A friend loaned me an Android phone the other day. I’ve been using a Blackberry Pearl for years. I like the squished keyboard and I can type pretty quickly on it. I’ve downloaded some useful apps to it too, though mostly I just use Opera for browsing and read the New York Times. It works.

Now, let me just say that I haven’t used an iPhone for any period of time so I can’t compare its OS to that of Android, but Android is pretty fun. This phone (an HTC running Android 1.5) is a device first and a phone second. It’s just as interesting without cell service as it is with service, though of course it’s nice when it works as a phone.

My favorite toys so far are probably the AK-47 and shotgun apps, though we know they’re a complete waste of time. I love accelerometers and I think these simple toys that use the accelerometer in such clever ways are just brilliant. Oh, I know that there are plenty of copycats out there but I don’t care. They’re just plain fun. I can’t wait to give them a try in the TSA line.

The barcode scanners look awesome but I haven’t been able to try one IRL because I don’t have a data connection. I can see how they might come in very handy though.

Touchscreens are pretty awesome but I’m not one to be a first adopter. I don’t need a touchscreen to do what I do with a phone, but they’re fun to play with. Don’t you just want to reach inside the phone and grab that sliding screen? I do. But I don’t like typing on that virtual keyboard. (Yes, the Droid has a real keyboard. I’ll check it out.)

I’ve found the initial experience with Android kind of overwhelming. There’s so much to be done with it, and downloading countless apps can be fun. But at the same time, there are many computer games out there that I won’t play because they just waste my time. Don’t we have better things to do?

Yes, I’m about 75 million people late when it comes to using a phone with a touch screen, or maybe it’s 150 million. But then again I’m just now watching Seinfeld, and only because it passes the time on the exercise bike to nowhere.

Clearly, Android has legs. I don’t need to tell you that. Just imagine what the device world will look like in a couple of years.

Here’s looking forward to our first Android book. Coming to a bookstore near you. Or maybe coming to your little handheld device thingy.

For now, I’ll keep the Blackberry, though my 1985 Volvo is going. It failed the smog test so the State of California will presumably buy it for $1,000. Sniff.

I’ve shared plenty of jokes about the iPad — the netbook without a keyboard. I laughed when Apple announced it because to my mind a $300 netbook is a much better deal, and it has a keyboard. But I’m starting to think that I’m wrong; that people will buy it.

Many, many people still find personal computers mysterious. They have one but it’s full of malware, spyware, or worse, and it’s probably running some version of Windows. Maybe even Windows 98. Who knows. And often enough, these same people can’t even tell you which version of Windows they’re running because to them it’s all the same. Or they tell you that they’re running “Microsoft.” Yes, they’re running the Microsoft Corporation on their personal computer. Anyway.

Their computer sits off in a corner or in the kids’ room. They use it to check their webmail or to pay bills, but they don’t understand it and they only touch it because they have to. Perhaps they have a Facebook account and they like to sit there and stare at that, too. They do some shopping on Amazon or Zappos and they read the news. They check their stocks. They play games. When it breaks or runs slowly they buy a new one.

Really, for many people who own personal computers, their computer is a toaster. Just like their iPhone or other smartphone. Unlike a toaster, their computer can do unlimited things, but like the toaster (or better yet, their countertop oven) they use only a couple of its features because they have neither time nor inclination to dig deeper. Who wants to be an expert on their toaster?

Here comes the iPad. The pretty toaster that you can hold in your hands and that does pretty much everything that your computer does in a cute package. It will let you check your email, play videos, and most importantly, run iPhone apps. All of the scary stuff is hidden behind a cute interface and you just use it. For everyone who already has an iPhone (about 75 million people) this is simply a natural progression.

The iPad will sell because it’s a big, fat iPhone that’s going to make it a lot easier for the toaster set to use their computer. And that’s just about all there is to it.

Okay, “uncle.”