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I’m not angry with Apple, any more that I’d fight with the Russians in Ukraine. But I’d fight against the Russians, and I’m feeling angry at Apple.
I was at the Apple Store, in the “mall,” in the late afternoon today. (Called “Chinook Centre”) It’s Tuesday. I knew from my recent visit that you can’t just find a genius with an iPad, at the back of the store, to write you into a queue—that’s only for seeing a genius, not a salesperson. So I waited, ostentatiously facing away from the end of one of the sales tables. How long? By my unostentatious made-in-Switzerland wristwatch, it took a while. I wear a Tissot, “which everyone’s wearing in Hong Kong” not because I shop at Birks Jewellers but because it was given to me by my boss. So I know the precise time: “A while” turned out to be twenty minutes. At least I could use the time to watch all the pretty people passing by.
The salesman called another salesman-techy from behind the genius bar at the back wall… who came out shortly carrying my computer that I had handed over on Friday. Ever notice how you don’t know how angry you are until you hear your own stiff voice? I had walked in today because I still hadn’t been telephoned by Apple. And I had a zoom meeting that night, a meeting that required study of previously e-mailed long manuscripts. On my laptop. Apple had my cell number; they knew they couldn’t e-mail me because, as I told some “genius” on Friday, “You guys have my only e-mail device right there!”
My cool cellular telephone, although it flips up like Captain Kirk’s communicator—how cool is that?— does not receive e-mail. Nor does it do google or data, because there’s no point: Not when I can easily carry around a MacBook Air for all my web needs, while wearing a pack to carry it, even though I am decades past student age, because I live by the Rocky Mountains: We may get four seasons in one day, not to mention a “rocket summer,” also known as a “chinook wind.”
I have learned to use a pack big enough to stuff my parka into so that, during a subzero prairie winter, I can wander through a heated mall, or “centre,” at my leisure without sweating to death.
I don’t know much about technology, but I do know, as I showed the genius, how to check my phone for messages. Clearly there had been no sender, “no such zone.” He told me that he called me once, on that very Tuesday morning, and got a busy signal. I might read science fiction, but for his claim that Apple had phoned me, once, I am as skeptical as a nonfiction scientist. They had been e-mailing me daily since Saturday. I had been told it could take 48 hours to transfer my data. I recited that figure, grimly, thinking maybe the techys don’t have to work Saturdays or Sundays, as I had gone to work on Saturday evening, and Sunday and Monday, being unable to clock in or clock out. My firm has no time clocks or time sheets, everyone is expected to use a cell phone or lug along their desktop computer. Lucky I have a laptop.
I used to be unexposed to how Apple did things in their store, such as slow sales help and not informing folks about their computer being ready. Another word for unexposed is naive. I am no longer naive about Apple.
…
…
Comments about Apple,
or me being away,
while I drink my Snapple, (r)
are A-OK.
Sean Crawford
Calgary
August
2022
NOTES
Rocket Summer was the first short story in Ray Bradbury’s Martian Chronicles. (Link to story criticism) In mid-winter, housewives hasten to put clothes outside on the line.
Late Tuesday Update: Yes, I had time—just barely—to read those e-manuscripts, and I made it to the zoom meeting, albeit sitting small in my chair, without much to say. I simply took notes of what others said, and thought of the zen of critical reading.
Blog notes:
I am writing this so that, as usual, I can post “on the fives” in the morning for my “fans.” The ones in my head, I mean. Feeling responsible to phantom fans is an excellent motivation for regular posting and all the assorted character training benefits of such self discipline.
Tonight I told the zoom gang that I was quitting my blog for a while, “cold turkey” because, as a carpenter who was 100 per cent human according to theologians said, “You can’t serve two masters.” They add he was also 100 per cent divine. I too am only human, so no blogging for a while.
Don’t worry, there are other good blogs to read, and my previous posts too. Comments on previous posts are always welcome. And as the state governor of California, “the governator,” said, “I’ll be back.”
