The battery in my MacBook Pro gave up the ghost.

It had been behaving strangely for a few weeks, for example making ridiculous claims such as there was an hour’s worth of charge remaining after the laptop had been on AC power all day. The machine had even plain switched itself off a few times while on battery power. I put this down to the battery needing calibration and resolved to recalibrate it At Some Point.

Then on Saturday I put the Mac down on my desk and found that something didn’t sit quite right. Desks are usually flat. The underside of laptops are usually flat. It stands to reason, therefore, that a laptop placed on a desk should not wobble. Mine did.

Turning the machine upside down revealed the problem: the battery had become so hot it had physically deformed and is now, suffice to say, quite useless.

Of course the machine would be exactly a month out of warranty. I’ve ordered a new battery from eBay rather than spend the £99 Apple want to buy direct from them but it still comes in at an eye-watering £68 with P+P.

I really need someone to catburgle his way into my flat and steal, destroy or otherwise mess up my MacBook Pro so I can get a new one on my insurance. Having the only original Core Duo amongst my Mac-owning friends is somewhat depressing. The downside of early adoption.