I can hear my husband saying, “I told you so.”  I downloaded a bunch of iTunesU files this afternoon, and free space on my 16G iPad shrank to 9G.  The Apple Store guy told me I have 14 days to return it as long as I keep the box.  I’m wondering if I should take it back and exchange it for the 64G model.  It might be worth the $200 more I’d have to lay out.

I’ve had a 16G nano or is it an 8G?  I think its 16G, and it’s only half full, so I figured if I kept my audio on the nano, the 16G iPad would be just fine for a couple of years.  Of course, if I did what I said I’d do and keep the audio on the nano, I would have tons of space left.  Frankly, 9G is still quite a bit of space, but I’m nervous, because I’ve only had the iPad for two days.

I’m still trying to find what the iPad does best.  It connected flawlessly to the household wireless, so it’s always connected.  That means I can check weather at the touch of a button with The Weather Channel Max app (free).  I loaded 600 photos onto the device.  I did install the free iBook app, and Winnie-the-Pooh came free with it.  It’s nice, but there were no free books at the iBook store.  Prices seemed to range from $3.99 – $14.  A little later the first night, I found the free Kindle app.  The Kindle Store has a ton of free books — I’ve browsed the free classics collection and I’d never run out of books.  Despite what this sounds like, I don’t plan to use the iPad much for reading.  But if you want to use the iPad for reading, and you don’t have much money, there are great books available for it.  One possible lure is being able to turn off my bedside light so hubby doesn’t have to sleep with my light on while I read, but I have a ton of print books, and I mostly read before turning in for the night.

I found it difficult (well, impossible) to update my WordPress blogs on Safari (I was thinking I’d have to type it into something and do a copy and paste thing).  Back to the App Store.  There’s a free WordPress app, and I could set all my blogs up on it, so I can update any of them from one window.  Very nice.

I tried to set up my Earthlink mail account on the iPad, but it wouldn’t do the security settings.  It did accept my Yahoo mail settings, and that works well.  I haven’t tried any of my other email addresses on there.

I’ve purchased two pay apps — Pages (which I haven’t really explored yet) and Things.  I have used Things, but I’m trying not to set too much up on it until I can get it to Central Texas and synch it with the Things version on the Mini.

The other apps I’ve installed are TweetDeck, Adobe Ideas, This Day, USA Today, NPR, Labyrinth Lite, and iShop.  iShop is a listing program that allows you to create numerous lists — ostensibly for shopping, but really, you can make any list you like.  It’s a beautiful, simple, elegant app with a single negative thing — once you save a list item, you can’t delete it.  You can delete a list.  I started making a master grocery shopping list on it.  About 35 items in, it typed and saved “spinamch.”  No way to edit it.  I know.  What do I expect for a free app, but I provided feedback on it consistent with one other person who said the same thing.  I’m hoping the developer will be able to add that feature soon.

In the standard apps, I haven’t even looked at YouTube or Videos.  I’ve looked at Notes, Calendar, and Contacts but haven’t done anything with them.  I also looked at Google’s Maps.  It looks like I could input Point A to Point B directions.  Then, I hope I could take it off line and follow the directions.  I haven’t tried that yet.

I’m disappointed that my laptop USB port doesn’t have enough juice to charge the iPad while I’m synching.  I’m typing this on my laptop while the iPad charges behind me.  Speaking of typing, what about the virtual keyboard?  It works fine, but it’s best for two finger typists.  I haven’t successfully touch typed on it yet.  You have to switch to the number screen for the apostrophe, but once you type the “””, the keyboard defaults back to letters.  I like the double tap the space bar for a “period and a space” shortcut, but I keep forgetting to use it.

I’m using it side-by-side with my laptop to try to figure out which uses I prefer for which activities.  So far, I don’t have definitive preferences.

So, what am I going to do about the 16G?  Will it be enough?  I don’t know yet.  I’ll keep you posted.