_Dear Friends,_

Happy Chanukah! Grace got out my Mom’s menorah and lit some candles but it is sure different being down here heading into the holidays in the sun rather than snow. I do get to watch the winter in Vermont via the webcams, but it is not quite the same as hanging out with the white stuff all around. I am not complaining, for sure.

With some extended hours and some great values, all of our retail stores are ready to help with your holiday shopping whether it is time for a new “*Mac*”:http://www.smalldog.com/Macs or an “*iPad*”:http://www.smalldog.com/iPads or some “*Beats headphones.*”:http://www.smalldog.com/category/Beats_by_Dr._Dre We are in the middle of our “Be Safe for the Holidays” campaign where we are giving $15 to Prevent Child Abuse Vermont for each hard drive or Apple Time Capsule sold. I can not think of a better gift than a data backup solution for that special someone on your list. I know we have talked many times about how important it is to back up your data. Too many times people come in with failed hard drives and we hate the look on their face when we give the bad news that data was lost. Hard drives fail, it is just physics. In most cases, if you are using a traditional disk hard drive that is spinning at anywhere up to 10,000 rpm you are relying upon bearings and other mechanical components to protect your precious photos, writing and files.

Need a quick gift for five of your favorite friends? This week’s Kibbles & Bytes special is a 5-pack of Chill Pill Speakers. This is a great stocking stuffer and we are offering a buy one get one promotion now but exclusively for Kibbles & Bytes readers we have a B2G3 promo! You get five Chill Pills for only $79.98! That’s a $200 value!

“*See this great deal here!*”:http://www.smalldog.com/wag900001673

Kibbles & Bytes will be taking a break next week and return on January 2nd with my predictions for the new year and a review of my crystal ball for 2014. But for this week let’s do a quick recap of the Apple year in review for 2014…

__We’ve asked a few of our employees what their favorite gifts are this season – either to get or to give, of course – and we have highlighted a few of the best!__

*Don,* __President and Top Dog:__
!>http://blog.smalldog.com/images/4178.jpg!
* The Nest smart thermostat is a great holiday gift! I use them in my home and am saving money daily as the Nest learns my habits, turns the heat (or AC) down when I am away and back up when I get home. It learns that I like it cool when I sleep and warm in the morning. It reduces your carbon footprint by only providing heat or cooling when you need it. While it is super easy to install and operate, Small Dog Electronics can come to your home to help with the installation, too! The Nest thermostat is a thoughtful gift and keeps giving.

*Hapy,* __President and CFO:__
!>http://blog.smalldog.com/images/4176.jpg!
* I would recommend the “*EZQuest battery backup charger*”:http://www.smalldog.com/product/85602/ezquest-volt-9000mah-2-1-amp-dual-usb-battery-charger-silver for iPhone and iPad (and most other USB devices). This sleek battery can charge your iPhone and your iPad at the same time if needed, and can store multiple charges. Never be left without a charge on your phone ever again! This has saved my bacon numerous times. Be sure to purchase an extra lightning cable to go with it (the “*6-inch Belkin cable*”:http://www.smalldog.com/product/83704 is ideal).

!http://blog.smalldog.com/images/4180.jpg!
* This year we added the Sonos line to our offering and I picked up a few speakers for my house and they are awesome! If you’re not familiar, Sonos is wireless speaker system that you connect through your wireless network that allows you to stream music to any room in your house from an iPad, iPhone, computer, and more. You can have reggae in the kitchen, jazz in the den, and blues jamming in the garage. It allows you to access your music streaming services like iTunes, Pandora, Spotify, and Rhapsody as well as giving you access to radio stations around the world. If you’re like me and have a large music collection stored on an external drive you can access all that music as well. The best thing about Sonos is not the speakers themselves, but the app and how simply it brings all your music into one simple control panel. If you like the idea of using this app and already have a nice speaker setup, you can add the Sonos connect which connects your existing stereo system to your Wi-Fi network. Available for purchase in our retail stores only.

*Will,* __Product Manager:__
!>http://blog.smalldog.com/images/4177.jpg!
* My favorite product this Christmas to gift is the “*Goal Zero Torch 250,*”:http://www.smalldog.com/wag900001638 which is simply great for anyone who spends their winter in VT. It is a flashlight and floodlight, a backup battery, and includes a solar panel for recharging if the sun were ever to shine through. We’ve already had gnarly driving conditions and power outages…and it is only December. The best is yet to come! This is a great backup to have in the car, at home, or in your -Y2K-…-Mayan cataclysm-…zombie apocalypse shelter. 

!http://blog.smalldog.com/images/4185.png!
* I had a well-loved pair of “*Urbanears Medis*”:http://www.smalldog.com/search?search=urbanears+medis that finally succumbed to years of wear and tear that I’d love to have replaced. Not only was the sound quality exceptional, and the design simple, but they were very comfortable. I’ve tried numerous in-ear headphones over the years and the ones that fit into your ear canal become uncomfortable after a short period of time and most that just “sit” in your ear tend to fall out of mine. The Medis are unique in that they have special “EarClick” technology (replaceable rubber pieces) that hold it at rest–sort of suspended–in your ear and it can’t fall out. Better yet, since most people’s ears aren’t all the same size or necessarily symmetrical, they come with a few differently sized sets of the rubber bits so you can customize them for comfort in your ears. An added bonus for comfort and audio quality is that the cords are wrapped in cloth. You’re probably thinking, “Audio quality?!”. Yes, there’s a fair amount of vibration transmitted along headphone cords that interferes with what you hear, but that is absorbed and muted by the cloth.

