iPhone and me: BFFs

Hurrah, blogging inspiration has arrived in the form of my new iPhone. Here it is, with the Gryffindor case I knitted to keep it cosy. Isn't it beautiful?

So I thought I'd share my favourite iPhone apps which I've so far discovered. Here goes:

1. Spendometer (free)
This is a little app to help track spending. You can set a monthly budget, and categorise how you spend your dosh. There's also a useful going out feature. Credit crunchy.

2. Facebook (free)
User-friendly and cleanly laid out, this is the best way to use Facebook on the iPhone.

3. Google Earth (free)
It's Google Earth. In an app. I like that.

4. Fluid (free)
Creates the effect of moving water over pebbles which ripples to the touch. The novelty quickly wears off, but it's great for entertaining small children (if you don't mind them jabbing their sticky fingers all over your touch screen).

5. Zoom in (59p)
I'm not impressed that the iPhone camera didn't have a digital zoom feature built in so I had to pay 59p for an app which does it for me. I know I could just crop them after, but still, it's handy to have.

6. Around Me (free)
A useful little app which uses GPS to work out your location and lets you know where your nearest supermarkets, bars, cash machines and other amenities are.

7. WikiTap (free)
Wikipedia in an app. Settle arguments in the pub.

8. SnapTell (free)
Take a photo of a book, DVD or CD and this app will reocgnise it and provide links to reviews, Wiki entries etc. It also gives price details and links to buy the product, but as it's a US app everything is in dollars so that's not much use for us in the UK. So for that I use . . .

9. pic2shop (free)
Take a photo of a barcode and this will identify the product, linking to its Amazon UK page.

10. Stanza (free)
Simply the best ebook reader. You can download looooads of out-of-copyright books direct from Project Gutenberg to read with it. I've got 70 so far...

11. Paper Toss (free)
Very addictive flick-paper-in-a-bin game.

12. News UK Lite (free)
See the top headlines from five major news sources. I've got the BBC, Guardian, Telegraph, Times and, erm, the Daily Mail. Well, know your enemy...

13. Stitchminder (free)
At last, stitch counters go virtual. Monitor number of rows, increase rows, pattern rows and pattern repeats.

14. KnitGauge (59p)
Measure your gauge.

15. Last.fm (free)
This is great. Enter the name of an artist you like and this app will stream music from similar artists.

16. RadioBOX (£1.79)
This was the only radio app I could find which would stream the BBC stations. Now I can listen to 6Music on my phone, hooray.

17. Shazam (free)
Use this app to identify music. Hold it up to a song which is playing and it will identify the song, album and artist for you, and provide a link to the artist's wiki entry.

18. Flixster (free)
See what the latest film releases are and when they are showing at your nearest cinema. Links to Rotten Tomatoes reviews and the film's imdb page are also given.

19. VegOut (£1.79)
A good one for us veggies. This identifies your location and tells you where your nearest veggie or veg-friendly eating establishment is.

20. iDrinkulator (£1.79)
Track your alcohol units and find out how they could be affecting your health. Useful but depressing. 23 units this week, gulp...

Other apps I couldn't live without: my to do list app, ebay app, Sky+ app (record programmes on the move), multi-converter app and shopping list app.

Other apps I could live without but choose not to: iPint (navigate a pint along a bar and win yourself a free virtual pint), BubbleWrap (pop virtual bubblewrap against the clock), Lightsaber (what it says on the tin: turn your iPhone into a lightsaber).

And I've only had it a week...