The Progressive Accumulation of Stuff

There’s this wonderful little phenomenon that Tim has christened “The Progressive Accumulation of Stuff”. It’s the reason why you may go into the grocery store to pick up some milk and leave with 2 bulging bags filled with cereal (to go with the milk), brownies (because they also go with milk), calcium enriched orange juice (an alternative to milk), cheese (because it was in the same section as the milk) and Triscuits, organic blue corn chips and of course, salsa (all unrelated to milk, but placed conveniently in the aisles on my way to dairy section).

It’s also the reason why I went to “just check out ” some shoes in the mall some ago and ended up buying three pairs.

I bring this all up because this is The Progressive Accumulation of Stuff is really why I now own a laptop. Observe:

1. I started going to the gym last year and realized that trying to read the closed captioning on the television while on the treadmill was only causing me nausea, but I didn’t really like watching Dr. Phil anyway. So I started looking into buying an iPod.

2. I found iPods very expensive, although quite aesthetically appealing. However as I did more research I found out that I needed USB 2.0 ports, and Windows XP to run iTunes. My two ancient desktops at home were (and still are) running on Windows 98. Dang.

3. I decided to shop for a laptop, so that when I did get around to buying an iPod someday, I would be able to upload my songs with ease. And besides, Windows 98 was getting on my nerves with its seeming incompability to run with anything.

4. I bought myself said laptop in the summertime. And then I stopped going to the gym.


It was a tragic how it all turned out at the end of my quest for portable music. However, as fate would have it, Tim got me an iPod Nano for Christmas! Now I can happily plug it into my new computer and upload songs to my hearts desire. I only wish I could use it more since I don’t really take public transit anywhere and having to plug it into my FM transmitter to listen to it in the car for my 15-minute drive to work seems like just a little too much work for the amount of gain.

So…I think it’s time to sign up for the gym again.