Finally, a little non-Expo-related subject matter to cleanse the palate, so to speak: remember how we, your friendly neighborhood AtAT staff, were subjected to the lurking psychological horrors of severe AirPort withdrawal last May? Suddenly we woke up one fateful morning to discover our AirPort Base Station wasn't responding, and when we went to take a look at it, it was constantly resetting itself in a most upsetting manner-- particularly upsetting, we might add, because that lovely lump of misbehaving silver plastic was just out of warranty. D'oh!

Well, luckily we discovered that the AppleCare coverage we bought for our iBook includes "associated peripherals" like the AirPort Base Station, so we were able to get our defective unit switched out for no cost in just a couple of days. However, we discovered that a lot (and we mean a lot) of people were experiencing similar problems; evidently a capacitor or two in many Base Stations just decide to fry after about a year's worth of use. People who owned an affected unit that was out of warranty or not covered by AppleCare suddenly found themselves in possession of a funky $299 silver blinking paperweight. Despite the fact that the problem appeared to stem from a design flaw, Apple refused to fix out-of-warranty Base Stations... well, unless people complained really loudly.

Good news, though; that policy appears to have changed. Now, according to MacNN, instead of screaming yourself hoarse, you can have an infinitely-resetting Base Station replaced simply by calling (800) APL-CARE and describing your symptoms. And if you own a Base Station with a serial number ranging from "PW940XXXXXXX to PW952XXXXXXX" and so far it's still working fine, just wait-- based on what we're hearing, it's just a matter of time. So keep that number handy, kids, and when your unit fails, you're be back up and surfing wirelessly in no time.

Incidentally, we happen to AirPortless now, as well, seeing as we're currently producing the show roughly 250 miles outside of our Base Station's advertised 150-foot range. Unsurprisingly, we can't seem to get a signal. However, being in New York, we're conveniently located less than three blocks from the local methadone clinic, and that's making the necessity of being tethered to the wall with a phone cord a whole lot easier to bear. (Trust us, it's much easier to type when you're not shaking uncontrollably and trying to get invisible bugs off your skin.)