giving in to temptation

As I was driving in to work recently and immensely enjoying the music that was playing on my car’s cd player, the thought occurred to me that I’ve never really had a desire to own an iPod. (Well, if someone wanted to give me one for free, it isn’t like I would turn them down, but…) This realization kind of surprised me, as I’ve always considered myself to be a bit of a “gadget junkie”, and a music-lover as well. With my other gadgets, I don’t just simply “own” them…I feel a true and deep affection for them. There’s my laptop. *sigh* And my digital camera(s). *sigh sigh sigh* And my Tivo boxes. *sigh sigh...* You get the idea. And then my guitars fall into a whole different category of love affair. *SIIIIIIGH* Anyway, one of the last techie gadgets I bought this past Christmas was a Slingbox. The Slingbox really wasn't for me as much as for my poor starving-student loved ones, who by using my Slingbox could enjoy not only sharing my cable tv, but also the use of their own personal Tivo box, simply by connecting over the internet. I think it worked out pretty well (with the exception of a few problems with a squirrely router for a while). So recently I was all ooh'ing and aah'ing over Aah's new Pocket PC cell phone. But I resisted the temptation, you see, because I've been all obsessed lately with Oprah's "Debt Diet". I am grateful to be able to say that I do not have a lot of personal debt, but I do currently have a car loan and a mortgage on my house, which I am now motivated to pay off as quickly as possible. The Debt Diet idea has been really exciting to me because it has suddenly made me much more aware of my own "nickel and dime" day-to-day spending. So I've been doing really good at paying attention to this, almost like the "how far can I stretch this dollar" game that I used to play with myself back in college. That is, until I received an email yesterday from Slingmedia, informing me that as a registered owner of a Slingbox, I am entitled to a free copy of their newly released Slingbox Player for Pocket PC. This is more temptation than I could bear. (Well this, and the fact that I am able to procure the Pocket PC phone plus unlimited data service with quite a hefty corporate discount, one of the perks of working for a large company.) So if Fed-Ex doesn't fail me, as of this afternoon I will again fall hopelessly in love with yet another piece of gadgety-goodness. If it works as well as I hope it does, this little gadget will provide me with a mobile version of phone service, internet service, cable tv AND Tivo. What more could a girl ask for? *sigh*

Oh well, I was never that good at sticking with diets, but I will start again...tomorrow. :)