a wasted two days

Here's how I'd describe it. 

Suppose you cut your finger.  You go to the hospital to get some care.  The doctor is nice and tries to be helpful but he doesn’t know how to make a stitch.  So he starts troubleshooting.  In the process of troubleshooting he makes some more cuts.  These are deeper. One thing leads to another and you now need a blood transfusion or you will not survive.  More experienced doctors are summoned. Over the course of the next two days, your old blood is siphoned out and slowly and tediously new blood is transferred in. You survive.  You are so grateful and relieved you barely notice that the cut on your finger is still there.

Friday night I spend an hour or so with Katie.  Then it’s Scott from Oregon.  Next comes Kyle from Niagara Falls — he was before dinner.  Surprisingly it is Kyle again from Niagara Falls after dinner, for at least two hours.  All this because I cannot open any folders on my computer if they are in the icon view and arranged by kind.

We try everything, venturing into places I never knew existed. And after leaving each new place my little problem grows bigger. Hours and hours later I am told I need a genius.  The problem that started small is now gigantic.  I can’t open any applications and my computer no longer recognizes me.

So on a glorious sunny spring day, with temperatures hitting 70, I am stuck in an Apple store.  The only solution I’m told is to wipe clean my computer and reinstall the operating system. I want to cry, but I do as I am told.

Five hours later I log on and nothing has changed.

I call and get Sean.  He becomes my savior.  Three hours on the phone Saturday and another three on Sunday.  My mom arrives here for a few days and I can spend no time with her.  I am too immersed in solving my problem with the smart, experienced Sean from Sacramento.

We end up creating a totally new user and individually migrating photos and music and files and contacts and calendars and everything else that makes up my life.  Finally everything works —  except for the folders.  I still can’t open them in the icon view arranged by kind. At this point I don’t care.  I’ll sort them in a different view.  I’m just so happy to be functioning again.