99 Cents Worth of Quicksand

I don't know if you'd say I've ever actually had a life. When I was in high school, on Friday nights when my peers were out... I don't know, hanging out at the malt shop or dropping acid or whatever it was the cool kids were doing in those days, I was home. In my bedroom. Watching The Rockford Files, or more precisely counting the moments until The Rockford Files came on. You can have your George Clooney or whoever, there's never been anybody cooler than Jim Rockford.

And don't get me started on the genius of Chico and the Man.

When I started to date the young woman who would later become my wife, it looked like I might have some sort of life; of course, most of our dates consisted of walking around the mall. Every once in awhile we'd really cut loose and I'd take her along when I did my grocery shopping. So let that be an answer to everyone who wonders why she married me.

Nowadays I have a job and 2 kids and plenty of stuff to do around the house, so it's not like I've got lots of time left over to spend at the discos. Generally once the kids are in bed, I can sit down... watch some TV, read a library book or one of the 8000 magazines I subscribe to, surf the web a bit. Once upon a time I even used to write a blog, which you might remember if you've been taking your ginkgo biloba.

So, you know, if it's not exactly a life that's going to be the subject of an Oscar-winning documentary or something, it's a decent semblance at least. Until that fateful email...

I wrote a while back about my experience with emusic.com, an online mp3 store that enticed me in with a lavish introductory offer with a somewhat more complicated reality. At that time it seemed like I might never extricate myself, but I was eventually able to get out with a pretty good haul of songs with regard to quantity, quality, and value.

Since then I've been mostly puttering with my iTunes cards, forever building lists but never buying anything, and also taking advantage of a deal from the library that allows me a small number of free weekly downloads from the Sony music catalog. I was concerned that I was getting a bit over-absorbed with all this music-mining, but I thought I had it relatively under control.

Then those devious folks at emusic sent me another offer: 99 cents for the first month, for credits that ought to allow me about 15 or 16 downloads (and the infamous "cancel at any time"). Less than 7 cents a song is a hard deal to turn down, and I would think it might be even for a person in full control of his faculties.

I jumped on it, and within minutes I had snatched up 9 tracks, many of which were already sitting on my iTunes wishlist. Now, however, I'm stricken once again with the dreaded paralysis by analysis. I've got maybe 6 or 7 bullets left in the gun, about 15 on the contingency list, and an infinite number more that I could add. There's not much logic in sticking around for a full-price month; even though it's not a terrible deal, it doesn't make much sense to pay money when I've still got iTunes credits, so it's this last handful and out. I promise.

So seemingly every day I go into emusic and wander the virtual halls, trying to figure out which of the songs on my list are the top ones -- then stumbling into a half-dozen more that I might enjoy slightly more. Or slightly less; who can say exactly? Music, money, OCD, and decision-making: a very dangerous cocktail for a guy like me.

I've seen this movie before and I already know how it ends: I take this 99-cent month down to the last possible second and click the mouse for the last song just before the clock strikes 12. Till then, you'll find me right here, clicking through the pages...