The Church of Apple

Even though I am a diehard atheist, I recently went to church.
The Church of Apple that is.

apple-logoEach time I need guidance, I visit one of its houses of worship. They are all brightly decorated and cheerily invite you to enter.
Unlike traditional churches, there are no statues of angels or saints inside and one does not feel intimidated by their surroundings.
There is just a simple icon at the door (the Apple) that many faithful kiss upon entering.

The church puts you subtly in a festive mood and you can almost feel the strings of your purse loosening up as your enter the temple.

When burdened by problems, I indeed go to the Church of Apple to seek solace and I am always greeted like an old friend, not like a sinner.
And I am never asked to confess or repent.
What is troubling you? they gently ask, and like a patient on a shrink’s couch I let it all out.

Numerous young clergymen are there, eager to commune with you. Since they are allowed to marry there is no shortage of them, and to my utter delight they speak a clear sounding English devoid of any Punjabi accent.

In all those churches there is an altar/desk populated by angels of mercy that Apple call “geniuses”.
All these angels have a direct line to God. They carry various electronic devices that allow them to talk directly to the Big Guy and you feel good knowing that he knows what’s troubling you.

Regardless of the time or the day, and in stark contrast with a Microsoft store located a block away the church is always teaming with people.

But it was not always like this.
For a long time I was fed at the breast of the Microsoft Holy Church.
I followed its scriptures (and updates) and was a faithful follower of its gospel.

This was a dark time for the Church of Apple and it was on the brink of bankruptcy.
It was the Second Coming of Steve Jobs that resurrected the church’s flagging fortune and made me convert to the Teachings of Jobs.

By all accounts, the late Steve Jobs was a mercurial bully who was feared and loathed by many; but he had a vision of what the Church of Apple should be and he ruthlessly went about implementing his doctrine. While he was at the helm he took no prisoners and walked on corpses.

Most of his employees were scared of him but they respected his leadership.
Sometimes it takes a captain Bligh to bring a listing ship to calmer waters and Steve Jobs did this.

Thanks to him, the Church of Apple is now “insanely” prosperous and is still attracting new devotees every single day.
I am one of them.

Pax vobiscum my friends!

Alain

 

A Christmas story – Part 3

On the eve of a highly publicized tournament, Bill Zeebut suggested that to secure a victory, Marcel ought to slightly “incapacitate” one of his main challengers.
Maybe trip him to bruise one of his legs or arrange a little car accident. Nothing serious mind you… just a little fender-bender to shake his confidence…

BelzebuthMarcel who desperately wanted to win this tournament toyed briefly with the idea. After all, he had not been asked to kill somebody, just to scare him a little.
It is done everyday… in business, in politics, in the affairs of the heart…
It is common practice… it’s no big deal…

But the idea still bothered him. He was glad to be successful, to be recognized as a good player, but it seemed to him that people were not as friendly as they used to be.
Everybody seemed tense and hostile.

Ultimately Marcel decided that he couldn’t harm anybody. He would just play his best and leave the rest to fate. He had after all become a good player and could win this event on his own.

The day of tournament, to the surprise of many he started to play very erratically. His boules went all over the field.
Desperate to score, he tried to mind-control his balls, but they seemed strangely unresponsive.
In spite of repeated urgent messages, they were now following a capricious course, often swerving away from the cochonnet.

He went into a cold sweat realizing that he was losing control of the situation.  Suddenly he recognized Bill Zeebut among the spectators. The man was smiling malevolently.
Marcel understood right away that Bill was punishing him for disregarding his instructions.

He tried to concentrate on the game and regain control of the situation but to no avail. And the worst he played, the broader Bill’s smile became.
Marcel grew very angry. As he was getting ready to shoot, he saw Bill Zeebut at the opposite end of the field, still grinning.
He threw his boule with the despair of a man firing his last javelin.

He saw the ball moving in slow motion toward its target, and beyond that he also caught sight of the smirk of his former benefactor.
Suddenly filled with a murderous rage, he summoned his waning powers and ordered his boule to strike that evil grinning bastard.
The boule seemed to hesitate…
“Hit him, hit him” moaned an exhausted Marcel.

The boule regained momentum and sped toward Bill Zeebut.
A few seconds before impact, Bill suddenly vaporized leaving in his place a small sulfurous cloud.
Strangely few people noticed his disappearance.

Marcel lost the tournament by a wide margin.
After this, he never heard from Bill Zeebut again.

He now wins very few games but he has regained the friendship of his peers and his wife has stopped sulking and is cooking for him again.
Even his kids are now (sparingly) talking to him.

He is looking forward to Christmas and can even joke about his losing streak.

Moral of the story:

“The problem with winning the rat race is (that after winning) you are still a rat.”
Lily Tomlin

Alain

Joyeux Noël et Bonne Année a tous!

 

A Christmas story – Part 2

Marcel walked slowly home and went to sleep without dinner. His wife asked him if he was sick but he was too unsettled to even notice her.

The following Saturday he went to the pétanque field and got into a game. He played poorly and was widely off the mark.

On the second game, he resolved to try Bill’s screwy suggestion.
When he saw his boule curving away from the cochonnet, he closed his eyes and thought hard “left, left”… To his surprise, the boule immediately altered its course and moved toward the left.
This is amazing he thought.

As he kept playing, his mind-controlled shots became more and more accurate until most his boules came to rest within an inch of the cochonnet.
His companions were amazed.
Marcel just smiled, good-naturedly.

And this went on for a few weeks. Marcel had now become a respected pointer.
He had not heard from Bill for some time and wondered once in a while what became of him, but it was just a fleeting thought.

meliesOne day, as he was crossing the street, he saw an older woman in front of him stumble and fall to the ground.
His first impulse was to lend her a hand, but he thought that he heard Bill’s voice urging him to do nothing. Against his better judgment but mindful of his mentor’s advice, he continued walking without looking back.
He felt a little uncomfortable but rationalized that Bill certainly knew better.

In the meantime his game improved significantly.
He tried his hand at shooting and after a while he became quite good at it. Like an air traffic controller he carefully monitored the flight of his boules and with incremental corrections he managed to hit his targets eighty percent of the time.
To his great satisfaction, he became known as a “decent shooter”.

But with increasing success, his mood seemed to change.
The humble, easygoing Marcel vanished.
Following Bill’s endless suggestions he became arrogant and quarrelsome.
He grew gradually aware of this but he felt too indebted to Bill to change his behavior.

One day, Bill urged him to cheat to insure a victory.
Reluctantly, but driven by hubris, Marcel discreetly pushed a boule forward to secure an extra point. And this became a habit.
But little by little a rumor started to spread. Marcel was a cheater! He had to be watched!

To go from bad to worse, things on the home front started to unravel. Out of the blue his usually amiable wife started to balk and his children to rebel.
Marcel noticed but could not resolve to stray from Bill’s pernicious guidance.
Everything has a price he told himself, and to continue winning he was willing to put up with a few minor aggravations.

To be continued…