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Friday, June 13, 2008

Happy

My true love went to Norfolk Island. He went for 2 days in order to attend a 2-hour meeting. He came back tonight with 3 enormous bottles of booze and one of these for me:



which I am SO over the moon about. It's little, only 1GB (I've filled it already) but by golly I'm going to enjoy it. For one thing, I won't be able to hear the press squeaking as I work. And I won't annoy my silence-loving colleague as we print together. And I'll be able to do the housework with Led Zeppelin blaring in my ears and it won't annoy my true love, who finds the energy-injecting goodness of the Zep a bit much. Tuh.

Ah, the simple pleasure of something small to allow me to lose the world. I know I sound terribly out of touch, but I've managed to not have a personal music player for years (apart from the radio in my phone, and my bike chomped through its headphones a couple of months ago). It's not for lack of desire. It's because there's always been more important things to buy and no-one -- up to now -- has bought me one. And there's not been something so affordable and attractive. I love this little ipod. I'm thinking of it as a tiny portable mix tape. Sigh. I can't even begin to tell you how happy this makes me. Happy! I tells ya. Happy.



BTW, Norfolk Island sounds weird. They get to make up their own rules. Did you know that they don't have to wear seatbelts? And they are allowed to drink and drive... and cows are unfenced and constantly wander onto the roads. It was BB's worst nightmare, because he's a nervous driver at the best of times. They were laughing at him for putting his seatbelt on. But he's back alive, so who's laughing now, eh? He brought home a copy of the Norfolk Island telephone directory, which is very amusing, with little homilies scattered throughout and even a short-cut directory of nicknames at the front. And the mobile phone numbers are only 5 digits long! It sounds like something out of Gulliver's Travels.

8 comments:

Anonymous said...

Oh, I have one too, and I luff it! Great when taking the lad to the playground - I can listen to an audiobook and keep an eye on him at the same time, which I can't do with my nose buried in a paper book.

Anonymous said...

Way to go. I've got a red one and I love it. I listen to it while I walk to work most mornings.

Unknown said...

Sadly it becomes a bit obsessive - I have an 80GB one acquired in January in Singapore and I am doing my darndest to fill it all up, it has become a mission to get enough music to fill it. Don't know if I'll ever get a chance to listen to it all but I shall give it my best shot.

Mummy/Crit said...

glad yer enjoying the shuffle. and good to hear your bb got home ok.

Miss Schlegel said...

Please exsqueeze me if what I'm about to tell you makes you go, "er, der!", but are you aware of the brilliant podcasts you can get of BBC Radio 4 programs? I particularly recommend Melvyn Bragg's In Our Time, Women's Hour, Start the Week, and, oh, about a thousand others. Also the Arts and Ideas podcast from BBC Radio 3. All available through iTunes for free, obviously. Sometimes on my long walks after I've listened to the BBC for hours I start to sound a bit posh.

M-H said...

My partner took her mother to Norfolk as an 85th birthday present about 18 months ago. She nearly had to be resuscitated when she got home 'cos she'd slowed down so much. She said the tourists were the newly wed and the nearly dead. And they didn't have mobile phone coverage then - they'd had it earlier an voted to get rid of it. Interesting that they've got it back again. There was no phone in their holiday unit either, and a complicated arrangement for using a public one. No email at all. We decided never to go there. Even when we're nearly dead.

There are some good ABC podcasts too.

Ampersand Duck said...

Miss Sch (and M-H): I never knock back a good suggestion (much more of a DOH person than a DER person). I do listen to ABC podcasts, but haven't gone exploring at the Beeb. I think it's because I can only listen to spoken word when I'm doing something that only needs half a brain -- like driving, or walking. Printing and binding need music -- unless I'm batching tasks like folding pages or Sewing bookblocks, when I can give my attention to what is being said. Music keeps me focussed and allows the mind to wander creatively but attentively, if that makes sense!

But I will check out BBC podcasts so that I can stock up on interesting things to listen to when I travel. Thanks!

worldpeace and a speedboat said...

oooh lucky you! and being given it as a pressie, so nice :) I haven't got one yet either. partly, I suspect I will be sucked into a music-ripping and -gathering void that I don't have time for...