“MOM! BETHANY WON’T LET ME PLAY DOODLE JUMP!”
“Play your own games, Bradley. And let your sister finish her homework.”
Bradley kicked at the banister railing at the top of the stairs and stomped off to his room, flung himself onto his bed. So unfair, he fumed. Bethany gets all the cool games. Bethany gets to have an iPhone 4 and all I get is a stupid iPod touch which doesn’t even have a Retina Display or a three-axis solid-state gyroscope. Bradley had a tendency to memorize WWDC keynotes.
He kicked off his sneakers and stared at the wall, frustration turning acid in his mouth. If only his dad hadn’t used Restrictions to disable purchases on his iPod. If only he hadn’t gotten in trouble for buying that thousand-dollar “I Am Rich” app two years ago when Tony from across the street had dared him to. If only Doodle Jump were free. So many if-onlies.
Wait. Bradley sat up straight, his nine-year-old mind just clutching at the edge of an idea. A moment later he was down the hall, banging on Bethany’s door.
“I already said no, Bradley. Go away.”
“I’m scared.”
There was a pause, then he heard his sister getting up and walking to the door. A moment later she was looking down at him. “What are you scared of, Bradley?”
“I’m scared that Mom and Dad are going to die someday.”
She sighed and rolled her eyes, but she opened the door all the way. “Come sit down.” He ran in and climbed onto her desk chair. His legs dangled.
“What brought this on?” she asked, sitting on the bed.
He glanced over her desk, noticing the open math book and the iPhone next to it, running what looked like PCalc. “I dunno. I was just thinking about stuff, and remember how Mr. Pauletti had that scuba diving accident last year and now Tony doesn’t have a dad? I don’t want that to happen to us.”
His sister looked at the floor. Uh oh. I went too far. “Well, Mr. Pauletti wasn’t being careful, remember? He antagonized that stingray. Everybody knows you’re not supposed to antagonize stingrays. Dad taught us that at the aquarium, remember? So you don’t have to worry about him.”
“I guess.” He looked over at Bethany’s iPhone again. On TV the good guy always waits for just the right moment to grab the bad guy’s gun and bend his arm behind his back. But how does he know when it’s the right moment?
“And Mom is never going to let him go scuba diving anyway. Not now.”
“But what if Mom dies?” He pulled the chair a little closer to the desk.
“Mom’s not going to die.”
“But she might, and then there won’t be anyone to tell Dad that he shouldn’t go scuba—”
“MOM’S NOT GOING TO DIE, OKAY?” Bethany was crying. When did she start crying? She buried her face in her sleeve.
Now.
Bradley pounced on the iPhone and fled the room, earbuds trailing behind him, barely noticing his sister’s startled yelp. He made it back to his own room and locked the door just in time.
“BRADLEY! OPEN THIS DOOR!” She was still crying as she pounded.
Quickly he turned his attention to the purloined iPhone 4, taking only a moment to marvel for the dozenth time at the precision of its construction. Steve was right: it’s just like an old Leica camera. Home key, App Store, Search. Come on… there it is. Write A Review.
“BRADLEY! I’M NOT KIDDING!”
His thumbs danced across the onscreen keyboard, paying no attention to spelling — there was AutoCorrect for that — or proper capitalization. This was his one chance. “Make it count,” he said aloud as he typed out the exclamation point, the question mark, the second exclamation point, the second question mark, the third, the fourth, the fifth. No. That’s too many. Backspace. Just right.
The hallway was quiet. Had she given up? He listened for a moment, then heard what he had feared: two pairs of footsteps coming up the stairs. Bethany’s and… Mom’s? Worse: Dad’s. Oh no.
He had just enough time to add a postscript. But there was still something missing. Of course: a cute animal emoji. But which one?
The footsteps rounded the landing. They were almost at his door. No time to choose. All of them.
He heard the doorknob rattle, followed by a muffled swear. Then a scraping sound, which must have been his father feeling for the emergency key they kept on the molding above the door.
Octopus. Fish. The key sliding into the keyhole. Another fish. Whale. A soft click. Dolphin. Send.
It was done.
The door flew open. The rage was plain in his father’s eyes. Shaking, Bradley handed over Bethany’s iPhone. The door closed again. He was alone.
Whatever punishment was coming, it could never be as awful as the silence that preceded it.
But this time, he didn’t mind. In a few days, Doodle Jump will be free.
And so will I.
humoring the rain away (via copenhagencyclechic.com)
Beeth> Girls are like internet domain names, the ones I like are already taken.
honx> well, you can stil get one from a strange country
currently obsessed with scott walker’s “Jackie”
And if one day I should become
A singer with a Spanish bum
Who sings for women of great virtue
I’d sing to them with a guitar
I borrowed from a coffee bar
Well, what you don’t know doesn’t hurt you
My name would be Antonio
And all my bridges I would burn
And when I gave them some they’d know
I’d expect something in return
I’d have to get drunk every night
And talk about virility
With some old grandmama
That might be decked out like a christmas tree
And though pink elephants I’d see
Though I’d be drunk as I could be
Still I would sing my song to me
About the time they called me “Jacky”
If I could be for only an hour
If I could be for an hour every day
If I could be for just one little hour
Cute in a stupid ass way
And if I joined the social whirl
Became procurer of young girls
Then i would have my own bordellos
My record would be number one
And I’d sell records by the ton
All sung by many other fellows
My name would then be handsome Jack
And I’d sell boats of opium
Whisky that came from Twickenham
Authentic queers
And phony virgins
If I had banks on every finger
A finger in every country
And every country ruled by me
I’d still know where I’d want to be
Locked up inside my opium den
Surrounded by some china men
I’d sing the song that I sang then
About the time they called me “Jacky”
If I could be for only an hour
If I could be for an hour every day
If I could be for just one little hour
Cute in a stupid ass way
Now, tell me, wouldn’t it be nice
That if one day in paradise
I’d sing for all the ladies up there
And they would sing along with me
And we be so happy there to be
Cos’ down below is really nowhere
My name would then be Junipher
Then I would know where I was going
And then I would become all knowing
My beard so very long and flowing
If I became deaf, dumb and blind
Because I pitied all mankind
And broke my heart to make things right
I know that every single night
When my angelic work was through
The angels and the Devil too
Would sing my childhood song to me
About the time they called me “Jacky”
If I could be for only an hour
If I could be for an hour every day
If I could be for just one little hour
Cute in a stupid ass way
There is something really evil about taking thousands of the world’s smartest young people and using them to sell online text ads more efficiently.
—Fake Steve on Google and their use of the worlds’ smartest and brightest. (via David Karp) (via buzzandersen)
apple nostalgia circa 1989
just encoded the hidden audio tracks on Apple’s first Developer cd “Phil & Dave’s Excellent CD”, after seeing a flickr request from Michael McCracken. Play here: http://developer.muxtape.com/. Oh so dated… and yet I still enjoy the Formula One track after all this time. Has the power to bring out a special coding monster in the listener.
I came into possession of this cd from a Canadian fan of my freeware control strip modules back in 1995. Best present EVER in the mail. Thanks, whoever you are!
To attack the pedals may be strenuous over the short run, but is an expression of trust in one’s own powers, for with the bicycle everything depends on the self. Those who wish to control their own lives and move beyond existence as mere clients and consumers — those people ride a bike.
—Wolfgang Sachs
