This year, we all agreed that we all have way too much stuff in our homes. We're all trying to downsize and rid ourselves of excess clutter accumulated over many years, so we decided that for Christmas, we'd give consumables so as not to contribute to more stuff that takes up increasingly scarce space. We didn't strictly limit ourselves to consumables, though, but there was the effort to simplify things a bit. However, my brother and I decided to give our mom a few more techno-gadgets, as she seems to really dig those sorts of things. My brother gave her an Internet radio, which gets broadcasts from all over the world, and also finally allows her to receive radio broadcasts of the Metropolitan Opera, which for as long as anybody could remember, have been broadcast on WCLV out of Cleveland. However, some years ago, that station changed frequencies and was no longer able to be received down our way, making it impossible for my mom to hear her beloved weekly broadcasts of the opera. She did get a broadband laptop and has been able to hear it that way, but the Internet radio will allow her to hear it in all of its glory since it can be hitched up to the stereo speakers in the living room. I got her an iPod Nano, an amazing little device that can do tons of things, from allowing you to listen to FM radio broadcasts to taking short videos to allowing you to download tons and tons of music to....well, a lot of different functions. It's a sleek little device, a beautiful shade of green, which I had no idea how hard would be to find. Every store I called about whether they even had these gizmos in stock was either out of them (must've been this year's hot item to give as a gift!) or they only had pink ones left, and I simply could not see my 82 year old mother having a pink iPod. That is so not her. I would love to have gotten a blue one, but they were simply not to be found anywhere. So green had to do, and I like green as a color, so that was acceptable. I suppose it will take a while for my mom to figure out all the functions of this neat little thing - hell, it would take me a while to figure one out! - but I expect it won't be long before it becomes an indispensible device. I know that my now practically antique first generation 512MB iPod Shuffle has become something I feel like I just couldn't get through my workdays without. I love loading up tons of music on it and listening to it throughout the day. It makes things go so much faster when you're listening to really good music. It sure beats dragging around a portable CD player and having to change CD's each time the one I've been listening to is over. This way, I can listen to 6 CD's non-stop and have enough music to last an entire day if I want. The iPod Nano I gave my mom has an 8G capacity, meaning she could load it up with photographs, videos, music....all sorts of things that my iPod lacks the space to store. But what I truly love about my iPod is that it comes with a lanyard that allows me to wear it around my neck. That's its best feature, if you ask me. Sure, there's no display of what track is playing, but oh, well, it's a small sacrifice for its diminutive size. Still....part of me is thinking that I may want a Nano sometime down the road as well. Just too cool a device! So much you can do with it that it could well become addictive! But then, doesn't most technology sort of become that way?
Friday, December 25, 2009
A consumable Christmas
This year, we all agreed that we all have way too much stuff in our homes. We're all trying to downsize and rid ourselves of excess clutter accumulated over many years, so we decided that for Christmas, we'd give consumables so as not to contribute to more stuff that takes up increasingly scarce space. We didn't strictly limit ourselves to consumables, though, but there was the effort to simplify things a bit. However, my brother and I decided to give our mom a few more techno-gadgets, as she seems to really dig those sorts of things. My brother gave her an Internet radio, which gets broadcasts from all over the world, and also finally allows her to receive radio broadcasts of the Metropolitan Opera, which for as long as anybody could remember, have been broadcast on WCLV out of Cleveland. However, some years ago, that station changed frequencies and was no longer able to be received down our way, making it impossible for my mom to hear her beloved weekly broadcasts of the opera. She did get a broadband laptop and has been able to hear it that way, but the Internet radio will allow her to hear it in all of its glory since it can be hitched up to the stereo speakers in the living room. I got her an iPod Nano, an amazing little device that can do tons of things, from allowing you to listen to FM radio broadcasts to taking short videos to allowing you to download tons and tons of music to....well, a lot of different functions. It's a sleek little device, a beautiful shade of green, which I had no idea how hard would be to find. Every store I called about whether they even had these gizmos in stock was either out of them (must've been this year's hot item to give as a gift!) or they only had pink ones left, and I simply could not see my 82 year old mother having a pink iPod. That is so not her. I would love to have gotten a blue one, but they were simply not to be found anywhere. So green had to do, and I like green as a color, so that was acceptable. I suppose it will take a while for my mom to figure out all the functions of this neat little thing - hell, it would take me a while to figure one out! - but I expect it won't be long before it becomes an indispensible device. I know that my now practically antique first generation 512MB iPod Shuffle has become something I feel like I just couldn't get through my workdays without. I love loading up tons of music on it and listening to it throughout the day. It makes things go so much faster when you're listening to really good music. It sure beats dragging around a portable CD player and having to change CD's each time the one I've been listening to is over. This way, I can listen to 6 CD's non-stop and have enough music to last an entire day if I want. The iPod Nano I gave my mom has an 8G capacity, meaning she could load it up with photographs, videos, music....all sorts of things that my iPod lacks the space to store. But what I truly love about my iPod is that it comes with a lanyard that allows me to wear it around my neck. That's its best feature, if you ask me. Sure, there's no display of what track is playing, but oh, well, it's a small sacrifice for its diminutive size. Still....part of me is thinking that I may want a Nano sometime down the road as well. Just too cool a device! So much you can do with it that it could well become addictive! But then, doesn't most technology sort of become that way?
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