Only two stories tonight

One is health related. The other, technology.

A couple weeks ago I helped a friend, Adam, move to Red Deer. I didn't think anything of it at the time, but while loading furniture, I'd lost my footing on the walkway from his front door, stumbled and ended up on the ground. My end of whatever piece of furniture it was landed square on the outside of my right leg, south of the knee. It turned a bit red, but no harm done, I thought. For the last couple days I've had some significant swelling in that area, and there is a significant lump at the site of impact. The swelling goes down overnight, but the lump remains and the inflammation returns about mid-day. I went to the walk-in clinic at Market Mall tonight preceding my 8:15 appointment at the Apple Store (see the next story) I figured I have a hematoma, except that in my experience, a hematoma generally turns blue like a bruise. According to the doc, this isn't always the case. He figures it may also remain - as in permanently. To be sure, he's ordered an ultrasound. I am to call for an appointment Monday.

If I haven't said it enough, I'm truly impressed with Apple and Everything Mac (as the slogan goes). Even when (rarely) there's a mess up, all it proves is how fabulous the customer service is. Recently a software upgrade for iPhone was released. I tried updating as usual by plugging my phone into my Mac and using iTunes to initiate the upgrade. It did everything it was supposed to: it backed up my current configuration, installed the new software... but hung up reinstalling the backup - all my settings, contacts, playlists etc. All the phone did was proceed through 25% of the reinstallation, then restart and loop. I called the Apple customer service line. Their recommendation was to make an appointment at the Apple Store, which they did for me and confirmed my time. Annie was my service rep for the trouble ticket. She started by re-trying what I had already attempted, cautioning me that we'd likely have to wipe the phone clean and start from scratch. This is, in fact, what we ended up doing. They have an all-powerful service tech version of reinstall that isn't available to the average iTunes user. It cleaned up my phone troubles within about ten minutes and I walked away sporting a Version 4.0.1 iPhone. The best part? For zero dollars. During the trouble-shoot Annie and I yammered on about this, that and the other. Can't remember how we got on the topic of accounting, but it turned into an opportunity for me to refer my accountant Julia to Annie. I think I've raved about Julia in blog posts past, but if not, let me say, she's amazing.

Me an' my lumpy leg are off to dreamland.

Turtle out.