Die-Pod: My Commuter Well-Being is in Serious Jeopardy

It was like reverse karma.

I was hustling down the stairs at Grand Central to catch the 6 train this morning. A woman of undetermined nationality, subway map in hand, asked a woman in front of me for help. Fearing the subway was about to leave, the commuter brushed past the tourist without so much as a word. The tourist through her hands skyward in frustration upon this reaffirmation of the Ugly American stereotype.

I was right behind, so I offered up my help. The woman smiled and I hit Pause on my iPod (the Libertines’ debut album, if you’re scoring at home, before Pete Doherty became tabloid fodder). I helped her find the 4-5 to Bowling Green (“uh, it’s right there”) and we were on our way.

I hit the 6 platform and slid my finger into my pocket to un-Pause the iPod.

Nothing.

I tried it again.

Nothing.

Mind you, my iPod is my first line of defense in my daily commuter wars. It’s more important than good reading material like the Times, Nick Hornby’s latest, even AMNY. It’s more important than the Bose headphones. It’s the fountain from which all Metro-North relaxation flows (or at least trickles).

And now, my little lifeline-in-20 Megs was racing through tracks like an iPod shuffle after 841 Red Bulls: “The Man Who Would Be King,” “Music When the Lights Go Out,” “Narcissist.” Ripping through entire albums in, oh, six seconds, with nary a note reaching my ‘phones.

The 6 pulled up. I shut the thing off and turned it on, tried shuffle mode. “D is For Dangerous” by the Arctic Monkeys, a live “Love Over Gold” by Dire Straits, “Town With No Cheer” by Tom Waits.  

No cheer, indeed–it took all of 10 seconds to tear through 30 tracks. And still, not a peep of sound.

Good Lord.

Will tomorrow’s commute see me plug my cassette Walkman (a big, honkin’ Toshiba circa 1992) into my Bose cans? What ever would that sound like?

Who’s had this problem and can offer some sort of light in the proverbial tunnel?