First a word about iPhones.
Believe it or not, I had to be dragged kicking and screaming into the computer age. In the last ten years I have gone from swearing I will never give up my IBM Selectric II typewriter to being on the edge of a nervous breakdown when my iPhone didn’t work. Coming from someone who once mourned the extinction of carbon paper, thanks to Big Xerox, no one is more surprised about my addiction to technology than I.
I didn’t always have a Smart Phone. In fact, just like I was with personal computers, I was one of the last holdouts to upgrade to an all-in-one pocket device that could manage my crazy life at the touch of a screen. I used to shake my head every time I received an email with the little caveat at the bottom stating, “Sent from my iPhone.” I wondered what was wrong with a person who couldn’t wait until he got back to his desk to read his freaking email. Sadly, I am now that person. And I have nobody to blame but my son.
If you think I’m a technology freak, you have never met my son. Like any other member of Generation Y, Jacob was born with a mouse in his hand. He never knew a world without computers, remote controls, digital media and MTV. As far as technology brands go, Apple is to Jacob’s generation what Tab was to mine. (Surely you remember Tab, don’t you?) From his very first iPod, to his iPhone, to his iPad, to his iMac, Jacob has become an Apple junkie. All of his iGadgets are interconnected and he is connected to all of them, all the time. Whenever I need him, I only have to call, text or email and he responds within minutes 24/7. He laughs when I call him iJacob, but the truth is if Apple ever invents a product that can connect directly to the user’s brain with a keypad implanted on one’s forearm, Jacob will probably be the first in line to buy it. Speaking of waiting in line, these twenty-somethings think nothing of camping out in front of an Apple store for days as soon as a new product is announced just so they’ll be the first on the block to bring it home. I will never go there. The last time I waited in line for anything was to meet Alan Jackson at Fan Fest in Nashville back in 1994. I didn’t get to take him home but it was worth the wait.
Anyway, Jacob is the one who insisted I get an iPhone a few years ago. I finally broke down just to make him happy and he was infinitely more excited than I was. Of course, it took me several weeks to figure out how to dial someone who wasn’t already in my phone book. (Hint for iPhone newbies: There’s a hard to find key pad icon, but it’s there, trust me.) Once I finally got used to my iPhone and learned all its features, it is now officially my Most Important Gadget, second only to the wide screen monitor on my desktop computer that I can actually read without squinting. Still, the iPhone has become a lifeline to me. Not to mention a time saver! Once I figured out how to use the GPS, I stopped getting lost all the time. Too bad my iPhone can’t drive my car. Maybe one day…
Imagine my horror yesterday morning when my iPhone stopped working! I was in panic mode all day long until I finally got to the Apple store where an Apple Geek (older than me!) clicked a few buttons and got me up and running again. I was so freaking relieved I almost fainted. My husband had to guide me out of the mall so I wouldn’t bump into anyone while I focused intently on the gadget in my palm and reconnected to the world. Whew! Virtual reality at last!
I guess I am now officially a technology junkie. Thanks, Jacob.
Now, on to the iDiots.
Over in North Miami, things are really jumping again. As I reported last night in The Marie Antoinette of North Miami, Councilwoman Marie Steril is doing her part to hold on to North Miami’s reigning title of Most Corrupt City in Miami-Dade County. (Sorry, Hialeah and Opa-locka. You both lost out again this year.) Upon reviewing yesterday’s Miami Herald article again, it occurred to me that Madam Steril really has absolutely no excuse whatsoever for claiming she didn’t know that she had to make a full disclosure about her mother buying a city-owned property. Don’t forget, the City of North Miami hosted an Ethics Workshop just this past April, led by the executive director of the Miami-Dade Commission on Ethics and Public Trust. Did Marie not learn anything from that workshop? Or did she not bother to show up? Either way, any elected official worth his or her salt would inherently know to ask questions BEFORE they do something that may or may not be ethical. In Steril’s case, I find it ludicrous that she had no idea she was doing anything wrong by not disclosing that she helped her mother buy a North Miami city-owned home with the help of the U.S. Department of Housing and Urban Development. If she claims she didn’t know the rules, she has no business being a councilwoman. Plain and simple! If the director of North Miami’s Community and Planning Development claims ignorance as well, she should lose her job.
If this scandal weren’t bad enough, Councilman Scott Galvin sent out a newsletter today confirming that there was a bona fide offer from Tom’s Truck Sales to purchase North Miami’s unneeded garbage trucks and other equipment for the sum of $107,500.00, which offer WAS NEVER BROUGHT TO THE COUNCIL!
Councilman Galvin is understandably upset that someone on the city’s “staff” withheld this information from the Council, especially when the Council was considering DONATING this equipment to Haiti. Mr. Galvin should investigate this and find out who is behind this deliberate deception.
Is anyone else seeing a pattern here? The deliberate withholding of pertinent information by some elected officials and city employees in order to gouge taxpayers and benefit a few individuals is now becoming a commonplace epidemic in North Miami. Who is running that city anyway? Oh, yeah. Hand picked Andre Pierre crony, Stephen Johnson. You know, the former Chief of Police who helped Pierre illegally rig his office with surveillance cameras and produce fake police badges for all of Pierre’s other cronies. Never mind – asked and answered.
I have never seen such a collection of incompetent and unscrupulous people in my life. Seriously, folks, North Miami citizens have to get out and vote some honest and ethical people into office next May, or you can expect more of the same. There is no excuse for voter apathy or ignorance when you’re footing the bill for the screw ups of the idiots in office and the people they hire.
It’s almost a full time job keeping up with and reporting about the corruption in North Miami. Good thing my iPhone is working!
Stephanie Kienzle
“Spreading the Wealth”
