Highway to Hell

I am a power iPod user. I listen to it in the car, when I'm getting dressed in the morning and when I'm working -- whether on writing or "real" work. I can't imagine doing any creative work without some sort of musical accompaniment.

I got my first iPod mini in the fall of 2004 when I faced two months of almost constant travel for my job. I am now on probably my eighth -- each slicker and with more storage than the last. I have somewhat of a reputation as an iPod slayer in my family and at the Fashion Island Apple store. Invariably the device just stops working for me and I need to get another.

There are currently 12,950 items on my iPod. I have never listened to 5,895 of those. That's not an entirely accurate figure because I know there are a lot of Joni Mitchell songs and old Broadway show tunes in there that I have heard before but just haven't played on this particular device.

I despair a little when I scroll through the list of things I haven't listened to. I have 5.2 hours of Glenn Gould to listen to, 2.2 hours of the Velvet Underground and 13.9 hours of tango music.

If I tried to get through all of the unlistened to music in a year, I would need to listen to 16 new songs every day.

I'll do it today at least. So far -- Highway to Hell by AC/DC, Val Jester by the National, an arrangement of La Mer by Debussy, and Side of the Road by Beck.

Not sure if I'll keep it up.