Teatime with the new iPad

After spending a weekend with our new iPad, returning to this MacBook laptop to blog seems so clunky and quaint.

I can say one thing immediately about the iPad: It's a wonderful reader. I have never had the slightest interest interest in a Kindle (really? it's the 21st century and you had no intention of a color screen?), and I look forward to watching those wither and crumble in the weeks ahead. While my spouse has spent the weekend loading fun apps and games onto the iPad, and watching video (fantastic!), my moments with it — to my complete surprise, really — have been spent reading. The iBooks feature is glorious. The display is crisp and clear. The navigation is simple, the page-turning function lifelike and intuitive. The battery life seems interminable. The best part, to me, is that the iBooks store is easy to use (like iTunes) and is already filled to the gills with free books. You'd be amazed how much great literature is free — from Dickens to Joyce to Twain, from The Art of War to The Prince — including several intriguing old texts about tea.

My favorite free tea book thus far is Tea Leaves: Being a collection of letters and documents relating to the shipment of TEA to the American colonies in the year 1773, by Francis S. Drake. It's loaded with details of the tea boycott that lead up to Boston's infamous tea party. And, frankly, it's easier to hold an iPad and flick the pages with the pinky sticking out from my teacup than it is to hold and navigate a real book. So here's to more iTea with the iPad.

Can't wait for my favorite iPhone tea apps to update for the bigger, brighter iPad!

It also doubles as a marvelous tea tray ...



Oh, and don't miss this nifty new tea gadget for the iPad. (Whether you intend to buy one, be sure to click on the "pre-order" button for full details...)