So pretty much every website and blog under the sun is making top 10 lists of 2008. So I thought I would do the same. My top 10 lists include, Top 10 Free Software, Top 10 Firefox Plug-ins, Top 10 Websites. So without much further ado (is that spelled right?) here are my top ten. Hit the Jump to see the lists

I awoke this morning expecting a snowstorm, to still be sick and New Years Eve. What I didn’t expect was my Zune to suddenly stop working. It has been noticed all across the country and even across the world that Zune 30GB are restarting and freezing at the loading screens. In my sick like state I first thought that I was dreaming because I hadn’t used my Zune in a couple of days. So I got mine off my desk and sure enough its frozen on the loading screen. Plugging it in does nothing, doing a hard reset does nothing as well. Some people are suggesting to take it apart, disconnect the batter and then reconnect it and it will work. This however is a temporary fix and it will break as soon as you try and sync it with your computer.

The lines to Zune support seem to be full and the wait is of an hour or more. A lot of people are just getting a case number and then being told to call back within 3-24 hours. The support line is 1-877-438-9863.

It seems that the main problem maybe that this year is a leap year and that the Zune is expecting it to be January 1st 2009. However it is December 31st 2008 so it keeps resetting itself or is confused and freezes. People are suggesting to set your computer clock to January 2ed 2009 and then plugging it in. However I tried this and it didn’t work. The reason? The Zune is still frozen on the boot up screen so it won’t make it to the sync screen and won’t realize its connected to a computer. How true is all this leap year reasoning? I have no idea but it seems logical to me, although I am still stick and a little “out there.” My suggestion? Go back to sleep and wake up and hope that its fixed. As of right now there is no solution from Microsoft about the Zune. Hopefully this will change within the next couple of hours. My suggestion to Microsoft on how to fix this problem and keep everybody happy? Send all Zune 30GB users a free 80 GB Zune. That or give away 25 free song downloads and 2 free movie downloads. I would take either of those very happily.

Edit: Here is Microsoft’s first response to it:

We are aware that customers with the Zune 30GB are experiencing issues with their Zune device. We are actively working now to isolate the issue and develop a solution to address it. We will keep customers informed on next steps via the support page on zune.net (zune.net/support).

UPDATE:

Microsoft has come out and said that the issue is the internal clock and that all issues will be resolved over the next 24 hours. No need to open up your Zune or anything just wait it out. Response here.

[Via Gizmodo, Zune.net]

President Bush received a new pair of shoes today. However he was in Iraq so they had to air mail them directly to him. Classic. Where are all the Secret Service Agents? I hope that they are protecting President Elect Obama. [via CNN]

Bush has declared a State of Emergency for Northern Massachusetts for the ice storm. On Friday Gov. Deval Patrick declared a statewide State of Emergency on Friday. There are still 108,000 people without power. This storm is much bigger then I had first assumed. I do have to say that when looking around town there doesn’t seem to be that much damaged to house or to cars. I also haven’t heard of any injuries related to storm so there is some good. There is supposed to be another storm hitting Monday through Wednesday. They are predicting mostly rain so hopefully there won’t be any more damage.

UPDATE:Since posting this I have been around town and seen some of the damage and its not good. Our part of town probably got hit the least there are parts of town still without power. There are also parts of town where you are running over power lines and times when you have to drive on the opposite side of the road because trees and branches are still blocking the road.

As some of you may or may not know, last night/ this morning we got hit with an ice storm. We ended up losing power 12 times and the longest being about 3 hours. All through the night I could hear branches and trees cracking and falling over. This morning I woke up to see the damage and it wasn’t good. We have a tree down across our driveway and plenty of smaller branches and tops of trees down in our backyard. There is probably about half and inch of ice in the backyard on the ground just from it falling off of the trees. Thousands are without power and my parents are going to work at the CERT shelter to assist people who need a warm place to stay. Thanks to my mom and Jay Bowman for the pictures. [Slideshow here and here more pictures here.] Full gallery of pictures here.