I am an evil iPod parent and should be sold into slavery with Microsoft!

A dramatic headline it is true but I am prone to dramatic flourishes especially when emotions are running high.... and running high they are ever since I callously discarded my old iPod in the Apple Temple in George Street in Sydney City, all to get 10% discount on the brand new iPod I was buying.... the speed with which I handed over my first bought iPod was frightening and shocking especially since it had saved me from going quietly mad in many bland airport terminals - OK it is doubtful I would ever do anything quietly, including going mad, which let's face it, kind of cried out for a voluble soundtrack! - and came with me on various trips to Malaysia, Canada and to my parents' Ancestral Estate in Alstonville NSW... I loved that inanimate piece of technology with a devotion that my digital camera and PC could never quite muster.... here for the first time was a small tiny piece of metal and circuits that managed to contain all the precious music that has acted as the soundtrack to my lifestyle, and that selflessly (well I don't speak digital so I doubt I'd have understood if it had complained) kept playing year after year for 4.5 years until one day.... yes one day.....sob.... I....I...

.....traded it in for a newer model! I didn't mean to....OK well actually yes I did since my new iMac (fussy but wonderful thing that it is and far better than the PC ever was) refused to work with Ye Olde Original iPod (henceforth YOOI) and it was case of only ever listen to about 100 old tracks (all that was left after my disastrous attempt to reset YOOI to factory standard) or get a brand spanking new iPod (BSNI, which doesn't trip off the tongue like YOOI does it? Hmm let's call him Bruce then) ..... so I went to the Apple Temple, confident I could buy Bruce without YOOI suspecting a thing, but alas the evil tempters at the A.T. were offering 10% off if you surrendered in your old iPod....what a horrible dilemma.... how could I possibly give up YOOI for a measly 10% off..... apparently hideously easily it turns out as I whipped out YOOI so fast that I swear his circuits were thrown every which way inside his aging carapace and threw him onto the counter.... consumed with guilt, I dared to ask what would happen to YOOI and I was told by the devilishly cute guy behind the counter that YOOI would likely be pulled apart in some lab somewhere..... I didn't even dare ask why but I suspect there is an illicit trade in old iPods for use by Microsoft in nefarious experiments.... and just like that YOOI left my life...

Of course I told myself YOOI was just an inanimate object and I had freely surrendered up the digital camera and PC (which you will be relieved to know I never named) without any qualms, but YOOI was different....YOOI was fun, independence, music in 4200 shades of enjoyment tha I could soak up anytime anywhere....and now I had just callously given up my first bought iPod in a Faustian deal to get a cheaper deal on my new iPod....I was bizarrely upset in a way that confounded any logic to counteract it.....

That was until I got home, opened up Bruce and saw his pretty sleek lines, colourful screen, and the face that he synced up all 4200 songs on my iTunes database in 15 minutes flat..... to my increased shame all thoughts of YOOI raced from my mind.... and so while I love Bruce as my Second Bought, I can't help feeling like Mommy Dearest, dropping off my dearly treasured YOOI to be dissected like a piece of pigs bladder for whatever dark purpose Apple deems necessary.... Bruce would do well to be nervous because despite my protestations of devotion to my iPod, they can be dumped at a whim.... I am an evil iPod parent and should be hung, drawn and..... oh look Bruce's screen is lighting up...he's so pretty..... now what was I saying?