We each ordered a starter size of the wild mushroom orecchiette with a total of four sides of various vegetables: broccoli with almonds, rocket and parmesan, some kind of lightly curried carrots thing, and buttered seasonal greens which consisted of a couple kinds of cabbage. It was all incredibly delicious, but took a while to arrive. This turned out to be a good news, bad news situation. We had left plenty of time to catch our flight and had only begun to wonder what happened to our food when the manager appeared and was profusely apologetic about the delay. Apparently, the chef took issue with some underling's cooking of our broccoli and sent the whole thing back. It is entirely possible blows were thrown or someone even killed. In any case, he gave us a couple of glasses of very nice Pinot Noir on the house.

I had planned to sleep on the flight, but instead watched four movies: The Wrestler to prepare me for American culture; Valkyrie to make sure I was briefed on European history (or at least the one bit of it that Americans know about); Milk because it was set in San Francisco which is where we were headed; and the Watchmen because its got a character who gains super-powers when something goes wrong in a physics lab.

This last is particularly relevant as we are staying at the Stanford Guest house right next to the longest linear particle accelerator in the world. I’m very optimistic about something going terribly wrong which rends space and time and results in my having the ability to smell with super-human accuracy or see using other people’s eyes.

The statement is a bit extreme. I mean the thing does work as a phone; it's got a few issues, but compared to any mobile from five years ago, it's great for the basic stuff. And, more importantly, the first part of that statement, that it is an absolutely brilliant toy, is completely true.

I've been particularly impressed with the various music apps that people have developed for it. Over the years, I've seen various pitches for similar apps for other devices, but very few have actually been developed and even fewer can be used to create anything resembling actual music.

But here we have some professional musicians actually producing music out of the things. All things considered, it's an impressive performance. I somehow doubt any of these gals have practiced anywhere near as much on these iPhone Apps as they have on their real instruments.

Admittedly, I ran across this because I know one of the ladies in the band, so I may not be entirely unbiased. In fact (subtle plug), I've used a pic of the two of us to promote a red nose day fundraising effort. Still, I think it's pretty remarkable performance.

I've tried a few of these apps myself, but, entirely due to certain genetic inadequacies passed on by my parents, I suck monkey-butt at anything musical. I think digi-drummer is my favourite because you can drum along to tunes as you listen to them.

The main problem, though, is that the iPhone just doesn't look very rock and roll. There's a reason the design of the Fender Stratocaster hasn't changed in more than fifty years. It's the right tool for the job. You can bounce around a stage with a fender strat and look and sound cool. Even the very cool and sexy Mentalists don't look particularly cool or sexy standing behind a table coaxing tunes out of their iPhones.

And there's got to be a certain visceral pleasure in banging an actual drum with a couple of wooden sticks. You just can't get that by gently tapping a six inch touch sensitive screen. Drumming is as much about the violence as it is about the music. There is no doubt in my mind that without drums as an outlet, Gene Krupa would have ended up a leading hordes of Mongolians across the steppes of Russia.

So we're back to argument that the iPhone is a fantastic toy, but a crap drum kit.

A couple of years ago, there was a Formal Friday at work that coincided with Red Nose Day. I rented a Mountie uniform for the occasion. Many people were amused by this and I have been asked several times since if I would ever wear it again. That year I managed to raise a small amount of money for Comic Relief by charging people to have their picture taken with me.

This year, I’m going to try to get the money in advance. I hereby make a sacred Canuck vow that for every £100 I raise, I will wear the uniform of the Royal Canadian Mounted Police for one full day at work.

If the idea of a mountie wandering around the halls of Television Centre amuses you (or possibly just makes you feel more safe), please donate at http://www.myrednoseday.com/yanda.

The more you donate, the more days you will have a visible Canadian police presence (imitation only) keeping the employees of Britain’s broadcasting service safe from wolverines and mad trappers. There is a chance I may end up wearing the red serge for the rest of my working life if enough money is pledged. Even if I retire at 90, I figure it would only take a little more than one million pounds to mean I would never wear anything else in the office.

Comic Relief is a charity which encourages people to do something funny for money. The money in question goes to support long term charity projects. They do a lot of work on mental health in the UK and on combating malaria and AIDS in sub-Saharan Africa amongst other projects.

