special edition tiny

I went down to Q101 to pick up my special edition RHCP iPod, and got it a little too easily.

I showed up to the studio, told the woman squirreled away behind the reception wall of bulletproof material who I was, she presumably called the promotions department, and some dude showed up to hook me up with my prize.

When I had originally spoken to the lady from the promotions department, she had told me that I needed to provide a photo id and my social security card.

And I brought them along with me.

Oh, so very unnecessarily, it would seem.

The dude looked like he had kicked off happy hour at about 4:20, ahem, and seemed to be a little slow on the uptake.

He asked me what my name was, I told him, he handed me a list of people's names, told me to sign next to mine, and then handed me a small black box and an envelope.

He told me congratulations, and then wandered off back into the mysterious inner depths of "free speech radio."

When I opened up the box later, I was confused, because all I saw was a little black iPod with a silver back. It didn't look particularly magical or RHCP-y, but it was free, so it's all good.

Thursday, I had to go to an early management meeting at work, on my day off mind you, so I skipped on over to Best Buy afterward to get myself a lovely storage and protective case for my new iPod. I had some lovely reward zone gift certificates to cash in from buying my computer, so I figured why not use them for that...

Mind you, this is like a week after I actually picked the thing up from the radio station.

When I was actually trying to figure out which case to buy, removing the cases from their packaging when possible, I happened to turn the iPod over and see what looked like a smudge on the shiny silver back of the thing.

Upon closer inspection, it became clear that what I was seeing was not a smudge, but was in fact a tiny engraved RHCP logo circled by 4 tiny engraved autographs of the individual band members.

Dude, if I were making a special edition iPod for myself, you sure as hell would looking at the front of the thing to see what was special enough about it to require it's own edition.

Me, I'm expecting a red RHCP logo on the center of the click-wheel, or maybe something art-worky all around the face of the iPod that ties in with their new album, Stadium Arcadium.

But, whatever.

It sounds good either way.