Thank You, Genius Bar

About a week and a half ago, I popped in my eleven month old ipod's FSB cord to my VAIO to charge it for a trip to the Man Friend's in Jersey to no avail. No message. Nothing but a dead black screen. A few tries later it finally gave me the dreaded sad sack face and informed me "Please wait. Very Low Battery."

Ok, no problem. This had happened a few times before when it accidently turned on in my purse, etc. An hour later I left my apartment ipodless, my little guy still hooked up to charge. Upon returning a day later, the same very low battery message mocked me. This continued all weekend and again when I hooked the little guy up to my work computer.

Uh-oh. I'd lived this scenario before when my previous ipod decided to commit suicide for seemingly no reason other than to barely outlive my warranty and once again line Steve Jobs' pockets as I cannot imaging surviving in NYC without one of these little machines.

The timing couldn't have been worse as the Thanksgiving holiday was upon us and this meant me schlepping around the tri-state area. After a visit to the SoHo store, on Wednesday, it was determined the earliest I could get an appointment at the Genius Bar (where the employees would undoubtedly tell me what I already knew - my ipod was dead) wouldn't be until Saturday.

Realizing on Friday I'd be spending the night in Jersey, I logged on to apple.com and switched my appointment to the Parumus Mall for the following afternoon. How much less chaotic than the SoHo store! In less than 20 minutes, I walked out of the store with a brand spanking new 30G video ipod (free of charge and no questions asked) that synced with my itunes at home within minutes.

No muss. No fuss.

A sincere thank you, Apple.