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I got a moment to ponder things last night at work. Seems people finally decided that late night wasn't the right time to be calling a customer service oriented job. Fingers crossed that the same goes for today with people getting drunk/lucky or both!!

What I got to thinking was the following...God I'm glad I have an unlimited data plan with my iPhone. While spending most of the day listening to Pandora Internet Radio, then most of the night watching episodes of Man-Vs-Food and Futurama on my phone I realized that if I was tied down to a set limit of 2gb I would be going broke pretty damn fast!

Which leads to to another problem for down the road...cell plans for while I am in Europe later this year.  I know that I can purchase international minutes and an international roaming plan. But, I live on the web with my phone. I text and play games, listen to music and watch movies. All using a data plan that I won't be able to use for the 10 days I am out of country.

So, I guess my options are try to curtail my data usage as we get closer to travel time. Or, and this may not be a smart idea, try to go cold turkey!  Once I'm out of the country I'm off the web with the exception of at the hotel or Wi-Fi hot spot!

While cold turkey can be fine. It can also cause more problems then it's worth. Case in point when I tried to stop drinking caffeine cold turkey (not that data usage and a substance dependency is the same) but I ended up sick for a few days and just gave in and chugged a Dew and drank some coffee. Falling off the cold turkey wagon in this case could lead to a cell phone bill that only teenagers have achieved before!

I know I don't want to leave my phone at home and just pick up a European burner! I can only imagine how much fun that would be!

Long story short...I love my unlimited data and if AT&T ever decides that I am no longer "grandfather" eligible and have pay for a data tier I'll probably bitch and moan and consider changing carriers (but probably won't). Until then I will enjoy my unlimited data during a month where I use close to 12gb of data!! Thanks in small part to MLB2011, Netflix, Pandora, Sirius and a host of games!

App addiction

I am always amazed at the price of apps in the iTunes app store! There is always that one app that is like $999 and does essentially nothing. But, somehow got approved by the Apple App deptartment. I always see those as the great in joke around the Apple office.

Employee 1: "Let's see what the most over priced piece of crap is that we can push out and actually have someone buy."
Employee 2: "Yeah, useless and at a price point that people will have to believe it's awesome. How about just under $1000...let's say $999!!"
#1: "Awesome, I just made the first one!!"

That's the only way I can justify some of the crappy apps I have seen in the past. Essentially my phone is filled with a ton of free apps and only a handful of things that I have paid for. There is a large grouping of games that were all purchased for $.99 with the most expensive one being the $4.99 I spent on Press Your Luck.

Year in and year out though there is one app that is worth it's weight in gold, MLB's  "At Bat" app is a steal at $14.99

For the year you will get every home and away radio broadcast, news, video highlights, the occasional free MLB.TV game. Every displaced home fan should look into this app. The only down side is that if you listten to multiple games a week or if you watch one of the free games/videos then you can chew through your data plan pretty quick!

Pretty damn awesome though if you have unlimited data and a need to listen to every Cubs radio broadcast during the regular season and spring training.

Rise of the iMachines

Apple is taking over the world!! I don't think that this is news to anyone who follows the tech world.

iPad, iPod, iPhone, iMac, about a million variations on each. iTunes was , and to many still is, the gold standard of online media stores.

Which leads me to wonder where it will stop? When will Apple jump into the arena of food? Footwear can't be far off. They already have a partnership with Nike for those crazy runners out there. Hell you can buy jackets that not only has pockets to put your "i" related product...if it plays music the jacket can be you speakers!

The next logical step will be to go with an implant a la Futurama's "Eye-Phone" spoof.

Personally I think the next step is here in a more subtle way...iTunes DJ....it is simple mind control-- mood altering, outlook changing, mood killing...MIND CONTROL.

The brilliant thing is that it doesn't try to control you every time you use it. It's brilliant like that. I woke up today with my iTunes on and the DJ function playing. While I was drifting in and out of consciousness I was remembering two strange dreams I had (not sure if either is related to the tunes).

The first was I was watching an episode of Castle and all the characters had on t-shirts that I had purchased from TeeFury the other was that when I woke up everyone I knew on Facebook had changed their status to both Married and Pregnant. EVERYONE men and women!! I'll let that sink in.....I know right!!

First dream probably not related to music...second? Maybe. So, what was the tune list? Not sure what was on while I was sleeping but here are the next 15 songs that were in the Queue:

Almost Lover -- A Fine Frenzy
Mandy -- Barry Manilow
Love for Sale -- Harry Connick Jr.
Hold her Close -- Blessid Union of Souls
Grace -- Jeff Buckley
Girlfriend in a Coma -- The Smiths
$1000 Wedding -- Gram Parsons
I Trust You to kill me -- Rocco Deluca & the Burden
Don't Look Back in Anger -- Oasis
Kiss With a Fist -- Florence & The machine
Fuck You -- Cee Lo
Melt Your Heart -- Jenny Lewis and the Watson Twins
Real Bad News -- Aimee Mann
Unanswered Prayers -- Garth Brooks
Sentimental Heart -- She & Him

All great songs...but they alternate between generally depressing, emotionally depressing, lost love depressing, tragic depressing....I should just make a permanent play list and title it DEPRESSING. I also love how "I trust you to kill me" is placed directly in the middle of the list.

I understand that genius play lists are set up via similar song types, artists, melodic components, etc. But, the DJ button is supposed to be a true Random mix. Seems like there is something sinister at work here.

To quote the great Denis Leary, "Does that mean I sue Dan Fogelberg for turning me into  a pussy in the mid 70's?"  Maybe I should take his approach and try to sue Apple for the bad mood I'm in from time to time. It's just a thought...and I never said it was a good one!