Right now my Google Glass is sitting next to my laptop. It's resting ... er, charging. From the moment I picked it up this morning, my first hours with it have been a whirlwind.
At 9 a.m. ET on Tuesday morning, I walked into a brightly lit Manhattan loft and was greeted by Matt Kingsbury, a cheery "Glass guide" who'd walk me through setting up the gadget for the first time. I kept wanting to brush him off — buddy, I already memorized all the Help documents! I've been itching to get my hands on this for ages! He did caution me not to wear Glass all day, however: I should ease into using it, he told me.
On the elevator, as I was leaving the orientation, an odd thing happened. With a grin, a total stranger leaned close to my ear and said, "OK Glass! Take a picture." I recovered from the strangeness of the moment to point out that the display wasn't active — meaning that Glass didn't listen for the command — but what if it had been the case? It might have been one of the first acts of ... would you call that photo-bombing? Glass-bombing? Other people can issue voice commands, I remembered — that could get creepy.
As I walked down the street to the nearest subway stop, my Glass headset was definitely turning heads. Once we got on a train, I casually glanced around, meeting the gazes of some curious folks. An elderly woman blatantly stared. I contemplated walking over to tell her a bit about Glass, but the train reached my stop too soon. Ah, well.
"Please don't punch me," I said to a co-worker as I walked into the office. She's previously expressed distaste for Glass. "Just don't point it at me," she replied with a smile. I later allowed her to give it a try, and showed her how to tell if someone's using it in front of her: There's a faint glow coming from the screen. She seemed at least a tad more comfortable afterwards.
My first awkward moment with Glass came when I walked into the bathroom. Do I ... do I take it off? No one else was in there to complain about me wearing it, but ... err ... well, it felt weird to wear it, even if it wasn't recording anything. What did I fear? An accidental first-person view of the bathroom stall door? It would be very challenging to take and share a photo by sheer accident, but I still felt strange. I opted to put Glass on top of my head, like a headband.
I checked the battery on Glass: 35 percent. Oh no. I only turned it on about two hours ago! I didn't check to see if it was fully charged when I unpacked it, but then again my friendly guide didn't caution me about charging it straight away. I did use it a lot, definitely more than I'll use it once the novelty wears off, but still, is battery life going to be the biggest user complaint?
Check back for more of Rosa Golijan's Google Glass experiences, as she spends her first week with the new technology. You can also keep up with her adventuresby following her on Twitter, subscribing to her Facebook posts, or circling her on Google+.