Thursday, March 15, 2012

Genius Is Right

Debbie bought me a new iPhone. It's the one with Siri ... the smartest female on the planet.

Because I wanted to get the maximum benefits from Siri, I visited the Apple store last week. I also wanted to know why only 688 songs downloaded to my computer when I had over 1000 songs on my old phone.

I found out that in order to talk to a 21 year old computer "Genius" I needed to make an appointment and then wait another hour until my name was called. There are 50 or so geniuses there to answer your questions and most of us customers are not quite sure where to go ... or how someone is going to find us among the hoards of lost customers wandering aimlessly around the store.

Josh found me. He was my own personal genius.

"How did you do it ... find me, that is?" I asked.

"Take a look. This is what they wrote when you checked in." He showed me his iPad and next to my name was a brief description: Tallish, stocky build, tan slacks, glasses, blue tie.

"Would it hurt to just say, Brad Pitt look-alike?"

"Sorry, Mr. Pitt. What can I do for you?"

I told him about my iTunes problem, asked him about Siri and tried not to appear too stupid. I'm sure it didn't work. But Josh was very patient, willing and able to answer all my questions.

I was very impressed with his knowledge.

"So how long have you worked here?" I asked.

"About 3 years."

"You must like it."

"I do. It's really a second job for me. I have another career."

"Really." I said "And what is that?"

"I make balloon animals."

Balloon animals .... THAT was his career? Apple was his second job? I tried very hard not to laugh when he explained further.

"I have been doing balloon animals since I was 14 years old. Started in a restaurant and made $100 plus tips. I got busy so I trained a friend of mine to cover another restaurant. He didn't know about the $100 so I kept that and he made tips."

"So you two are still in business together?"

"Yep ... and some other guys."

"You have some more restaurants?"

"Yes. We are now in 20,000 restaurants in the US. We are linked by computer and schedule other independent balloon animal contractors for a percentage of the fees."

"Oh ... very .... nice." I stood there with my mouth open ... thoughts of giraffes and balloon headgear flashing through my mind. Who would have thought that balloon animals could be a whole flippin' syndicate?

'Genius' is right.  

++++++++++++++++++++++++++





We are packing up for a trip to Nashville tomorrow. It's Round two of the NCAA Tournament and another shot in the history books for USF Basketball. Stay tuned.

3 comments:

A Daft Scots Lass said...

I HATE Siri. Have you seen the Big Bang Theory episode where Raj falls in love with her?

joel said...

@Gillian ... I asked Siri if she dates anyone and she said "I have everything I need in the Cloud".

joel said...

@Gillian ... I asked Siri if she dates anyone and she said "I have everything I need in the Cloud".

Ballad of the Big Prostate

Here’s a little country tune I wrote just yesterday to commemorate a dark day in my history. I don’t have a tune but realized you can use an...