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What a day June 24th was.

First, up early to complete paperwork on the new place in NE Portland (more on that in a later post). After reviewing and signing more forms than it took to get my car loan (and then getting Lindsae to sign them while she waited tables at Cup & Saucer) and doing a once-over with our leasing agent at the place, I had the keys in hand and the time was pushing two in the afternoon.

iPhone time.

I had gone through the reservation process on the 15th, but I didn’t get the confirmation email that others had gotten, so I decided to call ahead to check my status for having my iPhone 4 waiting. After a quick check, it turned out I wasn’t in the system. But, I decided I’d shoot down and check out the situation - maybe the line wouldn’t be too long.

Wrong.

There were still people waiting in line that had been there since 5 a.m. I still had an entire afternoon of moving Lindsae’s stuff (she had reserved a Uhaul) to look forward to, so I was hoping to have the iPhone “joy effect” to help me power through it. That, unfortunately, was looking like a long shot at best. 

I decided to head in and talk to some of my friends that were still working there from when I did to try and get a sense if waiting in line would be worth it. As I walked in the store, past all the lines, there was a young boy who had completely passed out and was being attended to by staff and security guards. Since the sales process was slowed quite a bit by the incident I had time to chat with some of my ex-co-workers about my reservation situation.

My connections turned out to be pretty good and I was soon on my way to purchasing the black, 32Gb iPhone 4. If you’ve been reading my blog for a while, you may recall the trouble I was having with waiting on not purchasing the iPhone 3GS last summer. I decided I’d hold out as long as possible, hoping the next iteration would be a major one.

Patience paid off.

I won’t go through all the specs here, you can read about them on http://apple.com/iphone, but the thing is just incredible. Stupid fast. Crystal clear. Sexy. 

And once again, Apple wins not just one the major design revisions and feature upgrades, but on the subtle things that make your experience that much better. Google Maps now integrates the compass feature, allowing your map to face the direction you are, automatically. Crazy. The video quality and ease of use is amazing. The picture taking is (pardon the Northeastern colloquialism) wicked fast.

I’ve had the phone for two days and not since getting the original iPhone back in 2007 have I felt my mobile experience change so much. It made me want to explore the App Store further, even *gasp* buy a couple Apps. 

I can’t wait to see how developers implement all the iOS features and iPhone 4 hardware functionality into games and other applications. If anyone had a doubt that this version of the iPhone would continue the sales successes of the previous generations, those thoughts are long gone (despite the various reports of issues people are having—I personally have not experienced any of those).

Indeed, Thursday was a great day. New home, new phone. Stay tuned to check out iPhone 4 video and picture samples!