an iPhone^® (Androids^® are for drones). Technology has changed so that today my iPhone can do things I don’t want it to do (movies, give up my location, play Angry Birds) and many more things I do want it to do (phone, PDA, email, photos, find Starbucks^® and identify music). The new smart phones (and I’m just kidding about Androids) are the answer to a Certified Legal Nurse Consultant’s dream – they can be a portable office containing many, if not all, of your VERY IMPORTANT COMMUNICATIONS.

But alas, one thing hasn’t changed: I still have fat fingers. Even if I tip my iPhone on its side to widen the keyboard I still have trouble typing. When I get to heaven I’m going to seek out Steve Jobs (he’ll be there for creating the iPhone) and ask him why he put the backspace button next to the return button. I’ve typed more than a few emails with nothing in them because I keep backspacing over what I type.

In the fashion world they say if you hold onto something long enough it’ll come back in fashion (I’ve got hopes for my blue ruffled tuxedo shirt). This isn’t generally true in the computing world, but thanks to a little bit of 1990s technology, I am now armed with a BoxWave Capacitive Stylus that allows me to tap out my VERY IMPORTANT COMMUNICATIONS on my iPhone with the greatest of ease and accuracy. I can point, click, swipe and type with my stylus – Heaven on Earth for us fat-fingered types. I know I blogged about other iPhone styluses in the past, but this one is the absolute best. If you’ve ever had trouble with the iPhone keyboard – this is your answer. Buy one. You can thank me later.

SPOILER ALERT: There’s only one drawback that I found to using a stylus and you can probably guess what it is. When I proudly walked into Vickie’s office twirling the hot pink stylus I’d just purchased for her, she looked up, sort of snorted and said “Styluses are for wussies.” Talk about popping my balloon. Well Vickie, Trix may be for kids too but I’d rather be smart than cool. Certified Legal Nurse Consultants who aren’t afraid of looking retro, get yourself a stylus today – especially if you’ve got fat fingers, bad circulation (cold finger tips) or long decorative nails (any color). It’ll change your iPhone experience forever. You can thank me now.

Keep on techin’ (and typing),
Tom

P.S. If someone needs a hot pink stylus I think I’ve got a spare lying around somewhere.