Before my Dad passed he said he wanted to buy us appliances for our house. Well, even though it was a while ago that he told us that my Mom said she still wanted to get us something from the both of them. How awesome!

So, instead of just showing it off I thought I’d give a little video review on the unit. Enjoy!

Okay, I’ve had my Zune for a couple of months now so I’m able to dive into my likes and dislikes.

Overall: I like very much and I would totally recommend it to others. (For other reviews check out here, and here.)

Here are a list of the features that I liked and care about having (scroll down to see the explanations):

1. Good, nay, GREAT earphones.

2. Storage

3. User interface and software

4. Radio

5. How it looks (yes, i’m superficial)

Here is a list of stuff that I don’t really care about:

6. WiFi

7. Pictures

8. Zune Social

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1. Earphones - Are they comfortable? that’s really the main priority that everyone has. Sound, price whatever else…it all comes second to comfort. And these babies are comfy! I can wear them for hours. I also extra double love that the cords are wrapped in material, kinda like those friendship bracelets I used to make in grade school. It helps when you need to untangle them; it slides easily because it’s not rubber. And it looks nice.

And when I say everyone, I mean everyone. Just look at my photo of my premium Zune headphones on flickr: it’s one of my most viewed photos because people care about them. And this guy also wrote about the headphones. See….people care about comfort. Anyway, I digress.

What was that? Did you say something? Oh, you mean that these premium earphones aren’t standard and you have to pay extra for them? Phew, well, good thing I got mine for free.

2. Storage - I don’t need 80G. But I need more that 4. They gave me the 8G and its perfect! I have enough room for my podcasts, playlists, and tons of music. I don’t care about album art (stop throwing tomatoes) so that also saves a lot of space for me. I think 8G will hold me over until it’s time to buy another MP3 player…probably in the year 2020.

3. User Interface and Software – Wicked! Everything is organized the way you think it should be organized, which makes everything easy to find. It’s slick (colours and font) and makes a little bubble sound when you scroll through everything.

Too bad I can’t say the same for the software. It….sucks. Okay, maybe I didn’t spend enough time using and learning about it. But it’s probably because it takes so long to load. It’s really pretty looking but I want speed and simplicity rather than pretty. It’s also difficult to load podcasts. I will give it another shot but I wish they had something that was a lot simpler and less flashy. I hear about similar problems with other MP3 interfaces but still, that’s no excuse.

4. Radio – Can’t tell you on this one. I live and work in the same town, which is a valley, which means that I can’t get any radio stations not even the AM ones. It’s not a Zune problem, I have the same issue in my car. It sucks because the one thing I miss about driving to work was listening to the Dean Blundell Show. (someone told me they are making podcasts though…sweet!)

5. Looks – It’s sleek, it’s black, it’s sexy. I love it. The size is perfect, I love the scroll touch pad thing WAAAAAAY more than the iPod one. And so far it still looks brand new; maybe it’s scratch resistant? We’ll see after a few more months.

6. WiFi - You can share music with other Zune owners if you are standing next to each other. Sure, we played with this cool function (even have a video of it) but I never use it and HATE the 3 Play feature.

7. Pictures - I’ve never been one to carry pictures on me.  I don’t even have pictures on or around my desk. I keep my pics on Filckr and when I want to look at them I look at them.

8. Zune Social – This is something I thought I would be into but I’m not. I think it’s becasue I just don’t really like forums that much, or I didn’t feel like there was anything to talk about. i tried to use it to troubleshoot some stuff (related to the interface) but didn’t ind anything helpful. I gave up on it early….but like I said, I’m impatient.

At my old work, my friend Jen was (still is) a crazy health nut. Well, not crazy as in “Don’t mind if I do!!” but crazy as in “Wow, she really knows her shit.” She was also an awesome cook and baker. We called her Martha Stewart every time she brought something healthy (and uber tasty) in to the office.

At my new place of employment my habits started to slip. It was easy to join in to the occasional Harvey’s run. And popcorn and pop snack. Or sometimes not eat altogether.

Then Jamie got hired and Jamie likes to cook. He also is a big advocate of unprocessed foods. He encourages me to eat better and doesn’t even know it. I’ve been cooking a lot more often again. Tonight’s meal was Vegetarian Bean Curry and it especially made me think of Jamie and his food. I was thinking of bringing some into work to share with him because it is so tasty.

From time to time Jamie will share a tasty recipe and bring some delish grub into work.

Sometimes, however, he makes some delish grub and just blogs about it and doesn’t even bring some into work. What a jerk. Even when I made a comment about it…he still forgot.

So, I had to bribe him. I told him I’d do a review on his tasty grub if he’d bring some in. He complied (thank god).

Anyway, the review was on Mexican Scalloped Potatoes:

They were really, really, really tasty and I would eat them again.

Happy now, Jamie? Good.