My roommate Bram, took off for an exciting two+ weeks in Patagonia this past Tuesday, having just landed a new job at a Seattle startup. I’m really excited for him and a little jealous—he’ll be going down to Buenos Aires, home of the fun steps of tango that I love and Patagonia—the furthest south you can go without touching Antarctica.

My friend Tina happens to be in Buenos Aires right now, more than halfway through her nine month stint in South America. I mentioned this to Bram and minutes before walking out the door, sent Tina a Facebook message.

Moments after Bram walks out the door, I start getting IMs from Tina (which is fairly rare in itself!).

Tina: Hey, Bram just sent me a message on facebook–is he like in the process of leaving Seattle RIGHT now?

me: hey!

yes

he flies out at noon

any chance you have a number I can give him?

Tina: Sheize!!! If I only would have known…

I just sent him my cell.

me: you’re not going to be there?

Tina: I totally wanted to see if I could get someone from the states to bring me a new digital camera.

Purely selfish reason.

Tina’s last camera was stolen and though willing to spend money on a replacement, she was finding that all the models being sold are thee years old and overpriced. I called Bram immediately, hoping he might have some time to duck into one of the overpriced but-in-this-case-cheap airport electronics stores and caught him right as he was unloading at the airport. He agreed, but needed to check in first.

Tina and I end up chatting on Skype for a little while and catching up, me taking advantage of the webcam I picked up a few weeks back. So much fun—video adds so much to a conversation. J Eventually Bram calls my cell, tells me his flight is delayed, and is standing in the shop right now looking at cameras. I start relaying what Bram’s looking at to Tina on Skype when Bram comes up with the genius idea—”why don’t you just conference me in?”

Brilliant. And that’s when Skype bridged cities, countries, continents, and even hemispheres to put Tina, Bram, and myself on the same line for a drastically inexpensive rate. Bram read me the camera models he was looking at, I looked them up on DPReview, Skype IM’ed them to Tina with my opinion, and Tina chose her new camera. I’m sure she has it in Buenos Aires already.

How cool is this?

A couple of things I came across this morning surfing the Internets…

SMRT:
This guy tries to firebomb a night club in the UK. Epic failure. Caught on CCTV.

SMART:
Violinist Sirena Huang, then only 11, gives a dazzling performance, both technically brilliant and emotionally nuanced.