I was just about ready to admit that maybe the Kindle wasn't so bad. As much as I love real, honest-to-God paper pages and covers, the idea of being able to get a zillion books on a portable electronic tablet was seeming more appealing.

Now, though, as our New York relatives like to say: forgetaboutit.

Once I read the story about Amazon recalling George Orwell's 1984 from Kindle owners who had already purchased and downloaded the novel, I reverted: If it plugs in and lights up, it ain't a book. Period.

Like everyone else who read the story, I'm loving the irony of Orwell's famous big-brother-bashing book being the one that got taken away from the little people. Now that wireless giveth us e-books, it turns out it can also be used to taketh them away. Who knew?

Amazon explains that it took the book back when it became clear that a particular digital-publishing company selling 1984 for Kindle use did not have the legal right to do so. That seems appropriately respectful of copyright law, something that a lot of authors will appreciate. It just came a little late. You have to pay for a title search when you buy a house, but apparently the other kind of title searching got a little sloppy somewhere along the pipeline.

And, of course, the method of retrieval was unnerving. Thank God I didn't buy my knock-off designer jeans by wireless.

I'm imagining that somewhere deep in the bowels of Amazon's underground bunker, there's a poor guy who had to take a deep breath, click on the RECALL icon, knowing he was about to become the online-bookseller equivalent of that perv who hangs around the laundromat and filches underwear out of the dryer.

It's okay, buddy. You were just following orders. Orwell would understand.