The Nintendo DS seems like it would make the perfect eBook reader. It's more compact than the Sony Reader or the Kindle, is shaped like a book, and is hundreds of dollars cheaper. While Nintendo hasn't quite caught on to how awesome this is, the DS homebrew community has and now anyone can turn their DS into an eReader as good as any Kindle.

Once you have switched to eBooks, you won't want to go back to paper. I have been using my DS as an eBook reader for months, and I love it. I carry it with me everywhere. The DS is smaller than the smallest paperback, and can hold hundreds of novels. My wife owns a copy of the book I am currently reading on my DS (The Mists of Avalon by Marion Zimmer Bradley). Her copy weighs over a pound. Mine is tiny and fits in my pocket.

Seriously, give this a try.

This Youtube video might give you a sense of what the experience will be like. It demonstrates several pieces of software, the first of which is DSLibris, the subject of this tutorial. My apologies for the German - it was the only video I could find.

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8:26 am PST, 9:26 MST, July 9

I have decided that while I love Colorado, I hate Denver.

First the love. The land here is so gorgeous. Before you get to the rockies you reach the foothills, an area called the hogbacks, typified by dramatic red a brown rock thrusting from the ground in seemingly random places.

In Colorado, you can regularly see the dramatic power of Earth's geology. Everywhere you see the sedimentary layers of rock that formed millions of years ago when the middle of North America was not a mountain range, but an inland sea. These layers are not horizontal but in sharp angles from the ground, a testimony to the intensity of the forces that pushed the Rockies skyward.

Then you get into the Rockies themselves and you find yourself in a Pine forest unlike anything I've seen in the Northwest. Abby pointed out how different the smell is. Washington forests are damp, whereas the Rockies are dry as a bone. The trees are not as soft and there are no ferns to be seen.

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