Crabapple

One thing I've learned from the past two weeks using a laptop: much of what I do depends on Adobe Flash.

So today, after logging into the Apple Care, and realizing that their trouble-shooting instructions make as much sense as any help page on the computer, I slipped my new precious in a bag over my shoulder and entered the Apple store at the Rideau Centre, looking as lost and expectant as possible.  This had the desired effect of attracting a blue-shirted guy with a long dangling earring in one ear.  (Okay, it may have been an earpiece; computer stores make me sweaty and anxious.)

I explained to him that I'd had my laptop for two weeks and had been having a lovely time, but I'd tried to download Adobe Flash only to have it ask me for my "administrative password" -- which I don't seem to have, although I do have Apple Care... (Both elder daughter and the Resident Fan Boy had said, "Tell them you have Apple Care.")

So Earring (or Earpiece) Guy took me over to two young men talking to one young lady and told me that "Albert" will help me.
 "Tell him you have Apple Care," he reassured me.
  Albert studiously ignored me for several seconds and then acknowledged me, so I told him my sad story.

"Oh," he said glumly.  "The trouble with that is if I try to set you up with a new password, that will probably wipe out all your programmes."
"I have Apple Care," I offered, hopefully.
"That won't make any difference."

Right.  "So what would you recommend?" I asked, thinking muckle, but not daring to say it.
"Well, let's open it up," he shrugged, leading me to one of the tables.

"There's the puppy," he said.  "What's it doing down there?"  (I'd dragged it out of the way and lined it up with the other icons which had clearly been a bad move -- sorry, buddy...)

After a few clicks, he informed me, "You don't have a password."
No kidding.  "Uh, no.  I don't..."
A couple of more clicks.  "There you go."
"Excuse me?"
"Well, I guess you didn't set a password when you set your profile."  (I didn't set my profile; the Apple guy selling me the computer did.)
"You don't need the password; you just click through."
"Uh, should I get a password?"
Shrug.

 Why is it I always leave an Apple store feeling less intelligent than when I entered?