Kirk Hiner's

"When thinking differently just isn't different enough."

Mind the Mac

By Kirk Hiner

I don't believe in reincarnation, which is somewhat out of character for me because I usually believe in everything until its proven to me it doesn't exist. It's not that the concept of reincarnation seems illogical or unappealing, but rather that people who do believe in it generally have somewhat bloated egos. Why is it when people speak of past lives, they were always Cleopatra or Abraham Lincoln? No one was ever Judas Iscariot, Vlad the Impaler or Gus Smith—a barber who lived on 555 Whatever Street, had three kids and a wife named Martha, and died peacefully at the ripe old age of 82.

That being said, if I have lived a past life, I must've lived in the United Kingdom.

From the 10th through the 20th of June, I spent my honeymoon in the country that gave us The Beatles, Benny Hill and spotted dick; six nights in London, England, three in Llandudno, Wales. The two locations proved for quite a stark contrast, but both were equally fascinating. Llandudno is a small resort town at the base of the Great Orme, and it's pretty much for the elderly, we learned (coffee shops that close at 9 p.m.?). It's also near Snowdonia, which provides the most beautiful countryside one could ever hope to see—provided one doesn't have an unhealthy distaste for sheep and rhododendrons. London, on the other hand, is...well, as the newly named Tieraney Hiner put it, "London's like New York, only with character."

My apologies to New Yorkers, of course. I lived in the city for five years, and I loved it. This is one of the reasons I get so geared up for the Macworld Expo in July each year. And although I would choose London over the two, I spoke to many Brits who would happily take New York. The thing about New York, though, is the city blew it. With the constant desire to develop and destroy, New York (or at least Manhattan) has wiped out nearly all of its amazing past. To see the history and character of London, one needs to only turn a corner into any alley. To see the heart and character of New York, one needs to buy a history book.

But okay, you're probably wondering, "Kirk, what in St. John's Wood does this have to do with the Macintosh?" Well, to be honest, just me. For as Anne Bolyn said as she laid her head upon the block, "You can take the man away from the Macintosh, but you can't take the Macintosh out of the man." It's odd, I suppose that most people return from London with Beefeater key chains and "Mind the Gap" t-shirts, yet I returned with thoughts of Apple Computer and a package of Rowntrees. (These candies were suggested to me after I said to the cashier, "I was told to get something sweet and suckable." Here immediate response was, "Oh, you mean from the sweets tray?" You have to love British wit.)

Long before requesting the candy, Tieraney requested I not conduct interviews with English gaming companies such as Feral Interactive while on our honeymoon, so I didn't try to set them up. It wasn't a hard sell for her; I greatly enjoyed nearly two weeks away from a computer screen. I didn't miss designing websites, I didn't miss writing articles, and I didn't even miss playing games. When a man has The London Dungeon and Harlech Castle at his disposal, he tends to forget about DHTML and Centipede.

Yet, even in a foreign land (I chose the U.K. for our honeymoon because I wanted to impress Tieraney with my mastery of the language), I wasn't without fond thoughts of Apple Computer. There was nary a station of the London Underground that wasn't flanked with iBook posters; "Your life, to go." How true. It is my life, and I am on the go. But I was just riding the Tube, not getting some air with a skateboard like the kid on the iBook screen. Was this a tie-in with Aspyr's Tony Hawk Pro Skater 2, or had Apple just chosen an odd demographic at which to focus their marketing...British skateboarders? Either way, even in London, I had to fight the urge to run to the nearest computer store to buy one. That whole voltage compatibility issue precluded the purchase, so I instead used the money to sleep indoors.

I was occasionally surprised to discover Macs at work in unexpected places. For instance, did you know that the hydraulics of the Tower Bridge are powered by a single iMac? That's because they're not; I just made that up. But it's easy to find iMacs at work at The National Gallery. This only makes sense, though; if I'm going into an art museum to find a Cezanne, I should be able to pull up the location on the computer that inspired him (just play along).

And hey, how about in my favorite store, Tower Records? If there was one factor prolonging my escape from New York back in '97, it was the extra nine hours it would take to get from Ohio to Tower Records. Thank the Lord for the internet, right? In fact, Tieraney and I almost registered for wedding gifts at Tower, or at least I almost did. I sometimes confuse our ideas with just mine, which is why I was so surprised when Tieraney freaked out at the tarantula "we" agreed to purchase.

Nonetheless, the Tower Records at Piccadilly Circus boasted rows of iMacs. It amused me that I could fly to London to visit an actual "brick and mortar" Tower store just to shop at their website, but there was no need to. Not only did they have the Tom Jones' "Reload" CD in stock, but they also gave Puffy their own section! No more miscellaneous P in World Music: Asia: Japan. "Cake is Love," girls!

Of course, to the people of London, none of these Macintosh sightings are news. Ads are ads and computers are computers. Perhaps it's just my American arrogance that provokes such a reaction; "What?! Ya mean they got them thar 'pewters here in Europe, too?" In fact, if I were to make an analogy, I'd have to say that...no, I won't do it. I was about to say that England is the Macintosh of civilization, while America is the Windows, but I won't suggest that. Pretty much every analogy is fallible, after all, and I'm not about open up that debate. Next thing you know we'll have Germans claiming Amiga, the Australians and Japanese arguing over Linux, and no doubt the French won't be happy with BeOS, so forget it.

Although the honeymoon was splendid and I was never once for want of something to do, I did wish I hadn't sold my PowerBook so I could've used it on the airplane. Airlines always show the most godawful movies ("Miss Congeniality" both there and back? I booked round trip to London, not hell), so an iBook and the DVD for "O Brother, Where Art Thou?" would have proven quite handy. I could have also set up iMovie like that annoying guy from the Apple commercial, and blasted the even more annoying, "Who Let the Dogs Out" to wake up the lady who—after three gin and tonics and a sleeping pill—passed out on my shoulder.

And hey, I wonder if anyone has ever loaded Fly! on a PowerBook and followed the flight he's actually on. Had I done so, I would've at least made sure I had enough gas. I'm not in any way afraid of flying, but when the pilot comes over the speakers and says, "Okay, ladies and gentlemen, here's what we're going to do..." it is a bit nerve wracking. Yeah, I already know what we're going to do. We're going to keep flying until it's time to land, then we're going to land. If anything else is going to happen in there, I don't want to hear about it. Ends up, though, we didn't have enough gas to get to Cleveland and had to refuel in Montreal. My theory is that the pilots were lying about the gas, and instead just wanted to pull over for a Mountain Dew and some beef jerky. I do the same on long trips.

But now I'm safely back in these United States, trying to devise a scheme that will allow me to live England (I prefer Wales, but Tieraney will consent to London only because, "The food's better"). Will Applelinks pay in pounds sterling? Does Dynamics Online want an international branch? Is Macworld UK hiring? Doubtful. I guess I'll just have to hope I'm born there in my next life.

Oh, wait, I don't believe in reincarnation. Not in this life, anyway.

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