McGarvey’s Words

It was on the Carnival Pride a few weeks ago that it hit me: Email is everywhere (and, more pointedly, where email ain’t, I ain’t going).

That’s because I walked into what had been this huge cruise ship’s library and there it was: a humming Internet café with satellite access to email, the Web, and the other stuff we now take for granted. Oh, there were a few books stuffed into cabinets, but the action here was a dozen or so terminals with online capabilities. I paid $105 for 250 minutes and, over that one-week cruise, I used all but six minutes.

Sounds like a lot of money? Nah, to me it was a deal because 40 cents a minute doesn’t seem pricey at all, not when you are somewhere near St. Thomas in the Caribbean.

But as I read and answered email – using Yahoo Mail, incidentally (more on that below) – my mind flickered back through time and I recalled the first Internet email message I sent. This was around 1990, the recipient was a Reader’s Digest editor, but he didn’t have an email account, so I was asked to email a chunk of a story to another Digest editor who would retrieve it when he got home (he didn’t have email in the office), put it on a disk, and bring it into the office the next day. We were all dazzled by how cool this was. No need to re-type a story, just paste it into an email and there it went.  Remember the first email you sent?  Tell me and I'll post your recollections in this space.

Wow, has the world changed. In 2003, before agreeing to go on "The Grand Ole Opry" cruise aboard the Pride (not named after Charlie, despite rumors to that effect), I went online to Carnival’s website and made sure there was indeed email aboard ship. Only when I knew I could carry on with my work did I agree to go off to the Caribbean for a week of listening to Ricky Skaggs (a genuine bluegrass hero), Whisperin’ Bill Anderson (one of country’s best song writers), Little Jimmy Dickens (at 80+ years old, an icon in the industry), and Brad Paisley (the hot young star). And you know what: I saw many of the 1000 or so folks who paid premium dollars for this c & w junket whiling away hours between shows down at the Internet café, firing off emails to friends and relatives telling about this joke Rick Skaggs told ("My wife wouldn’t let me name our first born Amanda Lynn," said Skaggs as he fingered his mandolin), the historic moment when Paisley unannounced walked onstage to join Whisperin’ Bill in a rendition of "Too Country," or when Jimmy Dickens sang "Raggedy Anne" and no eyes were left dry as this very old man talked of death and loss and pain.

Right after each night’s show, there they were – people wearing cowboy boots, snap button shirts, jeans – and they were logging on to email and reporting back home.

What a revolution and this has happened in under 15 years. A generation ago only a very few geeks used email, ever, and now only the very old and the very young don’t, at least in America.

And that’s also why there are whole countries I just won’t go to. Asked if I had any interest in going on a trip to India, my only possible answer is, nope. I have called India many times in recent years, or really I have called it perhaps 10 times but for every successful connection there seem to be 10 or more attempts because the nation’s phone lines are antique, overworked, crackling toward implosion. When voice doesn’t work, don’t even ask about email. What a pity, an entire subcontinent relegated to nonexistence because it cannot or will not invest in a working phone system. Am I unreasonable? Not when I can be sitting somewhere in the middle of the Caribbean, handling my email as though I were back in my office.

Oh, the ship’s connection isn’t as fast or as reliable as my broadband in Tucson, AZ but it is plenty speedy enough for email and, honestly, that’s all I usually want. Checking email nowadays is more important than checking phone messages, at least for me, because when I travel to remote locations I tell people, don’t leave voicemail, do email and I’ll get back to you likewise. Are you calling less, too? Tell me, by email of course: rjm@mcgarvey.net.

Now for a dangling question: Why Yahoo Mail? Of course it does a good job of retrieving pop mail but, probably, you too have been annoyed that responding to that incoming email shifted the conversation to your Yahoo Mail account because that’s where your response was sent from – and who much uses any web-based email back home? This trait annoyed me for years but then I discovered an instant cure: sign up for Yahoo Mail Plus ($29.99/year). Yahoo touts the bigger mail box (25 MB), but it doesn’t even mention the real plus: a toggle lets you read email in Yahoo, but respond with your pop mail as the visible return address. That keeps the dialog where it belongs, in your pop account.

Even better: that means there’s no clue that you’re not in your office. Send an email from yahoo.com (or HotMail or Lycos or wherever) and it’s a tip-off that you are traveling. But there’s no give-away with Yahoo Mail Plus. There I was – swimming in the Bahamas, snorkeling off St. Marten, chatting with the genuinely likable Ricky Skaggs and Brad Paisley – but my email left no telltale sign that I was on the road. Every email I sent came directly from mcgarvey.net...even if I was typing in the middle of the Caribbean between sips of a Goombay Smash.

Email Travel Tips:

o Use Yahoo Mail Plus

o Never leave home without verifying email access at your destination.  If it ain't there, don't go.

Upcoming Columns:

o Why I use Poco Mail (never heard of it, huh?).

o Is eBay the cure for hotel loneliness (or how I made over $1000 selling tech junk)?

Keep coming back, for more of McGarvey’s Words.

About Robert McGarvey

Author of How to Dotcom (Entrepreneur Press), McGarvey is working on a book about Google and the rise of instant knowledge. A onetime columnist for BizTravel.com, he is a frequent contributor to dozens of magazines, ranging from American Legion to Electronic Business and Rutgers.  For the past five years, he has served as "The Ombudsman" for PORTHOLE Cruise Magazine.  Still curious about McGarvey? Read up on him here.

Click here to visit Joe Brancatelli's Travel Resource Site

Copyright 2003 by Robert McGarvey

Taos Land Sale: Click For Details