Then one fateful night, got back home, took off my jacket, and since my Palm was in one of its pockets, placed it extra-carefully on the couch... but when I took my jacket again, it slipped out and dropped mere inches to the floor and *crack!*, there was a nasty slash dividing the screen exactly in half. It had survived much, much worse, and my faithful Palm was still working fine, thanks to the screen film cover which still held it together.

I had a convention to attend the following day, and figuring that I could still use my Palm, since in Mexico City it takes more than a month and $150 bucks (yowsa!) to get a replacement, I took it with me because I would most certainly need it. One of the organizers at the convention asked me for help timing the conferences, and I took out my ailing Palm, which kept on going fine. Since I had to attend to other things, this guy asked me to leave the Palm with him so he could still time the conferences. When I got it back I just wanted to kill him!

He totally destroyed the screen glass, even leaving a thumb print exactly in the middle of it. And now, my poor Palm was stuck on the Preferences screen. Not even a hard reset worked and I could not hotsynch anymore. Murder was definitely on my mind.

My Palm was labeled Dead On Arrival. It took more than a month to get a replacement Palm Vx. Meanwhile, I got a job with the people who organized the aforementioned convention, but without my trusty Palm, I spent the first few weeks feeling as if I had been lobotomized. To make things worse, the PDA Destroying Neandarthal was in my department, refusing to share at least part of the repair cost, and actually telling me that it was my fault that I lent my Palm to him and that it was already broken. He got very close to getting something broken himself.