Meet Gregor.

Gregor is my new MP3 player, a Sansa e250. Generally, I'm satisfied:

• hefty, substantial feel
  
• fairly intuitive controls
  
• FM tuner/recorder and a voice recorder
• expandable memory via a micro-SD socket on the side
• sleek black front and a metallic back
• right price

Price and fragility kept me away from the Nano, despite my love of all things Apple. (Have you heard the horror stories about broken Nano screens?) I'd certainly rather have the biggest harddrive-based iPod with iTunes support, but that's not in my financial picture at the moment. Maybe later. (Maybe sooner. Andrew just bought a 30gb iPod Video with his own money, and I'm already feeling iPod Envy.)

My complaints about Gregor are mostly with computer connectivity. Neither of my Macs recognize him, even though he should appear as just another portable drive. If he did, I would click and drag tunes to the proper folder and be done with it.

Instead, I'm forced to use Windows Media Player 11 to sync Gregor with my music folders on my Dell laptop.

If you've used WMP 11, you might well be laughing and nodding and sputtering "kludge" at this very moment, especially if you allowed it to install "Urge" on your harddrive. (Urge is the brainchild of the MTV networks.)

So, WMP doesn't want to rip my disks. It gives me an error message and refers me to the Microsoft braintrust whose response is "Huh? Never heard of that problem before." Which means that I rip my disks in Win iTunes and tell WMP to search the iTunes folder for new music. You'll be pleased to learn that WMP is smart enough to do that much. I then select the new music, drag it to the "Sync" column on my screen, click on "Sync Now" and (*whew!*) I sit back until I'm told that I can disconnect Gregor. It just shouldn't be so difficult to put music on your music player.

[Aside: soon after I installed WMP 11 and Urge, I began having trouble. The computer took much more time than usual to start up. Services -- like my antivirus software and my wireless network monitor -- were prevented from starting. My problems went away after I uninstalled Urge. Caveat emptor.]

As for Gregor himself, his thumbwheel -- the blue plastic circle -- is awkward. Not unmanageable, and certainly not a showstopper, but not iPod smooth. And that's the only complaint I have with Gregor Sansa.

O.K., one other thing: I have a problem with earbuds. I must have mutant ears because (unlike most other sentient music fans) I spend more time putting them back into my ears than actually listening to music. A set of $15 in-the-ear, over-the-head Sony headphones ended my problem with popping buds.

So, if you see me on the bus, speak loudly. I'll be listening to Gregor.

Update: after two hours of torture making a playlist in WMP11, I investigated why the p.o.s. wouldn't rip my cd's. I had to edit the Windows Registry to allow me to rip at 128 kbps. All better.

Microsoft -- Tweak it and it will work.

I Am Standing at the End of the World.

Come find me, Caithlin De Marrais. I'll be waiting.

Also, check out Rainer Maria's myspace for Life of Leisure, track 2 of Catastrophe Keeps Us Together.

I sortof kept track of Rainer Maria over the last few years. The vocal duet of De Marrais and guitarist Kyle Fischer reminded me a bit of John Doe and Exene Cervenka -- lovely individually but cacaphonic together (to my ears, anyway.) But I always wanted to hear more De Marrais. So I was thrilled with Catastrophe , which is purely Caithlin on vocals, only to find out in December that Rainer Maria had broken up two weeks earlier.

I sincerely hope that De Marrais, Fischer, and (drummer) William Kuehn find suitable arrangements soon. Catastrophe might not have kept them together, but it is one hell of a resume builder. I listen to it daily.

Ypsi Bravery

Thank you to the four school board trustees who withstood hours threats, pleas, and ridicule (not to mention hours of specious logic) to do the right thing. As I said at the meeting, I hoped they would use their power to help the least among us, the invisible minority.

And they did: they voted to end the use of Native Americans as a mascot. Now Ypsilanti is in concordance with recommendations of the Michigan Association of School Boards, the Michigan Department of Education, the U.S. Civil Rights Commission, the U.S. Department of Education, the NCAA, and many other groups.

David, Cameron, Amy and Linda deserve mucho praise for their courage.

Thank you.

More on the Ypsi Braves

Brittany 10 writes:

ok...i'm an ypsi high student, and the board meeting to vote on the name is tomorrow night. in my opinion, why change something that's been there for 62 years? there's nothing wrong with the braves, and we as students feel that it is a sense of pride for our school, and there will be a LOT of unhappy students- and ypsi alumni (many families go back three generations of YHS graduates) if they were to change the brave name. there is NOTHING wrong with our mascot......it's not racism...it's PRIDE.

Hi Brittany. Thanks for writing.

I think that Braves supporters can't wrap their heads around this because they can't see beyond the intent of the nickname. They don't intend racism, therefore the word should not be interpreted that way. The truth is that racism is the effect, regardless of intention. And effect is judged by the people who are offended by it, namely, Native Americans.

It's a very simple concept that requires seeing through the eyes of the offended, or (at the least) accepting them at their word. You can't tell them how to feel about the word any more than I can tell you that you shouldn't feel attached to it.

You say there is nothing wrong with the mascot. Native Americans say there is. By definition, then, "braves" is offensive.

Your other points are quite valid:

• The name has been a tradition for 62 years. But I can think of many bad traditions that lasted much longer than that.
• People will be upset about the loss of the Braves. But that should not stop us from doing the right thing.

Before the Braves, YHS had no mascot. I can't remember what opposing teams called them, but it was something pansy-like. The students retaliated by choosing the least pansy-like name they could think of-- something fearsome and yet noble, the American Indian. Hollywood, and romantic American literature like that of James Fenimore Cooper, created that image of the Brave, the Noble Savage. It was offensive to Native Americans then, and it is offensive now.

Let's not pass on the stereotype -- the racist image of the Native American -- to another generation of Ypsilantians. Let's choose a mascot that all Ypsilantians can be proud of.