There are a million reviews of Apple’s new AirPods on the web, so this is not one of those. I have however been so impressed by mine that I just had to write about it. And why you ask? Well I feel like this is the first time in a long while that an Apple product has genuinely wowed me and exceeded my expectations. Everything from how small they are, how easy they are to pair (just open the lid) how well everything they do works, wow, just, wow. The feature where it pauses when you remove one? Works 100%. Instantly connecting to my iPhone when I take them out and put them in my ears? Works 100%. Battery life is great, charging them in the carry case is just genius. This is Apple at their very best, it feels, dammit I’m about to say it: magical.

I think the reason all of the above makes me so happy is that this is what it used to feel like to be an Apple user. Every new product was a chance to experience just a little bit more of that crack like magic. Of course it would always break occasionally (like when my laptop pretended like my AirPods didn’t exist until I signed out of iCloud and back in) but you were always willing to forgive the occasional glitches because the experience as a whole was so good.

Lastly, and really importantly they also pass a pretty high bar in my household: the Michelle Test.

I occasionally joke (lovingly of course) that I married my biggest critic, but it’s true in a nice way. I trust Michelle to give me feedback no one else would. The second she saw the AirPods in my ears she just laughed. And rightly so, right now it does feel goofy wearing them. So it was rather poetic that when she opened her xmas presents, among them was her very own pair of AirPods which she reluctantly concedes are pretty good. I caught her a few times just opening and closing the lid of the case, watching the little card go up and down on her phone each time she did.

So hats off to Apple for bringing some of that elegance and charm to their product line that wowed me back in the early 2000’s. I hope there’s more where that came from.