Strapped on cash, without a paying job, and unable to purchase anything at even the local grocery store without feeling the wrath of my mother’s anger, there was no way in hell that I would be lucky enough to see this guy while waiting in front of an Apple Store this fine morning:

A couple days before the fateful April 3^rd release date of the iPad, I received a notice in my email inbox informing me that my school’s bookstore would be selling a supposed “boatload” of iPads at noon of that Saturday. As I continued reading the message, I was sadly disappointed about the absence of any news regarding a free giveaway.

Nevertheless, I went promptly around noon and fought my way inside the store with my trusty sword as I fended off a hoardes of bespeckled men and women who probably got a better grade in Calculus than I did. Due to my brazen attitude and generally intimidating appearance, I was able to scare off one lucky guy playing Need for Speed on an iPad that was available to demo.

“Dude, you’re not even holding it right, man (TWSS!). Didn’t anyone teach you how to handle this thing (TWSS!)?”

Ashamed of himself, he put the iPad down, and quietly departed.

At last, the iPad was mine.

Sort of.

Right off the bat, I was impressed with the iPad’s snappy performance and how beautiful the device looked. As many people have observed, it indeed resembles a larger iPod Touch, spanning 9.6 inches across the screen. According to the annoying store clerk who kept reminding me not to drop the device from above my head in order to test the durability of the device, the device weighs 1.5 pounds compared to an iPod Touch which is 4.05 ounces.

Is the device awesome? Yes, indeed. You can tell how much Apple invested on the success of this device and how much effort they put into revolutionizing the way we go about our daily lives. It’s hard not to drool over the myriad ways you can use the device around the house: watch movies and tv shows, surf the internet (with your fingers!), play games on a portable device like never before, and read books such as Sarah Palin’s magical and revolutionary autobiography

Many early reviews of the iPad noted that the best use of the device is currently in gaming. So, I decided to test out Need For Speed. I had never played this game on my iPod Touch, with the exception of Aspalt 4(don’t buy it) and Real Racing(buy it!). Unfortunately, I was not impressed at all with the graphics. It seemed that NFS was not one of the few thousand or so apps that had been optimized for the larger screen up to today. The colors weren’t what I expect to see in such a high-tech device. The contrast was noticeably blurry, making the details in the scene resemble an old Nintendo 64 game.

Then I tried a first-person shooter game, which I cannot recall the name of. It reminds me of Halo with all the sci-fic atmosphere with a blend of Metroid Prime. Shrug. The controls were pretty intuitive, and the bigger screen made the game more enjoyable to play than on an iPod Touch. Once again, the graphics weren’t great. But the potential is out there.

Typing on an iPad was also a big concern for me. It seems that typing on the onscreen keyboard is more appropriate while sitting down with the device on your lap. I found myself hen-pecking letters with my right hand, as I carried the device with my other hand. Not very efficient or appropriate for long typing.

Lastly, time will be the best test of how “magical and revolutionary” Apple claims the iPad to be. Ebook reading just got a whole lot more lucrative, with the Amazon kindle looking rather pathetic.

My iPad can surf the internet, watch movies, send email, play games, AND read books! How about your Kindle?

Read books and…UV protection?

So, with over 150,000 apps already at the App Store, time will only benefit the iPad in terms of the gradually increasing number of iPad-optimized apps and a new generation of apps specifally built to utilize the iPad’s capabilities. That’s what I’m looking forward to the most in the coming months. Get excited people.

Purchased an iPad yet? Leave your iPad unboxing Youtube videos and other thoughts in the comments section below!

Photos by Mashable