Bad Eyes

I’m considering buying an eye patch.

When I take out my contacts and read in bed, I have to hold my book or iPad so near that I have to close one eye in order to focus. The distance from my eye to the words is just beyond the length of my index finger.

One of the odder effects of such bad near-sightedness (which I got thanks to chicken pox) is that I can see things extremely well at that short distance. Which means I can see the pixels on my iPad.

Those pixels are huge.

They’re huge enough that it’s a distraction. It’s hard to read — with my uncorrected eyes — on my iPad. Letters look like unstable jengas of gray boxes.

I skipped the iPad 2 because the one big quality-of-life enhancement the iPad could make (for me) is a retina display. The rumors seem pretty strong that the iPad 3 — apparently to be announced March 7 — will have a retina display. I hope so.