birthday gifts

i'm very up in the air about what to do for scott's birthday.  we normally don't exchange birthday gifts, just get an extra allowance for buying whatever we want (which normally goes into scott's play-poker-at-a-casino fund).  a few months ago, though, scott declared that he wanted a new ipod for his birthday.  right-o.  i started pondering the idea and thinking about it in terms of christmas.

then a few weeks ago, scott got back from picking up a new sprinkler head (to replace the one he'd shattered with the lawnmower), pulled the ipod shuffle out of his pocket where he'd left it from doing yard work that morning, and found that he'd apparently sat on it in the car and broken off the clip.  as in, the thing that attaches the ipod to his clothes while working out and running.  it's still useable, but it's now a four year old, 512mb ipod shuffle with a broken clip.

as regards the new ipod, i had been thinking of getting him an ipod nano, you can connect to the nike+ipod system so it keeps track of miles run, time, calories, that sort of thing.  you can even set a special song to play for your cooldown every run.  he'd love it!  and apparently you don't even have to get the special nike+ shoes to hold the sensor anymore - you can get a thing that straps onto any shoe's laces to hold it in place.  i was thinking of doing the nano for him and having his sisters get him the nike+ipod kit and armband.  perfect, right?

well, according to my wikipedia research, apple has released a new nano every september for the last 5 years.  which means that if i get him a nano now, in less than three months, there'll be a new one on the market (and the current one will be probably dropped by 1/3-1/2 the current price).  scott's not really up on gadgets, so he probably wouldn't care, but i remember how bitter i was that apple released the color ipod within months of me getting my "classic" ipod for graduation from my parents.  so what to do?  get him the nano now, or wait and make him use the old one in the meantime?