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Once upon a time, a lovely and thoughtful wife bought her husband a used iPhone 3G as an upgrade to his luddite-esque phone. She didn't know that they couldn't use the phone with their tyrannical carrier. What a bore. So, the phone sat. It sat and sat and sat. Then one day, the couple had a child, and this child became overly obsessed with the shiny new LG phones in the household. She loved to touch the screen and see pictures of herself, but her favorite activity was to throw the shiny new phones onto the cold hard hardwood hard floors. Did I mention the floor was hard and unforgiving? This frightened the child's parents. Taking the phones away from the toddler caused the child to emit screams so loud that the father's only escape was to drink. Gin. Lots of gin and cheap beer. This only exacerbated the situation. The days and weeks following were dark days. Grimdark. Gray, murky muddy days of woe. Edgar Allen Poe stuff.
One morning the child's father opened his desk drawer looking for his hidden stash of booze for he had to hide his drinking these days. And, there it was! An iPhone box! It sat in the drawer in a tangled viper nest of usb cables and a grab-bag of tech paraphernalia. The sleek black box looked down-right sexy with its inviting icons and ivory font. Their prayers had finally been answered! This device would serve as surrogate to the device-devouring toddler. Surely, it would satiate her hunger. With a smile and sparkle in his eye, the father delicately opened the satisfyingly heavy box. He actually gasped when touched the sleek phone. The messianic device was cool and smooth. He connected the umbilical cord between laptop and newfound savior. Oh the apps he would install! Glorious apps like PBS Kids and, and he could sync Disney movies and Yo Gabba Gabba episodes! Hours of blissful entertainment! Oh joy! Oh rapture!
The phone’s screen lit up with the comforting Apple logo. It reassured the man that all was going to be okay now. He was finally home after being lost at sea. The man sat smiling while the devices interfaced in an exchange of bits and bytes. He hadn’t smiled in days. It really was going to be okay.
The father in his haste fired up iTunes and ignorantly clicked “Update”. Oh dear reader the devastation that followed was, well, devastating. We’re talking Biblical ruination - Job and sackcloths and gnashing of teeth. The phone’s display showed only a USB cord and the iTunes logo. It was in a loop of despair. The man desperately watched Youtube videos and scoured tech forums, but to no avail. No patch, no script, no app helped alleviate the pain. It was futile. Hope was gone. It is folly after all to have hope.