I have good news! We found out yesterday that Joe got the internal position he interviewed for exactly a month earlier. Thank god! I am so relieved that we can keep saving money, and spending it too. ;)
So what did we do to celebrate? Well, first we went to Lonestar Steakhouse for dinner and each got a yummy filet. I cannot stress how good their steaks are, plus how cheap in comparison to the fancy steak houses we’ve been to in the past and didn’t even like.
After dinner we went to Circuit City and I almost convinced Joe to buy a new laptop since they had a sweet 17″ widescreen Toshiba that would be awesome for his gaming. He was hesitant to drop almost $800 without doing some research first, though. I saw the cutest laptop too but it was $1000+ which is way too much for how often I’d use it. I’d like something lightweight to surf on from the couch but not for that price! I think I’ll be ordering a new processor and memory for my desktop, though. Or a new computer if that’s cheaper.
Somehow we ended up at Target in the electronics department and Joe asked if I wanted to get the 80GB iPod Classic I’ve been drooling over lately. I debated, but it was on sale and they give you a $25 gift card, so how could I resist? I was standing there, unable to decide between the black and the silver, and what does my husband do? He tells the kid, “give us one of each”. This coming from my not-so-spontaneous (at least with money) husband! To say I was shocked is an understatement! He had a little buyer’s remorse after the kid rang us up but he got over it. LOL!
So we got them home and I made him open the black one so I could look at it before we opened the silver one. I loaded my entire Cure collection on it (of course) after I figured out iTunes. Yes, I’m going to gripe about it again because I really do not like it. The user interface stinks and if there’s a way to clean up deleted files from the library without manually deleting them one by one I’ve been unable to figure it out. But no matter as I found out Winamp supports the iPod and is much easier to use. Problem solved. And this knowledge will come in handy for when the girl gets her Nano for Christmas.
Anyway, I decided I’d rather have the black one which is ironic because I had been leaning toward the silver one initially and Joe was trying to convince me to get the black one (before he decided to get one too). I told Joe we should exchange the silver one for another black one since he didn’t seem to care for the silver but he decided he likes it after all so he opened it up this afternoon and started loading songs on it.
Can you guess where we’re going on Sunday? The Apple store to look at iPod accessories. I can’t wait!
Yay for spending money ;) Congrats to Joe for getting the job! That’s really exciting for you both.
I agree about Lonestar. We’ve gone to a million super expensive steakhouses, and we both love Lonestar, especially for the price. There are very few other places I’d pick for a steak, unless it was a special occasion or we wanted to try a new place out of state.
I’m so glad for you two! :)
iTunes is the best. I love it BECAUSE of the interface.
I’m not sure what trouble you are having with the delete function… if you select a song in the Library and hit the delete key, a small window should pop up with the following choices: Cancel, Move to Recycle Bin, Keep Files (meaning it is removed from the library but the file stays on your HD).
Is this not happening for you? Also, make sure you are deleting from the library itself, not from a playlist. If you delete from a playlist all it does is remove that song from the list… it stays in the library.
Also, you can’t delete or remove any individual song from a Smart Playlist.
Oh and also, if you want to delete several songs at once it works much the same as windows explore… use CTRL-Click or Shift-Click to select several files.
Jenniyb and msboombastic » Thanks!
kristi » It’s not that I don’t know how to delete files, I just don’t like how iTunes handles files that have been physically deleted from the hard drive. Instead of removing them from the library automatically, it puts an exclamation point in front of each file. Not a big deal IF I could sort by that column and do a shift enter to highlight them all and remove them from the library. But I can’t. So I have to hunt and peck to find all the files that need to be removed. What a total waste of time. I ended up deleting my entire library and reloading it. But who wants to do that every time they move or delete a file? I have almost 30 GBs of music! In contrast, Winamp just keeps my library up to date automatically. Plus I like the drag and drop functionality of adding songs and playlists to my iPod.
Yes that is annoying, but that’s why you should be deleting files from the library, not from Windows Explorer.
Congratulations to you both. You got the same iPod I have, the classic 80GB in black. I know you’ve long had a love/hate relationship with iTunes and iPods. But it really is pretty cool to have your entire music library, including playlists (and I put my videos, photos, contacts, and calendar on there, too) right in your pocket.
I use Macs and Windows PCs about 50-50, since all my work is on Windows and all my personal stuff is on the Mac. I also use iTunes on both platforms, and I occasionally use Winamp. I had to grin when I read that you think iTunes’ interface stinks, because like Kristi I love iTunes BECAUSE of the interface. :-D
I agree 100% with Kristi about how to manage your music files – use iTunes instead of Windows Explorer (or Finder on the Mac). I found I never had any reason to touch my music files or folders through the operating system – I told iTunes to keep my files organized for me, and I add and delete them directly inside iTunes. I don’t think I’ve ever seen that exclamation point you’re talking about.
Paul W. » I think my love/hate relationship with iPods centered around their price and usefulness. Now that their price has come down I can justify buying a toy I might not use as often as other people. It is pretty damn cool, though. This morning I played music trivia on my own Cure albums. That was fun! And when I get over my fear of flying, the iPod will be useful while traveling. Also since I got rid of XM I’ll be using it in my place of my 6-CD changer. So while I’m a very late iPod enthusiast, I’m totally on-board.
However, I think you and Kristi will just have to come to terms with the fact that I don’t like the idea of managing my MP3 files through iTunes. I like keeping them organized through the operating system directly. You both love iTunes – I GET IT. Me? Not so much. It has it’s uses, there’s no doubt about that, but I’m a Winamp kinda gal.
I’ve never used iTunes and I have iNothing. I use Winamp with my non-iPod (Samsung) 20G mp3 player and I love it. It’s easy.