Help needed: brick!

[duhtroll]

OK, I didn't do a damn thing, either.

I have a stock PPC 6800/US Cellular ROM with an 8GB card that stores most of my apps and my music.

The only apps I have running are:

SPB pocket plus
WoW profiler and vibrate
HTC album
TCMP latest
Palringo (rarely used)
Skype (never used)
Yahoo Go 2.0
Google Maps
Microsoft LiveSearch

and

Weatherpanel 2009 updated - this is the only thing I have changed in the last week. Everything else has been running for months with no problems.

The only files I have added recently were a few mp3s and some wallpapers, and I deleted those at the onset of the problem in case they were causing problems. I also uninstalled TCMP as it had crashed once or twice while playing large playlists, in case it could be the culprit - no help.

It started last night by running slower, with the memory starting at ~21, and would drop rapidly until I would reset - it got as low as 14 with no apps running.

Then it would take forever to boot and hang on the Windows mobile screen. It would also hang on loading the weather panel (also stock view no mods) so I decided it might be a problem with WP and uninstalled the program. This did happen right after I added a second city to the WP display (where I am this week) and set up the hourly update.

It then ran normally for about 8 hours (overnight) and began again this AM. I cannot get it to boot in normal mode without freezing on WinMobile screen.

It didn't even give me the option to boot in safe mode. I would use the reset button several times and even pull the battery - no luck.

I am out of town at a conference until Thursday and the local USCell store does not have a tech. The guy working there did get it to boot in safe mode so I have a phone, technically, but no other functions really.

This thing serves as my alarm, calendar, and runs my notes and presentations for this conference. Now I will have to drag my laptop around, which I can do but it's frustrating.

Anyone have this happen? I think the memory chip just decided to kick it.

Also, Active Sync would load by itself all the time (when it was working). Once I connect to a PC/laptop I will have to disconnect, manually stop the app, then soft reset, and even then it doesn't always work -- I catch AS coming up in the background.

I am stuck with this until Thursday night. I don't expect miracles - just wanted to know if there is something I can still try.

Thanks in advance. There is a lake nearby that I am tempted to "lose" the phone in and go to the non-teched store tomorrow and get a new one.