Nano Nano

It's been kind of a sad week for me. My attempts to buy William Shatner's kidney stone fell way short. Yup I got outbid by an online casino who paid $25,000 for it. I'm guessing it will end up with someone who is a bigger Trekkie than I. And I'm guessing that'll literally be the case, the lucky stone holder will probably eventually be some 300 pound guy who wears Vulcan ears out in public.

Now I'm no Dr. Janet Lester but I have in the past enjoyed a Star Trek episode a time or two. In the end I'm glad I saved my life savings for something equally as enjoyable: this past week I broke down (in so many ways!) and bought myself an iPod Nano.

If Star Trek taught me nothing, it taught me that technology will turn my life around. How many times when I was little did I wish I could have a communicator? Well heavens to Betsy the day finally arrived when I was given a cell phone so anyone can now reach me at any time! And I always longed for a tricorder and someday soon I hope to be a proud owner of a Blackberry device. Of course my biggest Star Trek related desire is for the transporter to become reality, allowing us to all some day get rid of our primitive forms of transportation. Until that day, I guess I'll just have to love my scooter (well, during the summer anyway).

A little over a year ago my Dad was kind enough to give me the year's hottest product, Apple's iPod, for my birthday. The compact little device with massive capabilities, soon became a rather large part of my life. Gone was the need to drag a handful of CDs with me to work for the day's music. Gone was the worse need for missing the blood of my existence, music, on my trips away from home whether far or a little further than near. I have found the times I've loved my iPod most is when I'm in some other city and I have the ability to dial up any of my favorite songs in a moment's notice.

But good things almost always turn bad (remember that Star Trek episode when the most beautiful rose turned out to burn upon touch, being made out of some acidic material?). What I discovered was that I had so many songs I needed to carry with me at all times that I quickly filled up my iPod to its capacity. Thus I was posed with a dilemma every time I bought some new music. I was forced to delete something from my iTunes library, and more and more that was getting to be tougher and tougher.

An easy solution beamed its way into my wee little brain sometime last year. Since the artist who was taking up the most digital space on my digital device was probably the least digital related artist around, Bob Dylan, I thought, geez if I only bought myself a second iPod and loaded only Bob songs on to that, I could free up a lot of space on my original iPod.

The thought wouldn't leave me alone. When the auburn-haired lass (how does one check out the authenticity of her hair color claim?) bought herself an iPod Nano last year, and I helped her do so, I became envious when she finally showed me her device. It was so cute, so sleek and modern.

For those of you who have spent the past year in an igloo the Nano is about the size and thickness of a piece of beef jerky cut into a threes. The one I bought is supposed to hold up to 1,000 songs but since I loaded it with many Dylan live performances (that tend to run six to eight minutes long) all I could fit on to mine was 755 Bob songs.

And it's all I've been listening to (and doing) since. I hit shuffle and have to smile when the 1994 version of "Shelter from the Storm" from a concert in Brixton, London England comes up next to the near punkish (and I can so relate to this) desperate version Bob wailed out on the official 1976 Hard Rain recording of the same song sung in a completely different way. I almost want to shout out to my friends and family to let them know what they are missing. But who knows who is still listening?