The warm temperatures in Chicago earlier this month belied the truism that the earth is getting warmer.

A BlackBerry Pearl-using BBHub reader took advantage of that relatively calm day to take a photo of the Chicago skyline from the vantage point of a nearby park.

You're looking at the photo now.

Dusk in New York City, the city that never sleeps.

BBHub reader and BlackBerry Pearl user Austin comes out, and finds a suitable vantage point to take a pic of the Empire State Building.

BBHub lead blogger Russ (that's me) receives this photo from Austin and posts it here.

Hey there from a place really, really close to a subtropical beach. Rather than in my customary Pacific Northwest ocean hangout, I am at the Atlantic. Whilst (not a Brit, just love that word whilst, heh heh) I prefer the Pacific, here the beaches are warmier and sandier.

Sandy enough to bear witness to beach volleyball. But it is not only here where the game is played.

You can play beach volleyball on your BlackBerry. That'd be via RESETGames' Beach Volleyball for BlackBerry.

Wanna see pic?

Then clic.

What a babeextraordinarily fit young woman.

Wanna play? That'll be $14.95, or $13.46 if you are on Club Handango.

Click the Read link below this post and your browser will "serve" up Handango.com's Beach Volleyball for BlackBerry page.

I drink wine, and use a BlackBerry. Usually not at the same time, but I find both wine-drinking and BlackBerry use to be positive enablements.

You too?

Salud.

If so, you may be interested to learn that the wine reference site Winezap now has a BlackBerry-compatible version.

Everything you would want to know about wine regions, type, food pairing, price and user ratings.

Just don't spill any wine on your BlackBerry keys, K?

Dedicated BlackBerry user Paris Hilton, who I read somewhere is heiress to a hotel fortune, has her Blackberry in hand as her facial features bear the tracks of a night of hard partying.

Who'da thunk it?

One of BlackBerry Cool's readers has just made an iPhone BlackBerry theme.

That's it at the top of this post.

What do you think?

Over on my ZDNet IP Telephony/Convergence/Broadband (and occasionally license to write "big think") blog, I have been running a poll asking voters:

If you could win a free BlackBerry Pearl or iPhone, which would you want?

Obviously poll is not scientific but the readers really prefer the iPhone.

I mean REALLY prefer the iPhone.

Take a look by how much at the time of this post.

Disagree?

Shameless Self-Promotion here, but you can weigh in if you want.

One lucky (though that may be a matter of dispute) eBay bidder now has a white BlackBerry Pearl headed his way.

He stepped up to the plate and forked over $1,025.00.

Poorer? Maybe a bit. But it's his money, so who are we to criticize? Listen, I write this from a Las Vegas hotel room where downstairs, people are spending a good bit more and getting nothing in return.

But at least winning bidder datasquid (cool user name BTW) has a new BlackBerry Pearl. A white one.

Mariah Carey cares about gee, I dunno, giving garden tours to little kids?

But just in case she gets an important text or phone message, she's got her BlackBerry in her right hand.

Just plain nice example of multitasking if you ask me.

Well you didn't ask me but that's what I think, anyway.

Actually it looks like this little girl is leading Mariah by the hand, not vice-versa.

A post went up earlier on HowardForums, showing what was said to be the BlackBerry 8900c but what prevailing opinion to be shots of the 8800.

My take? Probably the 8800.. but then again why are these testing folks calling this the BlackBerry 8900c?

Update: Some sites have taken these pix down due to leaker's remorse. While I would much rather not do such a thing, I've now taken this opportunity to unleash my "inner artist" and do some rad things to these images in Photoshop.

Decided to let 'er rip. So take a look.

Ever want to do that to your BB? Heh

And finally:

That was fun. Heartcha, P-shop.

I'm not big on skateboarders on the sidewalk. They get in my way, hey hey.

But put 'em in skateparks and it is fun to watch 'em rip.

Sometimes the very act of them rippin' makes a fun photograph.

And if you have a Pearl, such as BBHub reader iswise "wisely" (baa boom ba bing) had with him a couple weeks back, well, why not.

Great timing iswise. And dude you really captured the concentration in your friend's eyes.

If I tried this- even back when I was his age- torn cartilage city.

Worse torn cartilage than I actually had.

A number of you question the value of running an aquarium photo some guy has taken with his Pearl. Or why we like those shots of celebrities using- or even just toting- their BlackBerry.

Several reasons.

First, the BlackBerry Pearl was a major expansion, indeed transformation, of Blackberry from an enterprise-centric device to one which is making an impact in the consumer world. The sharply increased sales, and stock price, surrounding the release is a major development.

The presence of the camera in the Pearl is a major motivator for sales. And look it- we live in a cell phone camera world. Michael Richards' racist harangue. George Allen's "macaca"- which went on YouTube and could have accounted for the shifting of U.S. Senate power. Heck, even Saddam's hanging. All captured on cell phone cameras.

Pearl was not the camera of those for any of these events, but my point is that with video recording capability, Pearl could be. Whether video or still, the presence of cell phone cameras was a major reason why our corporate colleagues at TIME Magazine named "You" Person of the Year.

But what about the fishes and the birds and the nature scenes? Amateur and professional photographers have been taking photos of these scenes for years. I know, I'm one.

Many are challenging to shoot- a fish through glaring aquarium glass. A cat that happens to be sitting still. A friend's face through shadows.

Now these challenges are available for BlackBerry users to tackle. That's big news.

Yea, but what about Paris, Lindsay, Britney, the Simpsons (the live performers not the cartoon characters), the Olsens?

These people are trend-setters. More than that, they represent a new generation of celebrities who, like their non-famous peers, are comfortable with using technology themselves. You can bet that lots of older performers have their phone calls placed for them and their email read back to them by harried assistants. Not this bunch.

Oh. One more thing. Blame it on the "culture"- or lack thereof, but we can tell from our server logs that these posts are very popular. You flock to them.

So I guess what I am driving at here is BBHub is a big tent. You can find out the answers to the most oblique BlackBerry Enterprise Server issues, read a BlackBerry game review, check up on what investors are thinking about RIM, find out about new BlackBerry handsets and be alerted to bugs.

And sometimes fish as well.