Revelations

I went to the Apple Store today. It wasn't my first venture there. I went last year to get new headphones. This time, however, I was fraught with doubt. I had to go to the "Genius Bar" to have my computer inspected. Poor ol' Captain MacCromber... we've been through some tough times together. Lately his mouse-pad has been making disconcerting cracking noises every time I click it. Sometimes he won't turn on again after I've put him to sleep. Since I am going back to school soon and I have a lot riding on a functional computer this semester (read: thesis), I wanted to double check it.

There were two big concerns.

First, as a TACer home from break, I don't feel confident of my ability to fit into society. It always takes some... adjustments. I have to learn to stop talking about potency and actuality and start talking about iPads and politics. Walking into the store was like walking into a nightmare. It was like society overload: everything about it was foreign. There was wi-fi, wireless keyboards, people with earbuds, not enough clothes, and all in a hurry to go places and do things. I backed against a wall and waited for my turn at the Genius Bar. I didn't know what to expect. And I HATE not knowing what to expect.

Second, I was under a bit of a misapprehension. I thought that at a Genius Bar, all people had to be geniuses. You know... like an officer's club on a military base. The patrons are the officers. But I'm not a genius. Especially with Macs. I grew up on PCs. I can explain problems with a PC using moderately technical jargon. Macs make me feel like a blithering idiot.

Thankfully, this issue was clarified for me. They were supposed to be the geniuses. Ooooooooh. It's ok if I'm dumb. That's good. I can deal with being accepted as dumb by the strange, geeky men at the bar.

When my turn came, the man ran some diagnostics and got me all set up.

I didn't say anything dumb, I didn't lose my powers of speech, and I didn't fall off of my stool. I can function in normal society. Score.

The monetary damage was less than I feared and I had my computer back within a couple of hours. Score.

And the employee wasn't a strange, geeky man. Well, maybe on the inside. On the outside he was pretty cute. Score.