I woke up more or less on time, got to work more or less on time, got some stuff more or less done, and went home more or less at the end of the day (more, in this case).
Around 3:00 PM I went with an expedition of co-workers over to CambridgeSide Galleria to hit up the Apple Store; I needed to pick up my (brother's) computer. Apple was pretty cool about the whole thing - the battery was borked and potentially hazardous (there was a recall), and the logic board in the machine was, apparently, dead. The computer is out of it's 3 year warranty, and I don't have Apple Care.
They replaced the battery and did repairs on the machine, all for free.
That's right: free.
I hear that Apple is trying really hard to get some sort of award for customer satisfaction, and I'll be damned if they didn't satisfy me with that one. They got me - that could have cost hundreds and hundreds o' smackers, but they did the whole thing gratis. Awesome. Hooray Apple!
After work, lugging around two laptops, two power bricks, and whatever else, I headed back to the mall to find myself a keyboard. This whole external monitor thing at home doesn't really work all that well unless you can set the computer to the side. Unless you want to get a crick in your neck, that tends to require an external keyboard as well. I started out by heading to Best Buy to look around there. They didn't really have anything outside of the Apple keyboards which I've always been kinda leery of. They seem... too... low profile. Because of that, and the fact that they didn't have any of them out for me to try, I decided to head back to the Apple Store for the second (2nd) time today.
To get from Best Buy to the rest of the mall, you have to go up their escalator and exit on the second floor (why, I don't have a clue - it's not really straightforward). So after a few moments, I found myself descending an escalator into the mall. As I'm heading down, I see this little boy staring up the escalator nervously, standing at the bottom. He even goes so far as to whine a little and turn away.
When I get to the bottom, I look around... and there's just plain nobody with him. He was perhaps 4. I look around some more, keeping an eye on him. Nobody.
He starts to wander a bit.
Swell.
Now, being a young, tall, scary male with a big bag, scarf, and coat, I decide that perhaps I should enlist someone a bit less imposing to help figure out where this kid's family was. Catching the eye of one of the girls working in one of the center aisle booth things, I ask her, "Hey, have you seen this kid with anybody?"
She, being a nice, short, unimposing young lady, comes out of her booth and asks our young vagabond where his parents are. He shies away from her (I wouldn't have had a chance), and I tell her I'm going to go back up the escalator really quick to see if there's some mother up there freaking out about her lost child.
Eventually the two of us end up bringing the kid over to a plainclothes mall security/administration dude, who, after the kid tries to run away from him, hoists him up practically on his shoulder and starts to parade him back the way we came.
Suddenly, mom shows up. "Oohh! There you are!! Thank goodness!" she says, grabbing the kid unceremoniously out of our chivalrous security dude's arms. She then begins to berate what appears to be her sister, saying, "You were supposed to watch him!"
As we walk off, she thanks the security dude. He and I exchange a nod. Booth girl goes back to her skin care products. I head round the way to the Apple Store.
I'm now a proud owner of one of those little, understated Mac keyboards. It has a cord, and a number pad. It has a delete key. It feels, all told, almost identical to the keyboard on my laptop. It cost roughly $50, including the Apple Tax. Still cheaper, I think, than Logitech boards for about $60-90. It is indeed small, and takes up very little room. As Worf would say, "Delicious."
Delicious.
So, little keyboard, meet your new family: Daddy 30" UltraSharp monitor, momma 15" MacBook Pro, and cousin Axiom 61 Midi Keyboard.
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