iPod shuffle Arrives in Chicago

I received a phone call from the Apple Store on North Michigan Avenue in Chicago yesterday, with the news I was hoping for: they had received a shipment of iPod shuffles (capitalization as per Apple), and one was on hold for me. Everything was hunky-dory as I charged it on my work PC and filled it with my smaller iTunes-at-work collection. At home, though, problems arose. I chose to disassociate the iPod shuffle from my work PC and associate it with my Mac, erasing the work PC tracks, but the song-filling process was agonizingly slow (whether I used my USB 2.0 or 1.1 port) compared to how quickly it had filled at work. Eventually, the filling process hung, and iTunes froze up. Repeated attempts to force quit iTunes eventually worked, but the shuffle was still mounted on the desktop and attempting to drag it to the Trash caused Finder to freeze. Hard re-boot, and the shuffle is fragged: an error message indicated that the shuffle mounted, but its file system was not recognized. Sooooo, downloaded the latest iPod Updater from Apple and restored the shuffle. A frustrating evening gave way to a happy commute this morning.

In answer to C.K.'s question a few posts back: "There is a little plastic slider on the headphones so you can choke the slack up to your chin. Is this a feature of non-iPod Shuffle headphones that I just happen to have missed?" I don't recall about the headphones originally packaged with my old iPod, but the Apple In-Ear Headphones I purchased also have the plastic slider. I'm using it to create a loop in the headphone cord (by placing the slider all the way towards the headphones) and wearing the loop around my neck when not in use--this way, I can keep the shuffle and the headphones hanging in easy reach all day, but out of the way and secure (under my sweater, today). Caution: may require a sufficiently svelte neck.