This Better Not Be Some Kind Of First Step Towards Pretentiousness

I don't like Apple.
Never have, and I doubt that I ever will.
Is it because I'm some rabid PC fan? Hardly. Linux evnagelist? Nope.
The primary reason I don't like Apple is that I've had to use their products in a professional setting (not much choice when you're working in desktop publishing), and my personal experience has been that Macs suck. They're buggy, they crash constantly, and there's just some undefinable quality to the interface that irritates the hell out of me.
Then there's the whole Mac-head culture.
It's not the culture itself that bothers me so much as the fact that there is a culture at all.
(I have much the same problem with Linux).
To me, a computer is a tool, not a lifestyle choice. I don't give a rat's ass how warm and fuzzy your iMac makes you feel; what I care about is whether or not it works.
And, as mentioned, in my experience, Macs don't work.
Now if your experience is different, fine. If they work flawlessly for you, more power to you. If you think that they somehow have the power to bring the world together in unity and to cure your toenail fungus, you're an idiot, and I don't want to hear about it.
Certainly, Macs have little or nothing to do with karma.
(This quote from the article, in reference to the anti-piracy poem embedded in OS X, ought to tell you everything you need to know about why I hate Mac-head culture: "It does have the deterring effect: If you were going to pirate, you'd look at this and say, 'That's just sad. I'd feel bad (stealing from) these people.' ")
Also, the iPod was not the revolutionary device that Mac-heads would have you believe.
There are much better MP3 players out there.
In fact, I've owned two of them.
Which leads me to my point. My current MP3 player, which has a large color screen and can play video files (which I purchased long before the Video iPod was anything other than a rumor), is dying.
Or rather, its non-replaceable battery is.
It remains fit for its current use, which is to be left plugged in to AC power and piped through my receiver as a home stereo system.
But if I'm going to force myself to get back into walking and working out, it would be nice to have a portable MP3 player.
My PDA can play MP3s, but the interface is a little clunky.
Since I now have the laptop to provide video entertainment when I travel, I really don't need anything too fancy, and since most of my MP3s can be archived on my existing player's 20 GB hard drive, I could go with something smaller.
*Sigh*
So I bought a 2 GB iPod Nano.
I just have to remind myself that it's a tool (or a toy, at any rate)l, not a lifestyle choice. Certainly I'm not going to turn into some kind of pretentious neo-hippie asshole or anything.
I'd better not.
At least it's black...