Well, I backup my Kindle books via direct folder-copy. Happily, when I installed the program to my netbook it set up a My Kindle Books folder as a subdirectory of My Documents automatically.

Still haven't been able to find out how the Kindle on my Blackberry reacts when I try to use it in the absence of a decent connection. If I don't find out on the road to, or at, Dragon*Con, I will for sure at my grandfather's on the way back into Dallas afterwards.