Sunday, January 24, 2010

iNeed help

Another weekend has come and gone and, to paraphrase John Lennon, "So this is Sunday, and what have you done?" Well, not a lot, to tell you the truth. I did have a nice breakfast at the new student residence this morning, but I've spent most of my weekend organizing my iTunes folder and have come to the conclusion that I am developing some sort of OCD disorder.

Now, I know that the use of the word 'disorder' just then was redundant as the 'D' in OCD actually stands for 'disorder', but the sentence didn't sound right without it. And did you know that this is an example of RAS syndrome, that is the "redundant use of one or more of the words that make up an acronym in conjunction with the abbreviation itself," like PIN number or ATM machine or HIV virus? RAS stands for 'Redundant Acronym Syndrome', so note the self-referential irony in that the term 'RAS syndrome' is actually itself an example of RAS syndrome.

Oh my, now I've gone cross-eyed.

Where were we before we got lost in that linguistic hall of mirrors? Oh yes - iTunes. I got a new iPod Touch for Christmas, and whilst uploading all my music I made sure that every track had the correct album art, which I think is a reasonable endeavour. I've now gone too far though because I'm now checking the year and genre attached to each song, cross-referencing with Wikipedia as I go, as well as correcting any spelling errors and mis-capitalizations. I have over 7000 songs on my iPod and my plan was to go through one, maybe two letters of the alphabet each day so that I'd have the project finished in a fortnight, but over the last 48 hours I've not been able to stop. I started on Friday evening and I'm now up to the S's already.



Last night in bed I actually got round to listening to the damn thing and noticed that one of my Dave Matthews Band albums was incorrectly listed as a compilation. Did this affect the quality of the music coming through my headphones? No. Could I ignore the error? No again. I had to get up, come downstairs, switch on the laptop and sort it out there and then. At 2 in the morning. I really need help, don't I? There are no psychiatrists this far north though, so in the meantime back to work...The Best Of Sad Cafe - Rock? Don't think so - Soft Rock maybe - and no year; what does Wikipedia say...?

P.S.
Before anyone points it out, I'm fully aware that the fact that I have The Best of Sad Cafe on my iPod is probably more worrying than any form of OCD that I may be developing. I am truly a lost cause.

4 comments:

Anonymous

We are being snowed under by a blizzard of TLRs (Three Letter Acronyms) atm. I haves struggled all w/e with my SDP (Subject Development Plan), have a SEF (Self Evaluation Form) hanging over me, and I am trying to tell the difference between AfLs, AoLs and AaLs. Whilst these things tend to make me fall asleep as soon as I look at them they keep me awake at night worrying whether my competence as a teacher is going to be measured by the amount of paperwork I can generate!
Cummon, what other guilty secretes lurk in your iTunes library? PC

Gideon

I have many, many guilty pleasures on my iPod (alongside some bona fide rockin' classics)...just look at my collection of Peters: Frampton, Gabriel, Sarstedt, Sellers, Skellern and Wyngarde!

Vikki

Where does "Winchester Cathedral" fit? I don't know if that qualifies as a guilty pleasure or hidden shame. The only other iPod it is on in the entire world, sits next to me on my desk. :-)

Gideon

Hey, nothing hidden or shameful about Winchester Cathedral...is there?

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