Apple (but not that kind)

I hope everyone had a lovely Holiday, welcome back to blog-town!

I couldn't write about this before Christmas, because it involves a gift for That Guy. He needed the new operating system version for his computer, so I had to go to the Apple store.

Back before I was a Mac Owner, I felt awkward going to the Apple store, because I was hiding a dark secret: I was a PC. Now, I still feel awkward, but for different reasons. Whenever there, you are surrounded by employees who know more about computers than you could ever need to, and technology so advanced you are afraid to touch it lest you get your grimy, unwashed fingers all over the shiny surfaces.

There are easily more employees (color-coded by department) than customers in the store at all times, and since there aren't enough customers to occupy them all, they tend to huddle in groups of two or three, probably talking about geek things like iPhone apps and Steve Jobs.

The required software was easy enough to find, so I also browsed iPod cases. What a huge selection! And every single case I looked at was $24.99. Sounds steep, but I was pleased to see that Apple uses the same price-point strategy as the Dollar store.

I made my way over to the central table to find out if there is some sort of checkout line. The guy there asked "Cash or charge?" I said charge, and he proceeded to ring me up right where we were standing. Right there, with his iPhone. He even swiped my card on it. Holy cow, it was crazy. I must be getting used to going there because the strangeness of this didn't even hit me till days later. I worry that there is a guy at the Apple store with my credit card number on a cell phone, and the computer savvy to use it stealthily. Maybe I should stop calling them geeks.