You know, if there's one big drawback to pretty much never sleeping it's that, if you happen to get a hankering for a new iPod at 3:30 in the morning, there really isn't any place to go buy one. Well, actually, maybe in New York there is-- it is the city that never sleeps, after all-- but here in Massachusetts, forget about it. Geez, until just a decade ago we still had all sorts of crazy Puritan-era "blue laws" on the books making it illegal for stores to stay open past 2:41 PM on any day that ends in "y," so consumer electronics shopping in the wee hours has never really been an option. Many's the night when we were up at ungodly hours thinking, "Gee, it sure would be nice to run out and pick up a new PowerBook or two right about now. And maybe a cherry Slurpee." But could we ever act on that perfectly reasonable and healthy impulse? Noooooooo.

But this Friday night, all that changes-- for a day, at least. When we were first tipped off to this development by faithful viewer Scott a few days ago, we figured he had to have been yanking our chain; an Apple retail store staying open for 24 hours in this state? And to take advantage of an alleged day without sales tax-- here in Taxachusetts? Shyeah, right.

Except that a day or two later we got confirmation from Apple itself, in the form of an emailed invitation to "shop tax free for 24 hours at the Apple Store, Chestnut Hill, the Apple Store, Northshore, and the Apple Store, CambridgeSide." Apparently Massachusetts has done the trendy thing and declared this Saturday to be the state's first ever tax holiday, during which consumers can buy just about anything (under $2500 and for personal use only) without paying our customary 5% sales tax. For stores like Apple's, where even the cheapest Mac purchase gets padded by at least forty clams for taxes, that could really bring in some serious customers-- and so Apple plans to make the most of it by keeping its Massachusetts store open for the entire duration of the tax break.

The upshot, of course, is that bleary-eyed nocturnal beasties like Yours Truly who just happen to live in the vicinity can spend one glorious night shopping for Macs during those wacky hours when every channel's showing infomercials for the Q-Ray Ionized Bracelet and you can't get a pizza delivered to save your life. And we're really hoping to be there, because we're very curious to see just what type of shoppers Apple will witness during those hours; will it just be the insomniacs and workaholics, or will there be a steady stream of plastered clubgoers once the clock strikes two?

See, here in Boston, all the bars shut down at 2 AM (about an hour after the subway stops running-- brilliant), so right then, the streets suddenly fill up with drunk people wandering around looking for someplace to buy more beer. One of us worked the overnight shift at the city's only 24-hour coffeehouse a number of years back, and without fail, once 2 AM rolled around there'd be a sudden influx of customers hoping that "coffee" was a code word for "vodka." Granted, none of the Massachusetts Apple stores is exactly in a plenty-o'-bars location, but we're still curious.

Anyway, the vague plan right now is for an AtAT representative to hit one of the local Apple retail stores-- probably CambridgeSide because it's closest, although Northshore has a simpler parking situation-- at some truly unholy hour this Friday night/Saturday morning, just because we can. We're not expecting to see anyone else there except for hypercaffeinated store staff, but we'll keep you posted about the planned time and location on the off-chance that there's someone out there as sleep-deprived and Apple-obsessive as we happen to be.