For anyone who is following the progress of my affair with Shuffle, I wanted to let you know that he is in full Valentine week woo. Saturday, when faced with the grueling task of completing my long run on the dreadmill, he showed up with the musical equivalent of my favorite flowers. This is beyond a feat–my favorite flowers are Peonies and orange blossoms–rare and American exotic, extremely hard to buy.

One by one, he flung musical gems at my feet–Scott H Biram, Spoon, The Thompson Twins. . . he reved me up with some White Stripes and flipped the switch right to a little Ray Charles then twisted it in a little with a Roger Miller to Social Distortion to Yellow Card mix up. Seven miles flew by. Really, they didn’t, but they were at least bearable. There were even a couple of times when his surprising song gifts made me bark out a loud laugh or shout out a chorus–my son came to check that I hadn’t fallen off the treadmill, no, I was singing along, not crying out in agony.

I swear, he way laying it on so well Saturday, I was more than a little worried about today. I needed to squish six miles into a crowded schedule and, on top of having caught a serious case of the ennui, there was another inch of snow on the ground this morning so I had to run inside AGAIN.

Mortified, I grudgingly put my shoes on and pushed “start.” I was SO sure that he would be yet another disappointment in this day that I queued up season three of Arrow on Netflix as back up. I would rather run to music, but when bad music happens, it ruins my workout mojo faster than a shin splint so I have to plan for all eventualities. . . and. . . it was a pound of Neuhaus Chocolate truffles wrapped in vintage paper and topped with a stack of bars from Rogue Chocolatiers in Three Rivers. Warming me up with Drew Holcom’s American Beauty, he made me smile. Then, the second I upped the ante on speed, he matched me beat for beat with Cowboy Mouth, Eminem and Ryan Bingham. When I started to wane and glance at the clock (The trouble with treadmill running is that, you really can quit at any time. If you are on the road, you still have to get home so you might as well finish up.) he sprinkled me with Aretha, The Waitresses and Phoenix. Just when I thought I would pretend to pee then hang it up, he kept me to my goal with Muse covering Nina Simone, Incubus and the Hives. . . . and it was all sooooooo smoooooooth.

While I desperately love my husband, I must say, I AM enjoying this little flirtation with an electronic device.