Best the Tourists Won't Be Stopped

The Wall Street Bull has been fenced off as it is an obvious target of the Occupy Wallstreet protestors (I'm serious) but this inconvenience won't stop the Italian tourists from getting the keepsake photographs they came to New York to get, no matter how many tour busses nearly run them over.

This chucklehead on the left was desperate to get his picture with the bull's rear.  He breached the perimeter and paced nervously while his friend scouted the cop situation in front (the situation: lots of cops) before retreating to a more legally sanctioned position.

I would have loved to have seen that guy tackled and billy clubbed for trying to get his picture with the bull's balls.

Best Well . . .

My happiest Apple memories are from when Steve Jobs wasn't even with the company. Mainly I'm talking about my surprise gifting of a PowerBook 520c Christmas 2004 (wish I could find that picture somewhere).

Man, I look at pictures of that old laptop and just feel too much love. I don't think any Apple device ever made anyone happier, and the only thing its screen did when you touched it was get blurry.

But there was that time in 2003 when I was at the few-days-old Pasadena Apple Store and Mr. Jobs was there, having a look around. I asked one of the Apple Store workers "Is that Steve Jobs?" and they said "Yes." I stared and stared. Black turtleneck, blue jeans, water bottle.

So it goes.

My Apple timeline (including family computers):

Macintosh Plus, 1986
Macintosh SE, 1987 or 88
Macintosh 520c, 1995
Some LC or something that we had at home when I got off my mission ???-2000 (we couldn't have had an SE for 12 years though, right? There must have been something else. But all during High School I had the Plus in my room and used it for everything)
G3 Desktop, 1998-2003
Family got an iMac, 2000
Titanium PowerBook, 2001-2006
Family got that iMac that looked like a lamp, 2003 or so
Owen's PowerBook while he was on his mission, 2006-2008
MacBookPro--the redesign, 2008
Family got a hot iMac, 2010

Let the record show, we were Macintosh OGs.

Best Right in the Middle of the Action

Have you heard of the #occupywallstreet protestors?  The leaderless mass of protestors who encamped on Broadway last week to protest the personhood of corporations . . . and every other cause that comes to mind?  Saturday they took their cause on the road and marched up to Union Square, where I happened to be.

Everything was so calm at first . . .



Then, with the sound of beating drums, the #occupywallstreeters began to arrive via University Place, clearly a ship without a rudder, unsure if it was going to stop at Union Square or what it was going to do when it got there.

Perhaps it did, but someone taught you to draw fists well.

Certain Union Square'rs remained unphased by the whole thing.

And certain Union Square figures just assumed it was a party.

So the protestors formed a central mass for a while, shouted things for a while, and danced the Hokey Pokey.  (I am serious)

Chalk was quickly deployed in a very anti-establishment manner.

This guy actually kept a pretty good beat.

After a bit the marchers were ready to go somewhere else.  They headed for Broadway at first, where there was a street fair at the time, which would have clearly resulted in a stampede/total disaster/complete cluster bomb (so, you know, a little worse than a normal NYC street fair) but the cops cut them off and saved everyones lives . . . and tackled their first few protestors who couldn't believe their right to assemble would be impeded in such a way as to protect other people or their property.

Not mannequins, spectators.

So the marchers headed back down University or something and everything got back to normal in Union Square.  Nice and normal.





Later on I ran into a large procession of another sort on my way home.  I liked this one better.

Best Okay, Okay, I'll Get an iPhone. And Join Twitter.

Hey, remember that earthquake we had today?  I know, it already seems like that was so long ago.  Still, I can't help but want to share my earthquake story.  If you live here, it's probably very similar to your story.

I was in the bathroom when the earthquake happened.

And I wondered to myself, for a split second that I barely noticed, "Am I on a boat?"

When I came out of the bathroom all my coworkers were leaving the office.  I wondered, at first, for a split second, if it was someone's birthday.  And then I wondered, second, for a split second, if they had all finally had enough.  They told me that the office had been shaking and they were getting out of there.  So I followed.

We passed someone in the hall as they were saying ". . . same thing happened in DC."  So I walk down 13 stories worth of stairs wondering "What sort of same thing?"

Out on the street the sidewalks are filling and everyone is on their phones to find out what has happened.  There's a mystery period where no one can make any calls, send or receive texts, or get online--and during this mystery period a Department of Homeland Security van zooms down Broadway, followed by police and a firetruck.  Slowly our wireless providers begin to provide and the news surfaces that there has been an earthquake.  Either in Colorado or Virginia.  No, the guy saying that it was in Colorado is reading yesterday's news.  The earthquake was in Virginia.  A 5.8?  That's big, right?  I am jealous of the people with internet phones, I don't like having to overhear the news.  Patricia, who works nextdoor to me, found me.  So did my former coworker Dino.  So there were happy reunions while we waited it out, whatever exactly "it" was.

Here the story kind of just fizzles . . . after maybe thirty minutes we're told it's okay to go back in the building, but we can go home if we want.  Won't get paid if I go home and they've stopped the subway for the time being, so I'll go back to work.

And I did.