All the mugs in the mini-kitchen at work have mysteriously vanished. In desperation, I took the lift down six floors to the BBC Shop and purchased myself a “Property of the Stig” mug. This cost me, with my staff discount, £7.01 including tax.

It’s a good mug. It has a pleasing shape with a good heft to it, a sensible two-finger handle, and it’s in a dark colour which should absorb any available radiant energy and thus keep my tea warm.

Unfortunately, the damn thing doesn’t fit in the dispensing area of our mini-kitchen’s magic robotic tea machine that dispenses a liquid that is “almost, but not quite, entirely unlike tea”.

However, imbued with the spirit of the Stig, I took a typical Top Gear approach to the problem. Using a miniature crowbar (aka a wooden stirring stick), I pried up the drain covering and wedged my mug in the sump below. This allowed the Stig to shower beneath the heavenly beverage and I am now once again swilling tannic acid and caffeine.

I find this happens a lot in new media circles. We’re a spoiled lot, really. And tend to ignore issues like global warming or the economy or plagues of frogs. Instead there was a lot of talk about displays becoming bigger and better, the devices becoming more powerful, and software becoming much more connected. These will, no doubt, affect how people use their mobiles and what place the BBC has in this space, but I think other pressures will also exert their influence (e.g. the need for people to inexpensively monitor flocks of frogs blocking the suns rays).

I’m at the Mobile World Congress in Barcelona now and I’m pleased to report that others do appear to be thinking about the economy and global warming and plagues of frogs (or at least heathcare).

Yesterday I saw Samsung’s new Blue Earth phone which is due to launch later this year. It is has a solar panel on the back of the phone and is made out of recycled plastic bottles. The Samsung rep stressed that they tried to think about every aspect of the product from an environmental perspective. The packaging for instance, is not only made from recycled materials, but is also as lightweight as it can be. The heavier a package is, the more energy required to transport it and the more materials needed in the first place.

It also uses a more energy efficient charger than normal and has a cool built-in pedometer that displays the amount of CO2 you would have generated if you’d driven the same distance you just walked.

Samsung also had on display a couple of concept chargers – one a hand-cranked mobile phone charger and one a dynamo designed to fit on to a bicycle.

I’m quite keen to see this last one in the stores. Motorola announced one at CES in 2007, but a quick google reveals no trace of it since the announcement. I did find one called the PedalPower+ made by a small company in Australia. They don’t appear to have a stand at MWC, though.

I also saw a number of solar powered phones designed for the emerging markets on display. These were very basic models expected to retail for about $30 to $40 USD.

And in the about-bloody-time category the GSM association announced an initiative to create a universal phone charger that will consume 50% less energy on stand-by than today’s chargers. More importantly, by 2012, they hope the majority of new handsets will all use this one charger. The GSMA estimate this may eliminate the need for up to 51,000 tonnes of extra chargers.

I created a bunch of accounts for various friends and sent them out. Now my friends could see exactly where I was thanks to the GPS on my phone; they could send me messages; see whether I was talking on the phone and how much juice I had left in my battery. They could even activate my camera without my knowing and take a picture of the inside of my pocket!

All of which is pretty cool, but kind of useless. However, one thing that is kind of neat is that I installed a couple of yahoo widgets that let me do things like use my laptop to send an SMS through my phone via the web server, or see what missed calls I have.

Ah, I hear you ponder, but isn’t your phone always with you? Aren’t there blue-toothy or usb connectiony things that allow pretty much the same thing?

Here, gentle reader, is where I point out the error of your ways. Right now I am lying in bed annoying my wife by writing this blog entry. My phone is in my office, having its tasty electrons replenished. I suddenly remembered that I was supposed to reply to a text message from an American heiress. What to do? I suppose I could have gotten out of bed and walked to the other room, but what if I’d fallen down the stairs or encountered a burglar or a wildebeest?

Thanks to the webserver on my phone and the Yahoo widget and Tim Berners-Lee I was able to send the message without even wrinkling the duvet.

Of course, if it wasn’t for the stupid web server, the battery on my phone wouldn’t need to be charged and I could have kept it close by while I slept.