Weekend Update (Friday Edition): Activation
The picture that I want to run for this entry shows Kathleen and Jean Ruaud in the midst of a twinkling exchange at Le Bateau Ivre, the wine bar in the Pod Hotel. Perhaps Jean will give me permission to run it; maybe he won’t. He does not publish clear pictures of himself at his own blog. So, instead, you’re getting the Yodelling Pickle. Not to mention the Blue Willow mousepad.
But enough about fun and larks; let’s talk about activating our Verizon cellular wireless router. Wireless cellular router? I wouldn’t count on anyone at Verizon knowing what to call it, let me just tell you. Trying to activate the account online, house technician JM ran into a snag, and decided that we’d better call. To me, calling any kind of computer service provider is only marginally more bearable than being tossed into a dark closet for an indefinite term. In the end, JM achieved the activation online, but not before a the woman at FIOS Tech Support to whom we’d been shunted responded indignantly to my taking up her time. If I weren’t superstitious, I’d lodge a complaint. She certainly didn’t know what a MiFi was, and she made it clear that she couldn’t have cared less. Not the clearest speaker in America, she couldn’t be bothered to pronounce “FIOS” clearly enough for me to know whether the acronym began with an “F” or with a “V” — so I asked her to spell it, and that just about blew all her gaskets.
Let’s talk about how “simple” it is to install the new iPod Shuffle. Not interested? Now that I’ve mentioned it, I’m not, either.
Don’t ask me why, but I didn’t expect JM to be here for very long. I thought that the three installations du jour would be as painless as most are, but they were all difficult. A piece of gunk in the Dymo label printer’s feeder caused no end of trouble until it was found. Downloading the latest version of iTunes took preposterously long; indeed, it seemed to have stalled — an unpleasant reminder of the good old days of DOS, when the latest version of Word came on thirteen floppies. And printers never worked.
In any case, I didn’t get much done this afternoon. I was particularly looking forward to my new Friday routine of inventorying and tidying the kitchen. I was going to fry a batch of chicken, and  whip up some cole slaw and potato salad to go with it. I won’t say that I’ll do it tomorrow night, because I’m notorious for taking it easy on Saturdays, once I’ve tidied the apartment. And my “Friday routine” is still pretty aspirational: I’ve done it once.
“What do you mean, Jean’s permission? What about my permission?”