My Pod!

Let me share a little story about our secret weapon that keeps Elizabeth COMPLETELY HAPPY in the car! It's this magical invention called the "my pod" or "my mp3"--or, as Elizabeth calls it "ABCs"--that is made by the folks at Parents' magazine. It plays 14 different nursery rhymes that she can change herself with a touch of a button! The songs are catchy little tunes sung by children with British accents...and most are songs anyone would recognize, like the alphabet song or her new current favorite "me shout"--er, "I'm a Little Teapot"...go ahead--sing through it once to yourself and you'll see why she calls it that!) And, as you can see, she totally digs it!

A couple of weeks ago, though, we had a near tragedy on our hands when it looked like ABCs had BROKEN! Daddy even cleverly changed the batteries (usually the most obvious solution to "fixing" any toddler toy these days!)...but it still didn't work! So, since she asks for ABCs EVERY time we get in the car, Mommy found herself on a quest to find a replacement! Should be easy enough, right? I mean, after all...they sell it at TARGET! Or...so Mommy thought! After different trips to multiple Target locations, searching it out online, and even enlisting the help of Grammy to scour her local Target stores in Houston, we soon discovered that the nursery rhymes version has been replaced by the new and improved CLASSICAL MUSIC version! OH NO!!!! And, mind you, I have nothing against classical music...but when your toddler wants to hear ABCs and Me Shout, then Beethoven's 5th Symphony simply will not do! ;-)

So, after even more super-sleuthing, I was able to locate ONE store on the internet that carried this "must-have" toy--and went to put it in the "shopping cart" only to find that I was blocked from navigating to the checkout page! AAAAAAHHHHH!!!!! Alas, if you are still reading this, then you deserve some reward for sticking with me through this long, drawn-out, Peter-like telling of this story to find out what happens, so I will end the suspense now by reassuring you that, in fact, it does have a happy ending! It turns out that the internet store that was selling the mymp3 is located HERE in Los Angeles! So I simply called them and had them reserve one for me! The kicker is...on the morning we were set to go get it, Elizabeth picks up her "broken" one, clicks away at the buttons, and all of a sudden...it's playing music again as if it were brand new! UGH! But, not willing to take any chances, I trekked down to the Kidsland store on Wilshire and Western and bought my "back-up" mp3...so now we are armed and ready if tragedy strikes twice!