*Jim,* __Phone and Web Sales__

!

h2. For more holiday gift ideas and specials, visit “*smalldog.com/macthehalls*”:http://www.smalldog.com/macthehalls/holiday-2014-sale or come into one of our “*retail stores.*”:http://www.smalldog.com/retail/visit-us-in-store-at-any-of-our-locations Our South Burlington store is offering “extended hours”:http://www.smalldog.com/burlington/macs-ipods-iphone-gear-apple-service-in-burlington-vermont now through Christmas eve.

h2. No matter what you’re getting or giving this holiday season, be sure to share it with family and friends!

Charitable giving is an integral part of our business, and we believe that helping our community is especially important during the holidays. We also believe that every person has a right to be safe for the holidays. That is why this holiday season, from December 17th through December 24th, when you purchase any external hard drive at one of our “*retail stores*”:http://www.smalldog.com/retail/visit-us-in-store-at-any-of-our-locations, we will donate $15 to Prevent Child Abuse Vermont. While it is sometimes difficult to compete with the big box stores solely on price, we do feel that we can compete effectively by being contributing and involved members of our communities.

We are thrilled to partner with “*Prevent Child Abuse of Vermont*”:http://www.pcavt.org to ensure that they do what they do best – help those in need. And isn’t that what the holiday season is really all about?

For a few weeks now, I’ve been hearing faint sounds of Christmas music coming through the ceiling in the IT room here at Small Dog HQ. I mumbled some humbuggeries as I headed up the stairs to see what all this was about. As it turns out our new marketeer, “*Rachel,*”:http://blog.smalldog.com/authors/rachelnarkewicz is a pretty big fan of Christmas and has been playing Christmas music since at least the beginning of December. Through a furrowed brow I made some comments about “kids these days” before returning to my ground level lair to scheme against Christmas and joy in general.

Back at my desk, I opened Safari to begin composing a sternly worded email to management outlining why I felt happiness and joy among employees in the workplace was inappropriate. When Safari opened though, it immediately jumped to “*santatracker.google.com*”:https://santatracker.google.com instead of my usual homepage of “*http://www.starshiptroopers.net*”:http://www.starshiptroopers.net. As I tried to figure out what sorcery had taken place for santatracker.google.com to usurp the coveted designation as __my__ homepage I started to hear cute little noises coming from the page.

Ok, maybe I could take a few minutes and look around before getting on to my email. The animations and sounds were pretty cute after all. As I moved the mouse around, I noticed some of the things on the page were interactive. One of the icons looked like a fan. Clicking on it brought up a little animation of what looked like a blowdryer blowing air at a reindeer on a platform in some kind of elf test lab. Below were controls to click on that changed the speed of the air. A tiny smirk crept onto my face; this was pretty neat. That email still needed to be sent though.

Clicking back I was once again greeted with the cute animations and sounds of this little elf world. There appeared to be many other games, animations and links. There was even a countdown showing when Santa would be making his delivery run. I could only imagine what cute animations that would have!

Before I knew it I had all but forgotten about sending the anti-joy email to management. The Santa Tracker was just too much fun. It was around this time that I felt a sharp pain in my face. Reaching my hand up and expecting to find a gash or inexplicable bruise I found my mouth was contorted into a weird shape that was unfamiliar to me. Opening a new tab in Safari, I entered a description of my symptom into google. The first result was a wikipedia page about “*__smiling__.*”:http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Smile It said that “Among humans, smiling is an expression denoting pleasure, sociability, happiness, or amusement.” My last visit to the physician had indeed confirmed I was human. Was I experiencing this expression of “happiness” and “amusement”?

Eventually, I had to conclude that I was. Maybe Rachel wasn’t so bad after all, and maybe, __just maybe__, happiness and joy among employees in the workplace __was__ acceptable. Maybe it could even be encouraged. All this change of heart wouldn’t have come about without the simple, cute and fun Santa Tracker at “*santatracker.google.com.*”:https://santatracker.google.com

*January*

* Apple announces the strongest ever quarterly earnings with $13.1 billion profit on $57.6 billion in sales
* It was the seventh anniversary of the iPhone and the thirtieth anniversary of the Mac

*February*

* Mac Pro did not ship
* Lots of rumors about iPhones and Apple Watch

*March*

* Apple announces CarPlay iOS vehicle integration
* Apple launches 8GB iPhone 5c
* Apple sells its 500 millionth iPhone
* Microsoft releases iOS Office Apps
* World’s first Apple reseller, FirstTech, closes after 73 years in business 🙁

*April*

* Apple now accepts all products for recycling at retail stores
* Angela Ahrendts joins Apple
* Apple updates the MacBook Air line with faster Haswell processors and a price drop
* Apple beats estimates with $10.2 billion profit on sales of $45.6 billion
* Apple announces 7-for-1 stock split

*May*

* Apple acquires Beats

*June*

* Apple announces iOS 8
* Apple announces OS X Yosemite
* Apple unveils Swift, a new Xcode programming language
* Apple introduces HomeKit and HealthKit
* Apple announces iCloud Drive
* Apple refreshes iPod touch

*July*

* Apple announces new partnership with IBM for enterprise apps
* Apple reports $7.7 billion profit on $37.4 billion in sales

*August*

* Summertime and the living is easy

*September*

* Apple announces iPhone 6 and iPhone 6 Plus
* Apple launches iOS 8
* Apple announces Apple Pay
* Apple announces Apple Watch

*October*

* Apple’s Sapphire partner GT Advanced Technologies files for bankruptcy
* Apple announces iPad Mini 3
* Apple announces new Mac Mini
* Apple announces iPad Air 2
* Apple announces 27-inch iMac with 5k Retina display
* Apple releases Mac OSX 10.10 Yosemite
* Apple reports $8.5 billion profit on $42.1 billion in sales
* Apple discontinues the iPod classic

*November*

* Apple sells a ton of iPhones!

*December*

* Everyone is buying Apple products for the holidays
* Apple wins iPod DRM case