In which I spend most of the day in front of the computer.

Today I woke up hungry at the ass-crack of dawn, but I stayed in bed until nine or so rockin’ out to tuneage on the beloved iPod. I made eggs and toast and coffee for breakfast when I finally got up. Then I plugged in my external hard drive enclosure, and began the process of putting my iTunes library back together.

I’ve been using SharePod to add content to my iPod since I left Iowa last September, so what’s on my iPod no longer matches the backup I have.

I couldn’t find my old library .xml file, so I had to import all the tracks into iTunes and right now it’s updating album art. When it’s done, I’ll import all the tracks I’ve got on the laptop, then the six gigs of music from Jayrob, and then the video content I have.

Then I’ll spend all evening massaging files, editing tags and shit, and finally I’ll export my playlists off the iPod itself and into iTunes. Once all of THAT is done, I’ll be able to sync my iPod for the first time in over four months… a process that will probably take half the damn night since iTunes will decide the relationship is new and re-write the entire drive.

Long story short? If you’ve got an MP3 library bigger than a few gigs, back it up. Now. Any way you can. Srsly. This is a pain in the arse.

In other news, I’ve decided to attend the first-annual Global Blogger Meetup in DC in March. So far, only three bloggers are actually slated to attend, but that’s all good because it means I get to call dibs on Vuboq’s couch without anyone arguing with me. (I’d prefer the guest room, of course, but Only Me’s already got it, the quasi-Aussie git.)

Vuboq says there will be a chili night on Sunday – I offered to make veggie chili if needed! – and maybe Monday Afternoon Margaritas the next day since I’m dying for the spinach enchiladas and liquid cheese he’s always blogging about. Then on St. Pat’s Day we’ll all go get trashed in honor of Vuboq’s birthday.

Airline tickets are $359 right now, so with vigilant surfing I should be able to find something under $300 and be able to take a reasonable amount of cash along. It’s a lot of damn flying for a 3-day vacation, but what the hell. I do, after all, have both an eBook reader and a kitting bag to stave off boredom, and I’ve already decided 2008 should be a Year Of Travel for me. DC in March, Seattle in June, and NY in September!

Now all I have to do is convince my employer to give me all that time off.