Still alive (not just me)

Well, I survived another year teaching at Upward Bound. If that makes it sound like an unpleasant experience I stress that I really enjoyed teaching my classes and the staff were (are) all magnificent. I got fantastically appreciative feedback from the students, which just about brought me to tears. But it is a lot of work, especially since I’m a new dad and since I was also trying to keep some things ticking over at Wildmind.

Two years ago, when I last taught at UB, I bought myself an “I survived another year at Upward Bound” present in the form of a very nice Skagen watch — very simple, slim, and elegant (a bit like me in my dreams). I needed a watch and it was just soooooo pretty. This year I bought myself something a bit less external, namely a new had drive for my iPod.

So first, I successfully talked myself out of buying an iPhone on the grounds that while it may be the ultimately cool electronic device I just really don’t use cellphones much. I have one and have used it for less than 70 minutes in the past year. That makes me sound like a freak, doesn’t it? So I thought I’d make do with my current iPod, LifeDrive, and really-just-for-emergencies cellphone until Apple bring out an iPod that’s like the iPhone but less, well, phone-y.

Second, my iPod promptly dies, displaying (at best) a little folder icon emblazoned with a rather alarming-looking exclamation mark. I try resetting it, formatting, it — all that good stuff — but it remains resolutely dead. I toy with buying a new one, and then I come across Josh Highland’s site, which describes how to replace the hard drive. I didn’t even know the hard drive was user-replaceable.

Then I find the DriveGuys website and pick up a replacement 20 Gig drive for just over $50 including shipping. It took five minutes to pop open the back, take out the old drive, swap it out with its replacement, and restore the iPod’s software. Then another 20 minutes to sync all my music and podcasts. And there you have it — a functioning iPod. I’m chuffed. Really chuffed.

I hardly ever listen to music on it (does that also sound weird?). Instead I listen to podcasts while I’m driving. Mostly it’s my favorite radio shows — the ones I keep missing live because I happen to be driving at the wrong times. I enjoy being able to pause a show while I’m concentrating on navigating or getting out of the car to get gas. I love that little electronic device!

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