Technology: iPhone Exuberance: How Do You Actually Like Yours?

I have been longing for an iPhone since they came out, and this weekend, without the kids in tow, I found myself in an Apple Store with a free half-hour to really try one. Like many first-time users, I was amazed at the graphic wizardry of the touch screen. And although this Apple Store was completely jammed -- not a pleasant Apple shopping experience -- there were about 20 iPhones on display to play with, and a half-dozen store employees to help you out.

I don't have a Treo or a Blackberry, just a regular cell phone. But I was hoping the iPhone would be the solution to the burden of hauling my laptop along on business trips. I take it mostly to do email, and if the iPhone could handle that, I could stop lugging the computer (without giving up the ability to browse the web or watch movies).

As seductive as the iPhone is-- smaller and sleeker in your hand than it looks in pictures -- typing emails on it was a painful process, worse than hunt-and-peck. It seemed that if you had more than a sentence to compose for an email, using the iPhone would rapidly grow tedious.

So with Steve Jobs slashing the price of the top end iPhone today by 33 percent -- from $599 to $399 (boy am I glad I didn't actually drop $599 on one on Saturday) -- how do you actually like your iPhone?

If you've got an iPhone, and you've got a couple weeks of experience using it for the functions beyond the phone -- the mapping tools, movie-watching, Safari, e-mail -- drop us a note with the comments section below to tell us what the experience is like.

Is it a practical way to compose email messages? What has your learning curve been like? Which of the non-phone functions have become indispensable, and which are oversold?

Let us know.