I have a predicament with my ipod. It really is more of a love-hate or hot-cold relationship. Much like my relationship with my computer at work...oh Windows - when it works its great, when it doesn't it sucks. Don't get me wrong, I love my new ipod. I have the ipod nano, the purple version to be exact, that I purchased on black Friday this year at approximately 4:30am for $145.00 with a $15 Target gift card with purchase. What a deal! Plus I have the chip that goes into my shoe so it tracks my distance, time, calories and so forth. Very cool. I have used it since January and have logged almost 60 miles on it so far. Also, very cool.
One of the coolest things about this new gadget is that it talks to you. A woman's voice (of course I picked a female voice) comes on at my halfway point and announces the distance I have left to go. Then she announces when there are 400, 300, 200 and 100 meters to go. When she begins this countdown it is my cue to go into sprint mode and try to beat my time and set a new personal record. This countdown combined with my music is very motivating. Then, at the end of the workout she congratulates me and tells me to push the menu button to end my workout. After that, however, I have to dial the ipod to the "end your workout" selection and push the center button to lock in my time. Sounds simple, right. As it should be.
Sometimes, however, it is challenging to dial the button around because a) I'm sweaty, b) the ipod is sweaty and c) I'm just stopping from a full sprint. However, I have developed a strategy...when my "lady friend" begins the 400 meter countdown I remove the ipod out of the pocket in my shorts and hold it, ready to "end my workout" and also attempting to remove the sweat from both the ipod and my fingers. Foolproof plan. This plan has been working fine so far - managing to add only mere seconds before "locking in" my time. Did I mention I've started competing with myself to better my time?
Well, yesterday my ipod went rogue on me. My strategy failed miserably. I held the ipod and when I attempted my plan, it all went crazy. I couldn't get it to "end my workout" and then it kept turning the volume way up rather than stopping. This kept going for what felt like 20 minutes (it probably was 20 or 30 seconds at the most) until I finally got it to stop. During that time I almost dropped it, probably swore outloud from being blasted by my too loud music and almost bumped right into my walker friends on the track. To top it all off, I was congratulated my some famous woman athlete that I had "just completed my longest workout ever"! Ha - not intentionally!
I'm thinking about getting some Holy water.
I think I'm supposed to tell you to get a Zune ;)
ReplyDeleteI own my fair share of Apple products and even though they're great - they're not always the most reliable or usable products. They have amazing designers but they don't believe in usability research (what I do). They also don't seem to take into account how much usage iPods get in workout settings (like the fact that they ship crappy earbuds that don't work well for sweaty ears).
One thing they do really well, though, is customer support. If you've got an Apple store near you, get an appointment with a genius. They're really good about fixing stuff or just replacing it right there.