As I chronicled, I have been sans iPod for the last few days. I really hadn’t realized how dependent I had become on it. Although I suppose I was just as dependent on my Palm before that.

It has returned, more than a week sooner than promised, and I am once again attatched to it.

I discovered, in its absense, that I’m no longer able to go back to using the Palm. The touch interface is so intuitive that going back to a stylus, and trying to write with pseudo-letters, is simple too hard to go back to. Score another for technology making us stupid. It’s a wonder I can still write at all.

I received either a new one, or a refurb one. I don’t know how one would tell the difference. It seems new to me. And it is working perfectly. The return slip confirmed that there was a hardware malfunction, and the other device wasn’t fixable. I don’t know how common that is, but I’m pretty sure I’ll be buying the extended warrantly when I get closer to the one year mark from purchase. And I rather wish now I’d spent the extra $35 to get the Best Buy in-store replacement program.

But, overall, I’m *VERY* impressed with how quickly efficiently Apple handled it. Thanks, Apple.