A terrible event occured about five hours ago. My iPod, the beloved Eduardo (or Eddie as he was known to his friends), was switched on and lo, rather than playing glorious music, a sad Mac appeared. And as a long time user of many Macs, I knew that this indeed could not be good.

Fast forward approximately five hours and I had tried every trick known to the Apple support pages. The 5 Rs, repeatedly. I tried and tried, and yet kept getting told that my beloved, the one I trusted, was now corrupt. As I struggled in vain to revive him, he started to mess up my computer: he was ready to take down the others with him.

What was I to do? Well, I looked at the Apple website to figure out how much a new shiny, possibly annodised aluminium friend would cost, and that was not an answer I like particularly much.

And so, in desperation I Googled "error code 1429", "clicky hard drive", and "corrupt iPod". At first the messages I was hearing were saying, "Ellie, let go, Eddie is gone from this world," but I just couldn't let go. I just couldn't. Then, from the fug of negativity looming out from the screen, I saw this, and dear friends I figured I had nothing to lose (except $300 on a new iPod).

I smacked the crap out of him. And he now appears to be working again.

Tough love I guess.