I hate the technology age.

Sounds odd from someone as young as I, but I do. I don't hate the technology itself. Its quite convenient stuff. My phone allows me to communicate everywhere I go. My iPod holds more music than I'll ever listen to. My GPS tells me where to drive. Wonderful stuff, this technology.

What I hate is keeping up with it. I figure it out about six months late, after I've bought something that I thought would fulfill my needs. Not saying any of those items don't do what I need, but I develop a desire for the newer thing that everyone else has. Call it keeping up with the Joneses, but it seems to be a trend for me.

My GPS is great. No complaints.

My cell phone is a 7-month old flip-phone. Works great. When it was time for me to pick a new phone, I thought I didn't need a Blackberry, or an iPhone. I still don't. But they sure are nice, and I realize now I should have picked one up when I had the chance.

My iPod Nano is great. Problem comes with using it. It comes with the headphones and the charging/interface cable. So I can use it while I work out. Awesome. For driving, you need a $20 accessory that plugs into the headset jack and broadcasts it on FM radio for you car radio to pick up. Not the highest quality sound, and it doesn't charge it. For that, its another $30. If you want quality sound, you need to plug it directly into the head unit. That's also $50, but it'll take a week to ship.

Leading me to my next point.

You can't buy anything in the store anymore. Everything has to be ordered online. If a store has it listed "in stock" on their website, you don't know if its at the store, or if they have it in a warehouse somewhere and its just "in stock" online. Quite irritating when you need something NOW.

So, yeah, after deciding today (2 days before I drive halfway across the country) that I cannot survive 9 hours in the truck on 3 CD's and a slew of country stations, I needed a way to make my iPod talk to my head unit. I hate the idea of the FM transmitters, because of the aforementioned crappy sound quality, so I went to Best Buy for a hardline connection. Aparently, the part required for my stereo isn't just a simple wire, its a whole "interface" and they don't stock it. 5 days to order it. Dammit.

After running around town for an hour or so, I finally found the $50 FM transmitter that would charge the damn iPod as well.