Departure Diaries #3: To Laptop or not to Laptop?

Hi my name is Christy and I'm a MacHead.

I've been thinking lately about writing while traveling. When I shift into full-time traveling I anticipate needing a normal laptop for power and storage space. But in the meanwhile for my shorter trips (like the one I've got coming up in a little over FOUR weeks!) I've been thinking about something a bit more portable. Like a netbook. Or maybe better, an iPad. I say maybe, because while I am completely in like with the idea of the iPad, I'm not sold on it's execution. Or rather, I'm not sold that it's the right solution for what I want.

It looks to be the perfect size for travel.

But.
But...
But I'm not convinced it's going to be a good travel companion. Speaking in terms of ease of word processing and photo processing. It's not going to have a normal operating system. It'll be more like a hyped-up iPhone.

So no Photoshop. No Word. (I'm willing to give Pages a spin, but I need to be able to use my documents on various computers and I don't have Pages on any other computer, nor will I be getting it...)

*Eh hem.*

See what I mean? This iPad business just may not really be the best for me. Sad, isn't it? It just bums me out.

Now, for writing on my upcoming trip. Does this mean I'll be thumbing it on my iPhone? I seriously hope not.

Sigh.

I guess for now we'll just have to sit on this issue until April 3rd, when I have a hot date with my local Apple store and will get some hands-on time with an iPad.

What type of computer would you travel with?